Jason Calacanis covers startups, tech, markets, media, and all the hottest topics in business and technology. He also interviews the world’s greatest founders, operators, investors, and innovators.
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Episode 2000! Epic guests, huge news, and how to build a media legacy in 14 short years | E2000
Friday, August 30, 2024 • Duration 01:37:19
This Week in Startups is brought to you by…
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Todays show:
Jason and Alex kick off episode 2000! They reflect on TWiST’s origins and early episodes (1:48), highlighting notable guests and memorable moments (22:31). They also share fan messages, and insights from cohosts (46:05), and wrap up celebrating standout moments (1:04:14).
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Timestamps:
(0:00) Jason and Alex kick off the show
(1:48) The origins and early days of TWiST
(9:50) Squarespace - Use offer code TWIST to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain at https://www.Squarespace.com/TWIST
Startup Pitch Competition: Three founders compete for $25K | E1999
Thursday, August 29, 2024 • Duration 41:58
This Week in Startups is brought to you by…
Fidelity Private Shares℠. Manage your cap table and data room, get faster, more accurate 409A valuation and fully automate your next financing round. Visit https://fidelityprivateshares.com! Mention our podcast and receive 20% off your first-year paid subscription.
Google Cloud. Accelerate your startup journey with the Google for Startups Cloud Program. Get up to $200K in Google Cloud credits – or up to $350K for AI startups – plus training and guidance. Apply at https://startups.google.com/twist
Runway. Looking to up-level your financial planning Runway is the modern and intuitive way to model, plan, and align your business for everyone on your team. Sign up at https://runway.com/twist to get your first 3 months free.
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Todays show:
Jason and Kelly kick off the Founder University startup pitch competition (00:00), then we hear from Eric Gilbert-Williams on The Public Bored (4:32), Matt Schwed on Speed AI (11:38), and Joe Tannorella on PodEngine (15:50). Finally, Jason awards a $25K investment, and details how to apply!
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Timestamps:
(0:00) Jason and Kelly kick off the show
(4:32) Eric Gilbert-Williams pitches The Public Bored
(10:24) Fidelity Private Shares℠ - Visit https://fidelityprivateshares.com! Mention our podcast and receive 20% off your first-year paid subscription.
(11:38) Matt Schwed pitches Speed AI
(15:50) Joe Tannorella pitches PodEngine
Startup Pitch Competition: Four founders compete for $25K | E1991
Friday, August 9, 2024 • Duration 49:13
This Week in Startups is brought to you by…
Vanta. Compliance and security shouldn't be a deal-breaker for startups to win new business. Vanta makes it easy for companies to get a SOC 2 report fast. TWiST listeners can get $1,000 off for a limited time at https://www.vanta.com/twist
.Tech Domains - Don’t miss our “Jam with JCal” contest! To apply and get more details go to https://jamwithjcal.tech brought to you by .tech domains.
OpenPhone. Create business phone numbers for you and your team that work through an app on your smartphone or desktop. TWiST listeners can get an extra 20% off any plan for your first 6 months at https://www.openphone.com/twist
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Todays show:
Jason and Kelly kick off the Founder University startup pitch competition (00:00). We hear from Pablo on Big Rentals (4:18), Brittany on Where2Wheel (12:28), Ardalan on MyLens (21:31), and Mariano on Prosperous AI (29:07). Finally, Jason awards a $25K investment (38:34), and details how to apply!
(20:10) .Tech Domains - Apply for the Jam Session with JCal contest today at https://jamwithjcal.tech
(21:31) Ardalan Mirshani pitches MyLens
(29:07) Mariano Apodaca pitches Prosperous AI
Startup Pitches! LAUNCH Accelerator Demo Day | E1902
Thursday, February 22, 2024 • Duration 56:26
This Week in Startups is brought to you by…
Gusto is easy online payroll, benefits, and HR built for modern small businesses. Get three months free when you run your first payroll at http://www.gusto.com/twist
*Gusto pricing shown in ad is based on pricing prior to March 2025
LinkedIn Jobs. A business is only as strong as its people, and every hire matters. Go to https://www.linkedin.com/twist to post your first job for free. Terms and conditions apply.
