From Startup to Exit

TiE Seattle
  • 5.0 (5)
  • ENTREPRENEURSHIP

Welcome to the Startup to Exit podcast where we bring you world-class entrepreneurs and VCs to share their hard-earned success stories and secrets. This podcast has been brought to you by TiE Seattle. TiE is a global non-profit that focuses on fostering entrepreneurship. TiE Seattle offers a range of programs including the GoVertical Startup Creation Weekend, TiE Entrepreneur Institute, and the TiE Seattle Angel Network. We encourage you to become a TiE member so you can gain access to these great programs. To become a member, please visit www.Seattle.tie.org.

  1. 2H AGO

    A special tribute to Samir Bodas, co-Founder and CEO of iCertis and Board Member of TiE Seattle

    Send us Fan Mail In this heartfelt episode, Monish Darda remembers Samir Bodas not just as the CEO and co-founder of iCertis, but as a close friend, co-founder, and extraordinary human being. He shares the origin story of iCertis, the trust that defined their partnership, and the values that shaped the company’s culture. iCertis is the market leader in Contract Lifecycle Management. This is a moving conversation about entrepreneurship, friendship, resilience, and the legacy Sameer leaves behind. In this episode: - Samir Bordas’s legacy as a founder, leader, and mentor - The origin story of iCertis and an unexpected path to product-market fit - What makes a great co-founder relationship - The meaning behind iCertis’ “FORTE” culture - Navigating leadership through personal and health challenges - Lessons on resilience, purpose, and building a lasting impact Monish Darda is a cloud-technology pioneer and serial entrepreneur with a 30-year track record in the enterprise software space. As CTO and Co-founder of Icertis, Monish has overseen development of the Icertis Contract Intelligence (ICI) platform, the leading contract management solution in the cloud. Monish has also led Icertis’ successful deployment of cutting-edge AI and blockchain technologies, which have earned Icertis numerous industry accolades including recognition on Forbes’ prestigious AI 50 List for two years in a row. Monish has a BE in Mechanical Engineering and a Master’s degree from Florida Atlantic University. Brought to you by TiE Seattle Hosts: Shirish Nadkarni and Gowri Shankar Producers: Minee Verma and Eesha Jain YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@fromstartuptoexitpodcast

    40 min

  2. MAR 15

    Startup Spotlight: From Wall Street to the Wilderness - How Preeti Suri Built Adventure Tripper and Reinvented Adventure Travel

    Send a text What happens when a former investment banker turns a life-changing personal experience into a startup? In this episode, Preeti Suri, founder of Adventure Tripper, shares how she built a curated marketplace for multi-day adventure travel—connecting travelers with vetted local guides around the world. Preeti Suri is the Founder and CEO of AdventureTripr, a global adventure and wellness travel marketplace offering curated experiences across 50+ countries. A Chartered Accountant, CPA, and INSEAD MBA, she previously built a career in Big Four firms and investment banking before pivoting to entrepreneurship. Inspired by her own healing journey through the outdoors, she founded AdventureTripr to help people improve their physical, mental, and emotional well-being through movement, nature, and community. Preeti discusses the challenges of launching during COVID, the role of AI in travel planning, and why curation and human expertise still matter in an AI-driven world. She also shares the deeply personal story behind her entrepreneurial journey and the mindset required to build a mission-driven company. In This Episode, You’ll Learn - How Preeti Suri transitioned from consulting and investment banking to founding Adventure Tripper - The gap in the travel industry around curated multi-day adventure experiences - Why curation and vetted local guides matter more than endless search results - How the company pivoted during COVID and expanded from 5 destinations to nearly 50 countries - How AI is changing travel planning—and why human expertise still provides an edge - Adventure Tripper’s marketplace model and why fulfillment and post-trip support are key differentiators - Why the company focuses on a B2B-led growth strategy rather than traditional consumer marketing - Lessons from building a startup as a woman founder—and the mindset needed to overcome obstacles Brought to you by TiE Seattle Hosts: Shirish Nadkarni and Gowri Shankar Producers: Minee Verma and Eesha Jain YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@fromstartuptoexitpodcast

    36 min

  3. MAR 2

    Startup Spotlight: Aravind Bala, CTO, SeekOut.com - How to successfully pivot your company

