20VC: How To Build Credibility with Investors, Employees and Customers, How To Determine When A Stretch VP is A Stretch Too Far and The Right Way For Founders To Think About Dilution with Amol Deshpande, Founder & CEO @ Farmers Business Network

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

🗓️ 21 September 2018

⏱️ 32 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Amol Deshpande is the Co-Founder and CEO at Farmers Business Network, the farmer-to-farmer agronomic information network improving the livelihood of farmers by making data useful and accessible. To date, they have raised a whopping $193m in funding from the likes of Kleiner Perkins, T Rowe, GV, Temasek and more. As for Amol, prior to FBN, he was a Partner @ Kleiner Perkins where he invested in the likes of Harvest Power and Agilyx and before Kleiner, Amol was a Director @ Black River Asset Management.

In Today’s Episode You Will Learn:

1.) How Amol made his way into the world of startups, came to be a Partner @ Kleiner Perkins and then came to change the world of farming with Farmers Business Network?

2.) What were Amol's biggest takeaways from his time with Kleiner? Although important to think really big, how does Amol think about the Peter Thiel School of Thought, starting in a very small niche and expanding? Where does Amol see many founders go wrong when it comes to market size and assessment?

3.) How does Amol believe the very best CEOs hire the very best talent? What core characteristics does Amol look for when adding to his exec team? What are the leading questions and indicators that would excite/concern Amol? Why does Amol believe the smartest people do not always make the best hires? What are the core signs that a stretch VP is a stretch too far?

4.) What is the key to success for founders in building credibility with customers, investors and their board? What is the most challenging element of credibility building? Where does Amol see many founders go wrong and lose credibility today? How does your approach have to alter according to which class of individual you are looking to build with?

5.) How does Amol fundamentally approach the topic of capital efficiency? What does Amol believe is the right way for founders to think about dilution when raising? How does Amol determine when is the right time to raise big and pour fuel on the fire?

Items Mentioned In Today’s Show:

Amol’s Fave Book: Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln

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

Likewise, you can follow Harry on Instagram here for mojito madness and all things 20VC.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	Welcome back to the 20 minute VC with your host Harry Stebbings.
0:02.9	It would be awesome to welcome you behind the scenes here at the 20 minute VC,
0:06.2	which mostly includes gym sessions and book recommendations,
0:08.9	but you can do that on Instagram at H. Stebbings, 1996.
0:12.3	But to the show today, and what many don't know is I have a super nerdy passion
0:15.7	for businesses that, as I call it, submarine their way to success.
0:19.2	Maybe they're not as well known as the big brands, but they absolutely kill it in their space.
0:23.2	And that's the case with our episode today, as I welcome Amal Deshpande to the Hot Seat.
0:27.4	Now Amal is the founder and CEO at Farmers Business Network,
0:30.7	the Farmer to Farmer Agronomic Information Network, improving the livelihood of farmers
0:34.9	by making data useful and accessible. To date, they've raised a whopping $193 million in funding from the likes of Kleiner Perkins,
0:42.4	Tiro, GV, Temasek, and more.
0:44.9	As for Amal, prior to Farmer's business network, he was a partner at Kleiner Perkins,
0:48.5	where he invested in the lights of Harvest Power and Agilix.
0:51.5	And before Kleiner, Amor was a director at Black River Asset Management. And I do
0:55.5	also want to say a huge thank you to my friend Andrew Dudam at Hymns. For the intro to today,
0:59.4	I really do so appreciate that, Andrew. But before we dive in with Amol, thanks to my friends at
1:03.8	Wepay, let me introduce you to another very cool player in the space, Fuse Bill. Fuse Bill is a
1:08.4	subscription billing management platform designed for rapid growth businesses.
1:12.1	Why do hundreds of companies use it to bill more than 10 million customers a year?
1:15.6	Well, FuseBills' flexible, ledger-based product simplifies all aspects of recurring billing and
1:20.4	invoicing, meaning users can efficiently and confidently maximize their revenue at all stages
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from The Twenty Minute VC, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of The Twenty Minute VC and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.