(0:00) Jason joins seven strong startup pitches from LAUNCH Accelerator.(1:11) Jacqui kicks off the demo day.(1:40) Introductions to the guest jugdes.(4:40) Justin pitches Melengo(10:18) Gusto - Get three months free when you run your first payroll at http://www.gusto.com/twist
(11:32) Edward ptiches PodcastAI(18:09) LinkedIn Jobs - Post your first job for free at https://www.linkedin.com/twist(19:04) Daniel pitches Tolt(24:55) Rae pitches River(27:49) Northwest Registered Agent - Get a 60% discount on your next LLC at - http://www.northwestregisteredagent.com/twist(34:01) Kash pitches TaxGPT(40:56) George pitches Fanfare(46:31) Jam pitches Monic.ai(52:05) Our panel of judges pick their top three pitches.
E1068 AMA: NEA’s Ben Narasin takes questions from founders: most important content in a pitch deck, COVID’s impact on dealmaking, traits he looks for in founders & more!
Saturday, May 30, 2020 • Duration 48:38
NEA's Ben Narasin takes questions from founders: most important content in a pitch deck, COVID's impact on dealmaking, traits he looks for in founders & more!
Join the TWiST Slack: https://launchevents.typeform.com/to/kLq5Bi
Follow Ben: https://twitter.com/bnarasin
1:13 Paul: Has the current crisis changed your investment thesis? If so, how?
2:40 Ash/Christopher: How to overcome the money raised vs revenue generated in enterprise SaaS that requires heavy product work to reach product-market fit?
4:13 Emberlynn/Srinivas: What is the most important content in a pitch deck?
7:26 Guilherme: What will the VC funding landscape look like after the crisis passes?
8:37 Mary: What is the best way to present a newly launched startup that has been severely impacted by COVID-19 to investors?
10:48 Daniel: What advice would you offer college students passionate about venture capital so that they can also become investors?
12:22 Mark: What immediate skepticism do you have when you look at early-stage startups?
15:54 Len: What factor(s) would most set an early-stage (i.e. seed funding, launch-ready, pre-revenue) company apart from others seeking similar funding?
18:15 Aneesh: My startup sells multiple SaaS products for restaurant digitization. We don’t have the bandwidth to handle sales and marketing of all products at once. What should be our strategy to prioritize?
19:49 Linards: At what level of product traction will investors start to be interested? How does it differ across verticals?
22:40 Avidan: What role (if any) will equity crowdfunding play in the venture capital ecosystem at large?
23:43 Adam: What are you seeing related to startup valuations and VC terms post-COVID?
25:18 Emin: What kind of marketplaces would you like to see in the next 5 years?
26:34 Tammy: Do you think people will need a college degree for the jobs of the future?
28:48 Ellie: Post-WeWork, how should a tech startup with profit margins on the smaller side think about building a scalable and ultimately profitable business model?
30:15 Wei: What sectors are you investing in? What are you most excited about nowadays?
31:40 Ope: What skill sets do you need to move into VC from a non-Investment Banking background?
33:09 Suruchi/Mireille: In a medium article you wrote you wrote: "winter is here, severely ....don't obsess about the downside, think about the opportunities.” What opportunities have arisen so far? What changes are permanent and what changes are temporary?
35:20 Nghia: What are some books that you recommend today?
39:30 Ben: Are there areas that are non-investable at the moment whether it be overcrowded, overpriced, or the prospects aren’t great due to COVID?
40:24 Charles: Do you have any instances where a founder's positive or negative traits/signals have influenced a deal decision? On reflection, has instinct proved a better indicator than hard numbers?
43:42 Dave: What was your biggest exit/best investment? How did you source the deal? Alternatively, could you tell your worst anti-portfolio story (most successful company you passed on)?
44:46 Barry: What are some interesting healthcare startups or spaces that you have a favorable outlook for?
45:51 Raman: What’s your take on the future of learning?
E1067: Garry Tan, Managing Partner & Co-Founder of Initialized Capital, on dealing with downstream investors as a Seed-stage firm, software companies acting as governments, possibility of building IPO-level companies while fully-distributed & much more!