    Send us Fan Mail In this episode, we feature Aravind Bala, who is the CTO and co-founder of Seekout. SeekOut (https://seekout.io) empowers companies to go beyond LinkedIn in recruiting hard-to-find and diverse talent.  Prior to SeekOut, Aravind spent 14 years at Microsoft as a Partner Engineering Manager.  In this episode, Aravind shares the following: From Big Tech to startup leap: Aravind Bala shares why he left a 14-year Microsoft career to build a company “for real,” guided by Jeff Bezos’ regret minimization mindset—and the importance of finding the right co-founder (Anoop Gupta).The first idea (and why it didn’t stick): The team’s original startup, Next.io, explored a two-sided marketplace that used “money as signal” to cut through cold outreach—then hit the classic marketplace bootstrapping and consumer-virality challenges.A pivot born from survival + customer pull: With ~6 months of runway, a side project (“Career Compass”) drew strong recruiter interest, leading them to pivot into *SeekOut*, where B2B feedback loops felt more “debuggable” than consumer growth bets.How SeekOut differentiated vs. LinkedIn: Aravind explains the opening they saw: LinkedIn optimizes for member experience, while SeekOut could optimize for recruiter outcomes—especially by using *external signals* (e.g., GitHub/code, papers, patents, public profiles) and *diversity inference at scale*.When the market turned: The tech hiring downturn, recruiter headcount cuts, and shifting DEI priorities forced a rethink—plus a new reality: in a flooded applicant market, passive sourcing tools can feel less urgent.The “agentic” thesis: tools vs. outcomes: A core debate: most AI “agents” boost productivity (you still control everything), but SeekOut is pushing toward outcome-delivering agents—a “white-collar factory” model where humans supervise pipelines and give up more control to get 10x gains.What it takes to make agents reliable (and monetizable): Aravind breaks down why outcome delivery needs a factory-like pipeline with quality control, why some tasks need top-tier models, and why this shifts pricing from SaaS “all-you-can-eat” to per-outcome economics that can compete with recruiter/agency costs.Brought to you by TiE Seattle Hosts: Shirish Nadkarni and Gowri Shankar Producers: Minee Verma and Eesha Jain Brought to you by TiE Seattle Hosts: Shirish Nadkarni and Gowri Shankar Producers: Minee Verma and Eesha Jain YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@fromstartuptoexitpodcast

    45 min

  4. FEB 16

    2026 Investment Outlook and Predictions

    Send us Fan Mail Listen to our 2026 Annual Investment Outlook Panel with four top VCs. Get their perspective on the investment climate in 2026 and their plans to invest specifically in AI based startups. See how they did with their 2025 forecast and what their big predictions are for 2026. Tim Porter, Managing Director, Madrona Ventures Tim joined Madrona in 2006 and invests in B2B software companies in the Pacific Northwest. He is currently interested in intelligent applications and SaaS, cloud-native software infrastructure, the modern data stack, machine learning, DevOps, and cybersecurity. He is also a board member of numerous Madrona portfolio companies. Sudip Chakrabarti, Partner, Pruven Capital Sudip is a partner at Pruven Capital where he works with companies that are transforming the enterprise, cloud and infrastructure markets.  Sudip's past investments include Exabeam, Heptio, Serverless.com, Datacoral, Spotnana, Temporal, Tesorio and Polly. He had also been a board observer at Databricks, Digital Ocean, Actifio, Mesosphere and Samsara. Kellan Carter, Founding Partner, FUSE Ventures Kellan Carter is a founding partner of FUSE where he focuses on early-stage investments in intelligent software in both horizontal and vertical categories.  He currently sits on the Boards of Zuper, Pictory, Avante, Owl, Xemelgo and PDM Automotive. Joaquín Gallardo, Senior Vice President, Tech Banking at Silicon Valley Bank Joaquín is a Senior Vice President at SVB, a division of First Citizens Bank, in our Seattle/PNW market focusing on enterprise clients. In his role we helps Series A and beyond clients to scale their finance stack with venture lending alongside global treasury and liquidity solutions. Before joining SVB Seattle, he lived in San Francisco, learned to code at UC Berkeley, and helped to co-found a pre-seed company. Joaquín holds a bachelor's degree in economics from George Mason University. He lives in Ballard, Seattle with his wife and two children. In his spare time, he gets to think about how he wishes he had more spare time. Brought to you by TiE Seattle Hosts: Shirish Nadkarni and Gowri Shankar Producers: Minee Verma and Eesha Jain Brought to you by TiE Seattle Hosts: Shirish Nadkarni and Gowri Shankar Producers: Minee Verma and Eesha Jain YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@fromstartuptoexitpodcast

    1h 51m

  5. JAN 23

    Building Category-Defining AI Startups with Yifan Zhang (AI2 Incubator)

    Send us Fan Mail We’re excited to feature Yifan Zhang, Managing Director at AI2 Incubator, one of the most successful AI incubators in the world, born out of the Allen Institute for AI and backed by a newly announced $80M Fund III. Yifan is a 2x founder and CEO, Entrepreneur “50 Most Daring Entrepreneurs” honoree, and Forbes 30 Under 30 alum. Her journey spans building and exiting venture-backed startups, navigating extreme founder adversity, and now helping the next generation of AI founders go from idea to impact. In this episode of From Startup to Exit, Yifan shares: How AI2 Incubator works differently from studios, accelerators, and traditional VCsWhat they look for in founders, and why ideas matter less than resilience and executionWhy vertical, agentic AI applications are winning right nowHow AI startups are shifting from per-seat SaaS pricing to per-task, outcome-based modelsWhat it really takes to survive the founder “trough of adversity” and come out strongerWhy Seattle may be the most underappreciated AI startup hub in the worldThis conversation is a must-listen for AI founders, operators, investors, and anyone building in the agentic AI era. Brought to you by TiE Seattle Hosts: Shirish Nadkarni and Gowri Shankar Producers: Minee Verma and Eesha Jain YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@fromstartuptoexitpodcast

