20VC: One Question Founders Must Ask Themselves When Approaching Investor Selection, Why Series B Is One Of The Most Challenging Phases & What Makes For A Successful CEO Transition with Jeff Russakow, CEO @ Boosted
The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch
The Twenty Minute VC
4.4 • 637 Ratings
🗓️ 5 April 2019
⏱️ 37 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Jeff Russakow is the CEO @ Boosted, the startup producing vehicle grade electric skateboards rethinking how we travel. To date, they have raised $74m in funding from the likes of Khosla Ventures, iNovia Capital, Andreessen Horowitz and our friends at Initialized. Prior to Boosted, Jeff was CEO @ Gimbal where he doubled revenue in his first year and added 80 new enterprise clients. Before that, Jeff was the CEO @ Findly where he grew the company to 450 employees and 20m end users. Jeff also enjoyed prior roles with the likes of Symantec, Adobe, SAP and Yahoo.
In Today’s Episode You Will Learn:
1.) How Jeff made his way from leading enterprise CEO to re-thinking the way we travel today as CEO of Boosted?
2.) How does Jeff analyse the current sentiment to fundraising in the valley, specifically with regards to business construction? How has Jeff seen the investor class fundamentally transition over the last 20 years? When approaching investor selection, what is the 1 question that Jeff always asks? Where do founders often make mistakes here?
3.) Having raised the $60m round in 2018, how does Jeff approach the theme of capital efficiency today with Boosted? How does Jeff determine when is the right time to pour fuel on the fire? Why is Series B often the most challenging phase when considering the focus on unit economics and vision simultaneously?
4.) What is Jeff's gut reaction to the statement, "hardware is hard"? Why does Jeff feel this to be a glib statement that misses the point? How does Jeff respond to the criticism of the commodity element of hard, easy to replicate and copy? How would Jeff like to see the investor class change their mindset to hardware? What is the right way to approach it?
5.) What are the core elements required for a successful CEO transition? For a potentially incoming CEO, what must they be wary of with regards to the information conveyed to them by investors of the company? Where has Jeff seen many go wrong in CEO transitions? What can the founders do to make this process as smooth as possible?
Items Mentioned In Today’s Show:
Jeff’s Fave Book: The Missing Piece
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Welcome back to the 20 minute VC with me, Harry Stebbings. It'd be great to see you on Instagram at H. |
| 0:04.5 | Stebbing's 1996 with 2Bs. And there you can suggest both feedback and guests for upcoming episodes. |
| 0:10.0 | However, to our wonderful guest today, and I'm very excited to welcome Jeff Russocal, CEO at Boosted. electric skateboards, rethinking how we travel. To date, they've raised $74 million in funding |
| 0:21.5 | from the likes of coastal adventures, Inovia Capital, Andreson Horrors, and our friends from last |
| 0:26.3 | episode with Gary Tan at initialised capital. Prior to boosted, Jeff was CEO at Gimble, |
| 0:30.9 | where he doubled revenue in his first year and added 80 new enterprise clients. And before that, |
| 0:35.4 | Jeff was the CEO at Findlay, where he grew the company |
| 0:37.7 | to 450 employees and 20 million end users. Jeff also enjoyed prior roles with the lights |
| 0:42.9 | of Symantec, Adobe, SAP and Yahoo. But before we jump into the show's date, I want to spend |
| 0:47.9 | a minute to talk about Brex, the first corporate card for startups. Brex founders Enrique and |
| 0:52.6 | Pedro built a payments business in Brazil, |
| 0:54.8 | but found themselves rejected for a corporate card when they were in Y Combinator. They decided to |
| 0:59.2 | build Brex with instant online sign-up, no founder liability required, and limits 10 to 20 times |
| 1:04.9 | higher than standard cards. Pretty incredible, I know, and you can sign up for Brex and get |
| 1:08.8 | fees wavered by entering the code Harry during |
| 1:11.3 | sign up. Honestly, it really is such a special service. And speaking of Brex, an incredible |
| 1:15.8 | high-growth company. Well, a lot of what we do on the 20-minute VC is talk to experts, |
| 1:20.0 | pick the brains of founders and investors who tell us which trends to watch out for, offer tips |
| 1:24.2 | on fundraising, and teach us how to excel at any company stage. And although there's |
| 1:28.0 | no playbook for building a great business, we can certainly learn from people who've done it before. |
| 1:32.4 | Beyond listening to this podcast and talking to mentors and advisors in your own network, it's |
| 1:36.8 | important to have resources you can turn to when you're tackling a new challenge. Stripe has built |
... |
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