Friday, May 29, 2020 • Duration 01:37:37
1:03 Jason intros Garry Tan and checks in on how his quarantine has been going
4:39 How does Garry look at Initialized's portfolio companies? What are his 3 groups of companies dealing with COVID?
8:04 How will VCs react to the crisis? Why does Initialized specifically focus on Seed-stage companies?
11:13 How does Initialized contact downstream investors about their companies, and how has that changed during COVID?
14:12 Thoughts on Posterous, data-storage singularity & more
18:04 Losing thousands of photos after getting banned from Flickr and how that plays into software as the new government, becoming a super-router
22:32 How Spotify's access to public capital gives them an acquisition advantage, collab concepts
24:51 How does Initialized size their follow-on investments?
29:11 For how long is Initialized planning on operating fully remote? Thoughts on going back to work
35:56 What skills has Garry had to improve during his investing career?
43:33 How downstream investors try and take advantage of early-stage investors
47:51 Thoughts on Clubhouse investment, how/if they can scale their exclusivity
56:27 Thoughts on founders selling secondary shares, and how Chris Sacca helped Garry Tan at Posterous
1:02:09 Structural inequality leading to rich-bashing, how Fiat currency impacts welfare inequality
1:07:09 Thoughts on UBI, Instacart, potential profitability of food-delivery companies
1:11:31 Perception of Tech in the Bay Area, commercial real-estate in SF, Facebook's game-theory remote pay scale
1:18:27 Could today's tech giants (Google, Facebook, Uber) have grown to the heights they did as fully remote companies? Can IPO-level companies be consistently built while remote?
1:24:49 Do the best founders appear ageless? New Twitter features: good or bad?
E1066: The Power of Accelerators E6 David Brown, CEO & Co-Founder of TechStars on leading the virtual accelerator trend, benefits of going global, sustained vs. temporary changes from COVID & more!
Wednesday, May 27, 2020 • Duration 01:07:27
0:43 Jason intros TechStars CEO David Brown
4:47 TechStars leading the virtual accelerator trend
10:21 Will TechStars go with a hybrid model going forward and what key points should remote accelerators focus on?
15:27 How did TechStars settle on the number of 10 companies per cohort?
17:28 What has TechStars seen across their portfolio since COVID started?
21:21 Sustained changes vs. temporary changes due to COVID, will COVID lead to more entrepreneurs?
31:58 How to explain edge-case funding scenarios to founders who have real businesses that are having troubling raising capital, taking a long-term view on accelerator engagement, why B2B is easier than B2C
36:22 Why angels invest in one company over the other? Do metrics matter as much as personal relationships? What are ideal founder characteristics that David looks for?
40:25 How TechStars selects mentors by surveying their mentees, comparison against Y Combinator
51:45 Opportunity for going global, David's relationship with Co-Founder David Cohen
1:00:30 Would TechStars ever go public?
E1065 AMA: Slice CEO Ilir Sela answers questions from founders: tips on selling into scattered markets (like Mom & Pop shops), COVID’s impact on the restaurant industry, scaling Slice’s $43M Series C & more!
Thursday, May 21, 2020 • Duration 49:21
Slice CEO Ilir Sela answers questions from founders: tips on selling into scattered markets (like Mom & Pop shops), COVID's impact on the restaurant industry, scaling Slice's $43M Series C & more!
Join the TWiST Slack: https://launchevents.typeform.com/to/kLq5Bi
Check out Slice: https://slicelife.com/
Follow Ilir: https://twitter.com/IlirSela
1:05 Knyck: You mentioned Slice being a platform to provide the technology and buying power of scaled companies to small pizza businesses. Do you think that mom and pop stores in other industries like retail or services could use a similar platform, or is this type of structure specifically fitted for the economics of the pizza industry?
3:32 Michael: How do you see the restaurant industry changing in NYC post-COVID, and where do you see the growth opportunities to create a new type of offering?
5:17 Chris: I’m building a loyalty program startup for restaurants. We’re specifically targeting non-chain ethnic restaurants and customers who may have ethnic nostalgia for cultural foods. What do you think the opportunity looks like nationwide for this demographic? Are most restaurants using mainstream food ordering apps already, or is there a large segment of ethnic restaurants who are off-grid?
