The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch

<p dir="ltr">Bending Spoons is the acquisition machine of the tech world. They have acquired the likes of Evernote, Vimeo, Eventbrite, Streamyard and more. However, they never open their gates to the secrets behind Evernote's product machine. Today that changes with Federico Simionato joining 20Product. Fede has been a Product Lead at Bending Spoons for 8 years where he has led product teams at Evernote, WeTransfer and more.  </p> <p dir="ltr">AGENDA:</p> <p dir="ltr">03:02 From Dentist Games to $11BN Bending Spoons</p> <p dir="ltr">04:54 Advice for Aspiring Product Managers</p> <p dir="ltr">05:38 Building a Coveted Brand at Bending Spoons</p> <p dir="ltr">07:43 Evaluating and Testing New Product Ideas</p> <p dir="ltr">13:35 How Evernote has Mastered User Retention</p> <p dir="ltr">25:24 The Impact of AI on Product Design and Prototyping</p> <p dir="ltr">31:19 How Bending Spoons Does Product Launches and Lessons Learned</p> <p dir="ltr">33:27 How Every Product Team Should Do Monthly Updates to Users</p> <p dir="ltr">36:38 Recording and Transparency in Updates</p> <p dir="ltr">38:06 Lessons from Failed Product Launches</p> <p dir="ltr">45:14 Structuring Teams and Acquisitions</p> <p dir="ltr">47:12 Monetization Strategies and Push Notifications</p> <p dir="ltr">57:21 Quick Fire Round: Insights and Reflections</p> <p> </p>

<p dir="ltr">AGENDA:</p> <p dir="ltr">04:47 Cursor Raises $2.3BN at $29BN Valuation</p> <p dir="ltr">11:36 What Gemini 3 Means for Lovable, Cursor and Replit</p> <p dir="ltr">30:54 Peter Thiel and Softbank Sell NVIDIA: The Bubble Bursting?</p> <p dir="ltr">48:54 Oracle Credit Default Swaps: The Risk is Increasing</p> <p dir="ltr">01:07:22 Stripe Does Tender at All-Time High: Why the Best Companies Will Never IPO</p> <p dir="ltr">01:19:18 Why Retail WIll Cause a Surge of Capital into VC Funds</p> <p> </p>

<p dir="ltr">Dr. Andrew Ng is a globally recognized leader in AI. He is Founder of <a href= "https://www.deeplearning.ai/">DeepLearning.AI</a>, Executive Chairman of <a href="https://landing.ai/">LandingAI</a>, General Partner at <a href="https://aifund.ai/">AI Fund</a>, Chairman and Co-Founder of <a href="https://www.coursera.org/">Coursera</a>. As a pioneer in machine learning Andrew has authored or co-authored over 200 research papers in machine learning, robotics and related fields. In 2023, he was named to the Time100 AI list of the most influential AI persons in the world.</p> <p dir="ltr"><span style= "text-decoration: underline;"><strong>Agenda:</strong></span></p> <p dir="ltr">03:19 What are the Biggest Bottlenecks in AI Today? </p> <p dir="ltr">08:51 How LLMs Can Be Used as a Geopolitical Weapon</p> <p dir="ltr">15:48 Should AI Talent Really Be Paid Billions?</p> <p dir="ltr">29:07 Why is the Application Layer the Most Exciting Layer?</p> <p dir="ltr">36:22 Do Margins Matter in a World of AI?</p> <p dir="ltr">38:02 Is Defensibility Dead in a World of AI?</p> <p dir="ltr">45:29 Will AI Deliver Masa Son's Predictions of 5% GDP Growth?</p> <p dir="ltr">49:39 Are We in an AI Bubble?</p> <p dir="ltr">57:31 Will Human Labour Budgets Shift to AI Spend?</p> <p> </p>

<p dir="ltr">Carl Rivera is the Chief Design Officer at Shopify, where he previously led both Merchant Services and the Shop App as VP of Product. Before joining Shopify through its acquisition of Tictail, Carl was the co-founder and CEO of Tictail, the "Tumblr for e-commerce," where he built one of the most beloved design-forward commerce platforms of its era.</p> <p dir="ltr">AGENDA:</p> <p dir="ltr">05:05 Biggest Lessons from Selling My Company to Shopify</p> <p dir="ltr">09:55 Where Does Shopify Suck at Product: Lessons from that?</p> <p dir="ltr">17:37 What makes Truly Great product Design: The Five Pillars</p> <p dir="ltr">31:02 The Future of Design in an AI-Driven World</p> <p dir="ltr">36:00 Do We Skip the Design Phase in AI: Figma's Evolving Role in Design</p> <p dir="ltr">40:09 Remote Work vs. In-Person Collaboration: Where Remote Loses?</p> <p dir="ltr">42:43 What Happens to the Vibe Coding Market</p> <p dir="ltr">47:06 Product Management and Team Dynamics</p> <p dir="ltr">59:48 Does AI Favour Incumbents or Startups</p> <p> </p>

<p dir="ltr">AGENDA:</p> <p dir="ltr">04:22 Sequoia's Leadership Transition</p> <p dir="ltr">09:46 Michael Burry's Big Short on Nvidia and Palantir</p> <p dir="ltr">17:41 Gamma Raises $100M at a $2BN Valuation</p> <p dir="ltr">32:34 Does Defensibility Exist Today When Copying is Easy</p> <p dir="ltr">40:31 Should All Funds Be Way More Diversified</p> <p dir="ltr">47:12 How to Run a Fundraising Process & What Not To Do</p> <p dir="ltr">57:57 Datadog Surges 20% and Duolingo Crashes: What Happened</p> <p dir="ltr"> </p> <p dir="ltr"> </p>

<p dir="ltr">Ev Randle is a General Partner @ Benchmark, one of the best funds in venture capital. In their latest fund, they have Mercor ($10BN valuation), Sierra ($10BN valuation), Firework ($4BN valuation), Legora ($2Bn valuation) and Langchain ($1.4Bn valuation). To put this in multiples on invested capital, that is a 60x, two 30x and two 20x. Before Benchmark, Ev was a Partner @ Kleiner Perkins and before Kleiner, Ev was an investor at Founders Fund and Bond. </p> <p dir="ltr"><span style= "text-decoration: underline;"><strong>AGENDA:</strong></span></p> <p dir="ltr">05:25 Biggest Investing Lessons from Peter Thiel, Mary Meeker and Mamoon Hamid</p> <p dir="ltr">14:36 OpenAI Will Be a $TRN Company & OpenAI or Anthropic: Who Wins Coding?</p> <p dir="ltr">22:27 Why We Should Not Focus on Margin But Gross Dollar Per Customer</p> <p dir="ltr">30:25 Why AI Labs are the Biggest Threat to AI App Companies</p> <p dir="ltr">44:26 Do Benchmark Fire Founders? If so… Truly the Best Partner?</p> <p dir="ltr">54:38 People, Product, Market: Rank 1-3 and Why?</p> <p dir="ltr">57:36 Why the Mega Funds Have Just Replaced Tiger</p> <p dir="ltr">01:04:08 GC, Lightspeed and a16z Cannot Do 5x on Their Funds… </p> <p dir="ltr">01:14:09 Single Biggest Threat to Benchmark</p> <p> </p>

Andrew Feldman is Co-Founder & CEO of Cerebras, building the world's fastest AI inference and training. Cerebras recently closed a $1.1BN Series G round at an $8.1 billion valuation, backed by top names including Fidelity, Atreides, Tiger Global,...