    42 min

  6. JAN 1

    Best of 2025: From Startup to Exit Podcast

    Send us Fan Mail Join us for a dynamic highlight reel featuring short segments from the 2025 season of From Startup to Exit, TiE Seattle’s flagship podcast showcasing world-class entrepreneurs, innovators, and industry leaders sharing candid insights from their journeys. Each mini-segment brings you the essence of these remarkable conversations — from foundational lessons in product and leadership to reflections on how technology shapes markets and culture.  We kick things off with Paul Maritz, discussing his pivotal role in Microsoft’s product strategy during the Windows and server era and how a deep commitment to innovation shaped a career spanning multiple iconic tech companies. Next, Jeff Raikes reflects on building transformative software platforms like Microsoft Office and his later work in global philanthropy focused on equity and systems-level impact. Robbie Bach takes you inside the historic launch of Xbox, offering a rare behind-the-scenes look at driving innovation within a legacy tech giant. Meanwhile Steve Wood shares foundational memories from Microsoft’s early days as the sixth employee, emphasizing the importance of grit and experimentation in startup culture.  We also spotlight Brad Chase on the launch of Windows 95 and the strategic decisions that made it a defining moment in personal computing; Laura Jennings on shaping MSN into a major internet portal; and modern voices like Sabrina Wu, who breaks down the future of intelligent applications and the role of AI in venture investing. Yash Wagh delivers insights from his startup journey with Gone.com and building sustainable commerce models. Ece Kamar closes with a forward-looking conversation on responsible AI, sharing how human-centered frameworks will guide the next phase of technological growth. Whether you’re an entrepreneur, technologist, or curious learner, this highlights compilation is packed with actionable wisdom from leaders who’ve navigated the path from startup to exit. Brought to you by TiE Seattle Hosts: Shirish Nadkarni and Gowri Shankar Producers: Minee Verma and Eesha Jain YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@fromstartuptoexitpodcast

    51 min

  7. 12/04/2025

    Innovating for Impact: TYE Global Winners 2025 Share their Entrepreneurial Journey

    Send us Fan Mail Join us as Team Kymavi, the TYE Global winner, discusses their groundbreaking solution addressing environmental challenges through biodegradable bags, and Team Key Beauty, creators of an AI-driven makeup matching platform for women of color, shares their journey in redefining inclusivity in beauty. The teams dive into their experiences with market research, customer validation, and developing sustainable business models, highlighting how mentorship and the TYE program helped them refine their ideas, build essential entrepreneurial skills, and prepare for global success. Brought to you by TiE Seattle Hosts: Shirish Nadkarni and Gowri Shankar Producers: Minee Verma and Eesha Jain Brought to you by TiE Seattle Hosts: Shirish Nadkarni and Gowri Shankar Producers: Minee Verma and Eesha Jain YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@fromstartuptoexitpodcast

    52 min

  8. 11/17/2025

    Building Responsible AI for the New Era: A Conversation with Ece Kamar, Director of AI Frontiers Lab at Microsoft Research

    Send us Fan Mail In this episode, we sit down with Dr. Ece Kamar, Director of the AI Frontiers Lab at Microsoft Research, and one of the leading voices in Responsible AI. With over 15 years at Microsoft, Ece has played a pivotal role in shaping how AI systems are designed to collaborate with humans safely and effectively. She shares her journey from earning a PhD at Harvard University, where she researched how AI agents can become human partners, to leading responsible AI efforts at Microsoft and tackling challenges like fairness, reliability, safety, and hallucinations in large-scale models such as GPT-4. In this insightful conversation, Ece talks about: - How early research in human-AI collaboration laid the foundation for today’s AI agents - The evolution of AI through scalable data, deep learning, and generative models - Her pioneering work on Responsible AI frameworks at Microsoft - The emerging challenges and opportunities in the era of generative AI Whether you’re an entrepreneur, technologist, or researcher, this episode offers an inspiring look into how responsible innovation will define the next generation of AI systems. Tune in to learn how human-centered AI is shaping the future - responsibly. To ensure you don't miss other episodes like this, subscribe to our podcast! Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ecekamar/ Sponsored by: JPMC Private Banking Brought to you by TiE Seattle Hosts: Shirish Nadkarni and Gowri Shankar Producers: Minee Verma and Eesha Jain YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@fromstartuptoexitpodcast

    59 min
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Ratings & Reviews

5
out of 5
5 Ratings

About

Welcome to the Startup to Exit podcast where we bring you world-class entrepreneurs and VCs to share their hard-earned success stories and secrets. This podcast has been brought to you by TiE Seattle. TiE is a global non-profit that focuses on fostering entrepreneurship. TiE Seattle offers a range of programs including the GoVertical Startup Creation Weekend, TiE Entrepreneur Institute, and the TiE Seattle Angel Network. We encourage you to become a TiE member so you can gain access to these great programs. To become a member, please visit www.Seattle.tie.org.

Information

  • Creator
    TiE Seattle
  • Years Active
    2023 - 2026
  • Episodes
    37
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © 2026 From Startup to Exit
  • Show Website
    From Startup to Exit

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