9:01 Graham: Mom & pops are such a scattered customer base. Can you shed some light on how you started to get momentum in the early days as a small business yourself? Did early customers have any trust issues with something as important as payment?
14:22 Laura: What is the biggest point of friction you have with adding new pizzerias to Slice? Do you experience many/any pizzerias that don't see the benefit of joining the Slice community? If so, how do you handle these?
18:50 Henry: Have you thought of doing the same for other ethnic food restaurants like Chinese, Indian, Thai etc. and what challenges do you foresee? What would be your approach to tackle?
22:04 Matt: With all the vacant retail that's about to become available, have you thought about helping pizza brands expand into ghost kitchens or helping existing pizzerias launch virtual brands (a la Chuck E Cheese)?
24:33 Ian/Andrew (similar questions): What is this funding round helping your business and platform do for the Pizza shops and their customers? How do you plan on scaling your $43M Series C? How have your plans changed since Slice has gone mostly remote?
31:10 Charles: Please expand on the apparent disparity in pricing across platforms/instore. How can food often be cheaper through a middleman? Our family often finds the most frictionless experience for our regular pizza place is to call in as it's often a single dish. How can this be simplified further? One push pizza?
37:58 Matt: Can you speak to "why pizza” and not Chinese food? At the end of the day, are you limiting yourself by picking one category?
40:32 Mahreen: Curious to know more about Slice's marketing. What marketing channels have been most effective for your platform (in acquiring both customers/new businesses)?
42:14 Ian: What response did you get from companies to sign up, was the take up easy? Or did you have to convince them in a specific sales pitch, how did you frame it?
43:51 Presh: You seem to have a curated following list on Twitter, curious to know your favorite accounts to follow that have impacted your business thinking.. top 5 accounts you recommend following?
45:31 Presh: Where does Slice need to be in order to see an IPO?
47:31 Ian: What are your plans to develop your branding and web/mobile app
E1064: News Roundtable! Sam Parr & Zach Coelius on Barstool Sports vs. Call Her Daddy, SoftBank’s $17B loss, TikTok poaches former Disney exec as CEO, Facebook launches Shops & more!
Thursday, May 21, 2020 • Duration 01:02:58
0:51 Jason intros Zach Coelius & Sam Parr
2:28 Barstool Sports vs. Call Her Daddy
6:49 Penn National Gaming stock soaring, Dave Portnoy winning this controversy
13:17 SoftBank reports $17.7B annual loss, worst figures in 39-year history
17:19 Does SoftBank's involvement typically include a loss of focus for the founder?
21:43 TikTok’s parent co. Bytedance trades at a $140B valuation, poaches Disney’s former Head of Streaming as new CEO of TikTok
25:08 Was Kevin Mayer wrong to take this role? Are TikTok's recommendation algorithms the best in the world?
28:52 How do Chinese companies grow so rapidly?
32:06 Facebook launches Shops, is Zuck trying to kill e-commerce giants? Zach on his experience with Facebook slowly killing his business
40:06 How does Facebook's product organization work?
47:13 Jason on the future of social networks
49:56 Amazon potentially acquiring AMC Theatres, could this be an Amazon Prime upsell?
53:52 Everyone gives their best idea for Amazon's first move after buying AMC
59:59 Zach on his quarantine deal flow
All-In E3: Modern Cold War between US & China, economic recovery, potential mass migration out of San Francisco, pandemic politicization & more with David Sacks & David Friedberg
Thursday, May 21, 2020 • Duration 49:55
Angel investor Jason Calacanis (Uber, Calm, Robinhood) interviews the world’s greatest founders, operators, investors and innovators. Get an insider’s look into venture capital, learn how to start and scale your own startup, and ride the cutting edge of technology in today's headlines and beyond.
(23:33) Google Cloud - Accelerate your startup journey with the Google for Startups Cloud Program. Apply at https://startups.google.com/twist
(25:03) Ranking the three companies
(29:12) Founders' experiences and learning outcomes at Founder University
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