20VC: The Ultimate Guide to Scaling Marketplaces, Why Rule of 40 and EBITDA Optimisation is BS, How Founders & VCs Should Approach Market Sizing and Outcome Scenario Planning and Why Europe is Failing with Vinted CEO, Thomas Plantenga & Alex Taussig

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

🗓️ 12 February 2024

⏱️ 74 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Thomas Plantenga is the CEO @ Vinted, one of the fastest-growing marketplaces in the world with a valuation of $4.5BN. Prior to becoming CEO, Thomas worked with a range of organisations including Bookaboat, OLX, Sellit/Wallapop and FJLabs.

Alex Taussig is a General Partner @ Lightspeed and co-leads the fund's Consumer investment team. Alex's portfolio includes the likes of All Day Kitchens, Archive Resale, Daily Harvest, Faire, Found, Frubana, Keychain, Kikoff, Vinted, YaySay, and Zola.

In Today's Episode with Thomas Plantenga and Alex Taussig We Discuss:

1. The CEO Who Did Not Want to be CEO:

How did Thomas come to be CEO @ Vinted? Why did he not want the job at first?
What does Thomas know now that he wishes he had known when he started?

2. The Mechanics of the Fastest Growing Marketplace:

What is the single most important metric for Vinted?
How does Vinted determine what market to open next? What do they look for?
How does Vinted think about depth vs breadth in each country?
What is the AOV today? How does it vary by country?
How long does it take for each country to be cash flow positive?

3. The Biggest BS in Startups: Rule of 40 and EBITDA:

Why does Thomas think VC's obsession with "Rule of 40" is BS?
Why does Thomas believe EBITDA optimization is BS and useless?
What are the hardest elements of scaling a marketplace that no one knows?

4. The Bull, Bear and Investor Approach to Vinted:

Alex, what was Lightspeed's pre and post-mortem when investing in Vinted?
How does Lightspeed analyze TAM and market sizing when investing?
What was Lightspeed's single biggest concern when investing in Vinted?

5. Europe: A Hub of Innovation or a Retirement Home:

Does Thomas believe that European young people have a worse work ethic than those in the US?
Is Thomas concerned by the state of regulation hampering innovation in Europe?
What can be done to improve work ethic and the state of regulation today?
Why is Alex and Lightspeed more bullish than ever on Europe today?

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	What do you want to have, rather, a business that does a hundred million of free cash flow at
0:05.0	5%? Or do you want to have a business that does 5 million of free cash flow at 70%? 70%
0:12.7	EBITDA margin says nothing. It's about the absolute amount of EBITDAO free cash flow.
0:19.2	Like, a business is valued on money. More money that comes
0:22.7	freely out of it is better. This is 20 VC with me, Harry Stebbings, and this show was so much
0:27.8	fun to do. Today, we deep dive on one of the fastest growing marketplaces in the world, Vinted. They have
0:33.4	scaled into a monster challenging shine, Timu and more, and have a $4.5 billion valuation
0:39.8	to match it. Today, we sit down with Thomas Plantanga, Vinted CEO, and Alex Towsig, general
0:45.7	partner at Lightspeed, who sits on the Vinted board. This one gets very granular and so get
0:50.5	your notebooks out and enjoy, it's a special one. But before we dive into the show today, Hive is the marketplace for private stock.
0:57.8	Whether you run a fund, lead an investing syndicate, or invest solo,
1:01.9	Hive gives you unparalleled access to some of the most exciting companies in the world,
1:06.3	all before they go public.
1:08.0	Think Flexport, Reddit and Airtable, alongside many other companies I've featured
1:12.3	on the show. Secondaries are so much easier with Hive. Stay on top of the private market with free
1:17.5	access to volumes of real-time market data and enjoy Hive's automated trading experience with
1:23.2	thousands of trades across hundreds of unicorns. Hive is the fastest growing pre-IPO marketplace in the world.
1:29.3	Create a free account today at Hive.com forward slash 20VC.
1:34.3	That is Hive with 2Eys.com slash 20VC
1:38.3	and see why over 1,000 institutions and 10,000 accredited investors have joined Hive.
1:44.4	And if Hive provides incredible levels of access, Secureframe.
1:48.1	Secureframe provides incredible levels of trust to your customers through automation.
	...

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.