Founders Table

Conversations with founders on building the next great startup
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Conversations with founders on how they got started and concrete lessons and tactics for building your own startup. www.founderstable.co

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    Inventing the Solo CFO with Julian Rowlands

    My guest today is Julian Rowlands, founder of Cashboard, an AI-powered analytics platform built for finance teams. Julian does not have the traditional tech background, growing up the son of a writer and studying history in college before becoming a serial CFO. Julian got into finance after graduating college during the Great Recession. He applied for 100 jobs and got one interview, which resulted in a job offer, making the decision for him. Cashboard started as a pandemic side project. After a year spent validating the idea and talking to CFO's about their pain points, Julian had enough conviction to leave his job and focus on Cashboard full time In today's episode, we talk about: * Cashboard's mission to invent 'the solo CFO' by utilizing AI in financial analytics * focusing on addressing real problems with practical solutions * successful go to market strategies * the role of AI in financial data Where to find Julian: * LinkedIn Closing Questions * advice to current founders: sell before you build - if you can't sell your product, people likely don't love it * when you think of success, who or what comes to mind: having agency and autonomy - Marc Benioff comes to mind as someone that's been able to build a successful company and stay in the drivers seat * how do you recharge: socializing with friends and playing sports like Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu * any recent small investment that has had an outsized impact: travelling to meet customers in person Ask or Offer * ask: please connect on linkedin to talk about finance (mention that FoundersTable sent you) Referenced * Cashboard This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.founderstable.co

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    AI Powered Event Planning with Amy Yan

    Amy Yan is the co-founder of Nowadays, an AI-powered event planning platform. She and her sister launched the startup, leveraging their shared experience in organizing large-scale events as college student body presidents. Prior to founding Nowadays, Amy worked at McKinsey as well as tech giants like Google and Meta. In today's episode, we discuss: * Getting a role as a Boba Barista during the pandemic * Origin story of Nowadays * The competitive landscape of event planning * Go-to-market strategies, conferences, and alumni networks * Setting boundaries when working with family Where to find Amy: * LinkedIn Closing Questions * advice to current founders: startups are an emotional rollercoaster. avoid comparing yourselves with others and focus on your own progress * when you think of success, who or what comes to mind: for products, its simplifying event planning and reducing stress. for the team, its building a vibrant company culture that supports personal development and growth * how do you recharge: spend time outdoors, especially with her pets (a puppy named Rue and a kitten named Tigger). this includes activities like hiking and kayaking as well as dance * any recent small investment that has had an outsized impact: started regular physical therapy due to back issues affecting sleep Ask or Offer * ask: spread the word about nowadays * offer: 50% discount on Nowadays services to all listeners - contact Amy via LinkedIn and mention Founder's Table to redeem the offer Referenced * Nowadays This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.founderstable.co

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    Cloud Native Observability with Martin Mao

    Martin Mao is the founder of Chronosphere, a modern observability platform focused on cloud native architecture and fine grained control of observability data. Mao tried his hand at founding various startups during his college years, including an Australian facebook competitor, before joining big tech and working at companies like Microsoft, AWS, and Uber. At Uber, Mao was the manager of its in house observability team which developed M3, an open source prometheus compatible metrics backend. This is the same backend that powers Chronosphere. In today's episode, we talk about: * early years building an Australian facebook competitor * skipping seed and raising a series A with an 80-page business plan * the challenges of cloud native architectures: more data, more cost, more issues * understanding actual market needs vs theoretical projections * thoughts on AI in observability Where to find Martin: * LinkedIn * Twitter Closing Questions * advice to current founders: Understand your motivations and leverage the founder community for support. * when you think of success, who or what comes to mind: humble founders who recognize the role of luck and don’t claim their approach is the only way. Successful companies are those where former employees look back with pride and joy about their time there * how do you recharge: * any recent small investment that has had an outsized impact: Ask or Offer * ask: Introduction to talented individuals, especially those looking to join a tech company on the go-to-market side or technical side. * offer: If you’re dealing with observability cost or effectiveness problems, Martin would love to chat, although no specific offers like a discount or coupon are provided. Referenced * Chronosphere * M3 This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.founderstable.co

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    Permanently Curing Allergies Direct to Consumer with Aakash Shah

