20 VC 096: Developing The Idea Muscle and VCs Providing More Than Just Money with Dharmesh Raithatha, Partner @ Forward Partners

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

The Twenty Minute VC

Finance, Venturecapital, Tech News, News, Siliconvalley, Technology, Investing, Startups, Business

4.4 • 637 Ratings

🗓️ 14 December 2015

⏱️ 26 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Dharmesh Raithatha is the Product Partner at Forward Partners. He works with idea stage investments on product, growth and business strategy. He has a passion for User Research, Lean UX and using data to inform decision making. Dharmesh has over 15 years in product roles for companies like Mind Candy and the BBC. He has founded 2 startups and successfully sold one. A special thank you to Mattermark for providing all the data used in today's episode and can find out more about Mattermark here!

In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

1.) How did Dharmesh make his way into the world of VC?

2.) How has Dharmesh's startup driven past, altered his investment pattern? What are the benefits and weaknesses to this kind of operational experience?

3.) At Forward there Open Office Hours where people come and share ideas, so what is it about the ideas you like that make them good, what makes the bad ones bad?

4.) What are Dharmesh's tips or advice for idea creation and brainstorming?

5.) What would Dharmesh advice non-technical people looking to found a tech startup?

6.) What does Dharmesh believe makes a great founder? Has he seen any commonalities in the great founders he has worked with?

7.) What should teams focus on in the first 100 days of their startup? What is the 20% that produces 80% of the results?

Items Mentioned In Today's Show:

Dharmesh's Fave Book: How To Create A Product Customers Love by Marty Cagan

Dharmesh's Fave Newsletter: Silicon Valley Product Group

Dharmesh's Most Recent Investment: The Gifting Company

As always you can follow Harry, The Twenty Minute VC and Dharmesh on Twitter here!

If you would like to see a more colourful side to Harry with many a mojito session, you can follow him on Instagram here!

I would like to say a huge thank you to our sponsor for today's show: LoyaltyBay. Have you ever wished more of your website visitors would convert into a sale, signup or referral? If so, you need Loyalty Bay. With their saas conversion optimizer tool they increase any conversion metric by offering potential customers a choice of personalised rewards to get them to convert. They work with large enterprises like Virgin Media through to startups and have increased conversions on average by over 100%. Free 30 day trial at www.loyaltybay.co.uk

Transcript

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0:00.0	You're listening to the 20-minute VC and I'm your host, Harry Stebbings, and this week I'm delighted to announce we will be featuring the fantastic Ford partners in London.
0:10.2	They're an incredible fund with a specific focus on e-commerce ideas and making them into strong businesses.
0:17.3	Some of their portfolio companies include Taxi-Hailing app Halo, one of the most promising fintech
0:23.5	startups to come out of Europe in the last decade in the form of Zopa, and the insane appear here,
0:29.9	started by Ross Bailey, who was only 19 at the time of creating the company.
0:34.5	Joining us from Ford today is their head of product and tech, Darmesh Ritaph,
0:39.4	simply put, Darmesh helps Ford startups build great products. He has a background in artificial
0:45.1	intelligence and most recently worked as an employee at high-growth startup mine candy, the parent
0:51.4	company of popular game Moshi Monster. If that wasn't enough, he's also
0:55.3	founded two startups himself and successfully exited one of them. But before we dive into the show
1:01.2	today, have you ever wished more of your website visitors would convert into a sale, sign up or
1:07.3	referral? If so, you need loyalty bay. With their SaaS conversion optimiser tool,
1:13.3	they increase any conversion metric by offering potential customers a choice of personalised
1:18.4	rewards to get them to convert and increasing conversions on average by over 100%.
1:24.9	All you have to do is head on over to www.loyaltybay.com.
1:29.3	For a free 30-day trial or follow them on Twitter at Loyalty Bay LTD to stay updated.
1:37.4	However, it is now time to proceed with the show.
1:40.0	So without further ado, I would like to introduce the man of the moment,
1:43.7	Darmesh Ritather, at Forward Partners.
1:50.8	You have now arrived at your destination.
1:55.3	Darmesh, welcome to the 20 minute VC. It's a great pleasure to have you on the show.
1:59.1	Thanks so much for joining us today.
	...

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