20VC: Notion's Founder on "Founder Mode": When it Works & When it Doesn't | Why The Way Startups Fundraise & Construct Boards is Broken | Raising at a $10BN Valuation in Peak Bubble Times and How Notion Has More Money Than Ever Before with Akshay Kothari

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

🗓️ 18 September 2024

⏱️ 49 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Akshay Kothari is Co-Founder at Notion, one of the fastest-growing companies of the last decade. Akshay has run every function in the company from sales, to marketing to finance and even led their fundraising efforts raising $340M+ from Sequoia, Index and Coatue with the latest round pricing them at $10BN. Before Notion, Akshay was VP Product at Linkedin for 5+ years, leading all of their content efforts. He joined LinkedIn when his previous company, Pulse, was acquired by LinkedIn in 2013.

In Today's Episode with Akshay Kothari We Discuss:

1. Founder Mode, Veto Powers and Focus:

Does Akshay agree with "founder mode"? What are the biggest downsides to founder mode that not enough people are discussing?
Why does Akshay believe that the single greatest power of a founder is their "veto power"?
What is the biggest opportunity that Notion jumped on that they should not have done?
What is the biggest opportunity that Notion did not jump on that they should have jumped on?

2. Raising $50M @ $2BN Valuation:

Why did Ivan and Akshay decide to do this raise when they did not even need the money?
How did the fundraising process for this round go? Why did they choose Coatue and Index?
Why did Sequoia say no to this round?
With the benefit of hindsight, what does Akshay wish that they had done differently?

3. Raising $270M @ $10BN Valuation:

How did Sequoia come back into the frame with this round? Why did they say yes here when they did not before?
Why does Akshay believe that of all the investor brands, Sequoia is the most powerful? In what way does having Sequoia as an investor change the trajectory of the company?
Is Akshay concerned about how he will be able to scale into the $10BN valuation?
How does Akshay address the challenge of bringing new team members in with stock options priced at $10BN? How much of a blocker is that?

4. Boards and Social Media are F*******:

How is the way in which boards are constructed broken?
How does Akshay believe that boards should be constructed?
What roles should founders hire for in their board members?
Why is Akshay most concerned about the "Tiktokification of everything"?
Why does Akshay believe that social media has never been more concerning?

Transcript

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0:00.0	Founder mode is really good if you have a founder who's right a lot. If they're not, God bless that
0:05.6	company. There's more cash in Notions Bank today than the history of its race. So it's like in some
0:11.8	ways, like we've produced cash. We haven't spent any of it. I think the thing I would say about Sequoia,
0:16.8	I think it is probably the best brand. Similar to how we demand excellence from our employees,
0:23.6	I think they demand excellence from their companies.
0:26.2	Welcome back to 20 VC with me, Harry Stebbings,
0:28.8	and today we have the man who makes the show at Notion run smoothly in the hot seat.
0:33.4	Atshay Kthari.
0:34.6	Akshay is the co-founder at Notion,
0:36.4	and he has run almost every function in the company.
0:39.4	From sales to marketing to finance, he's even led their fundraising efforts, raising over $340 million
0:46.5	from Sequoia, Index and Co2, with the latest round, pricing them at $10 billion.
0:53.2	Before Notion, Akshsha was VP of Product at LinkedIn for five years,
0:57.3	and he joined LinkedIn when his previous company Pulse was acquired by them in 2013.
1:02.9	But before we dive in today, all of you listening use tons of software every day. Sometimes it
1:07.9	fills us with rage. You can't figure something out. The chatbot in the bottom right is useless.
1:12.6	You keep getting bombarded with these useless pop-ups. And for those of you who build products, no one wants their product to feel like this.
1:19.6	Thankfully, a company exists to help users without annoying them. Command bar. It does a couple of very helpful things.
1:25.6	First, it's a chatbot that uses AI to give users
1:28.6	extremely personalized responses and deflect tickets. But it can be beyond just text. It can also
1:34.0	co-brows with the user and show them how to do things inside the UI. Magic. But it can also
1:39.3	detect when users would benefit from a proactive nudge, like a helpful hint, or an invitation to start a free trial.
	...

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