    Aakash Shah is the founder of Wyndly, a startup that helps people permanently fix their allergies from home. Aakash came up with the idea as a result of suffering from allergies during covid19 lockdowns when cooped up at home with his family cats. This led him to co-found Wyndly with his cousin, Dr. Manan Shah, in 2020 as well as go through Y Combinator as part of the W21 batch. Before Wyndly, Aakash worked on growth across a number of startups. In today's episode, we talk about: * how wyndly provides a permanent fix for allergies through allergy immunotherapy * why traditional immunotherapy doesn't work for patients * benefits and challenges of working with family * scaling people and processes * dual challenges of building in healthcare and the consumer market * leveraging AI to do more with a small team Where to find Aakash: * LinkedIn * Website Closing Questions * advice to current founders: avoid distractions and focus on iterating quickly and shorter sprint cycles * when you think of success, who or what comes to mind: doing things that energize you, controlling your time, and building something meaningful with a motivated team * how do you recharge: maintain an identity beyond that of a founder and have hobbies outside of work Ask or Offer * ask: partner with providers to treat your patient's allergies * offer: discounted test kits for listeners who have severe allergies Referenced * Wyndly Aakash Shah is the founder of Wyndly, a startup that helps people permanently fix their allergies from home. Aakash came up with the idea as a result of suffering from allergies during covid19 lockdowns when cooped up at home with his family cats. This led him to co-found Wyndly with his cousin, Dr. Manan Shah, in 2020 as well as go through Y Combinator as part of the W21 batch. Before Wyndly, Aakash worked on growth across a number of startups. In today's episode, we talk about: * how wyndly provides a permanent fix for allergies through allergy immunotherapy * why traditional immunotherapy doesn't work for patients * benefits and challenges of working with family * scaling people and processes * dual challenges of building in healthcare and the consumer market * leveraging AI to do more with a small team Where to find Aakash: * LinkedIn * Website Closing Questions * advice to current founders: avoid distractions and focus on iterating quickly and shorter sprint cycles * when you think of success, who or what comes to mind: doing things that energize you, controlling your time, and building something meaningful with a motivated team * how do you recharge: maintain an identity beyond that of a founder and have hobbies outside of work Ask or Offer * ask: partner with providers to treat your patient's allergies * offer: discounted test kits for listeners who have severe allergies Referenced * Wyndly This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.founderstable.co

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  5. Moving Towards Observability 2.0 with Charity Majors

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    Moving Towards Observability 2.0 with Charity Majors

    Charity Majors is the co-founder and CTO of Honeycomb, an observability platform that helps teams solve problems faster within their distributed services. Before co-founding Honeycomb, Charity made significant contributions at companies like Linden Labs (creators of Second Life), Parse, and Meta. She has co-authored books including "Database Reliability Engineering" and "Observability Engineering" and is a frequent speaker at tech conferences. Charity is active on social media and is known for her advocacy of "observability 2.0", "testing in production", and thoughts on hiring and and career advancement. In today's episode, we talk about: * Charity's preference single malt scotch * the honeycomb origin story and Charity's initial reluctance to start a company despite investor interest * Observability 2.0: what is it, why now, and why it matters * the tragedy of high cardinality metric pricing * advice on overcoming the fear of public speaking and the career advantages of building a public profile. * focusing on communication skills and cultural fit when hiring * creating truly diverse teams that go beyond race or gender to build a collaborative and resilient culture * thoughts on organizational hierarchy and how that has changed over time * why it's important to have the business come first Where to find Charity: * Website * LinkedIn * Twitter Closing Questions * advice to current founders: life isn't fair - the path to success is different for everyone. health should comes first and you need to prioritize personal well-being for long term success. * when you think of success, who or what comes to mind: instead of thinking of people as higher or lower, everyone is a peer. in the context of business, success wil come from proving that strong morals and good culture can coexist with business success Ask or Offer * ask: for anyone that doesn't use Honeycomb and would be open to discuss their reasons, please reach out (via LinkedIn) * offer: 50% discount for 3 months when using honeycomb. use the code HNYCAST50 to redeem Referenced * Honeycomb * The Cost Crisis in Observability Tooling * Transforming to an Engineering Culture of Curiosity With a Modern Observability 2.0 Solution * Observations on the Enterprise of Hiring This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.founderstable.co

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  6. Selling before Building with Jake Johnson

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    Selling before Building with Jake Johnson

    Jake is one of the co-founder of Crew, an AI-powered platform that recruits, vets & pays your team globally. Prior to Crew, Jake worked as a PM at microsoft and an ESPN commentator while attending college at Dartmouth. In today's episode, we talk about: * lessons from doing ESPN broadcasting and focusing on "yes and" * getting into YC with the condition that they come up with a new idea * initial pivot and importance of validating ideas with sales instead of LOIs * moving into hr tech and building automated vetting system with AI * high touch go to market Where to find Jake: * LinkedIn * X Closing Questions * advice to current founders: entrepreneurship is an emotional rollercoaster, find coping mechanism for highs and lows. also find a way to enjoy the ride rather than solely focus on achieving an exit * when you think of success, who or what comes to mind: people like Brian Chesky (AirBnb) that are happy and fufilled by their work * how do you recharge: prioritize outdoor activities and staying active * any recent small investment that has had an outsized impact: investing in new hockey equipment and joining a league Ask or Offer * ask: Check out crew if you're looking to grow your team * offer: Jake is moving to San Francisco and open to meeting and networking with fellow entrepreneurs and potential customers If you're interested in contacting Jake, reach out at offers@founderstable.co with the episode title in the subject and details of your request in the subject! Referenced * Crew This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.founderstable.co

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    Bringing Transparency to the Insurance Industry with Max Cho

    Max Cho is the founder of Coverage Cat, a one stop shop to buy insurance for high net worth individuals. Prior to Coverage Cat, Max worked extensively in tech and finance at firms like Microsoft, Two Sigma, and Google. Max is passionate about fixing the problems in the insurance industry and believes that most people buy the wrong policies, overpaying for what they do get, and get policies that don't cover what they need In today's episode, we talk about: * a bottom ups approach to picking an undergraduate degree * personal issues with insurance as a teenager and the motivation to start Coverage Cat * coverage cat's core mission and what sets it apart * the inefficiencies of the insurance industry * tradeoffs with running a remote team * AI's impact on insurance * thoughts about the Y Combinator experience * a values driven approach to business Where to find Max: * LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/maxrcho Closing Questions * advice to current founders: plan for what could ruin your company (eg. failing to hire the right people) * when you think of success, who or what comes to mind: leaving the world better in small ways than when we've entered it * how do you recharge: occasionally from runs, mostly from helping customers achieve better outcomes * any recent small investment that has had an outsized impact: mostly experience buyer's remorse of buying too many things Ask or Offer * ask: individuals with more than $100k net work seeking better insurance should check out Coverage Cat Referenced * Coverage Cat This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.founderstable.co

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    Why DevOps is Bulls**t with Cory O’Daniel

    Cory O'Daniel is the CEO and co-founder of Massdriver, a cloud platform and visual development environment. Massdriver aims to simplify cloud infrastructure management and DevOps processes, allowing engineering teams to focus on building products rather than managing complex cloud setups. Prior to Massdriver, Cory spent over a decade working on backend, cloud, and platform - Massdriver started out as an internal tool he build to help automate much of that work. In today's episode, we talk about: * where to find the best taco's in Los Angeles * recurring frustrations with ops and cloud that led to the start of Massdriver * creating a platform for both engineers and operation teams using a diagram interface backed by infrastructure as code * why devops is bulls**t * facilitating platform engineering through better tooling * pivot from pure service play to professional services Where to find Cory: * X * LinkedIn Closing Questions * advice to current founders: prioritize automation and simplicity. choose boring tech. don't just take VC advice on face value and don't be afraid to push back * offer: Attend Massdriver’s weekly webinars for practical insights on cloud and DevOps topics, and suggest new topics you’re interested in learning about. Ask or Offer * ask: Check out the Platform Engineering Podcast if you're a developer founder in the dev tools or cloud space and want to discuss problems and customer solutions. Referenced * TACO * Infrastructure as Code * Devops is B******t * Platform Engineering Podcast * MassDriver * OpenTofu This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.founderstable.co

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Conversations with founders on how they got started and concrete lessons and tactics for building your own startup. www.founderstable.co

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    Conversations with founders on building the next great startup
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