Founder Smart - Startup Podcast

In this Episode, Susanne & Patrick, and I talking to Cooper Jones, co-founder, and CEO of Rah Rah. Rah rah is a platform that helps college students to make sense of campus life and, for example, book activities and services. Cooper and his co-founder started their entrepreneurial journey with Rah Rah while being still employed at Accenture. They took a leap of faith, quit their jobs and Cooper even liquidated his retirement savings plus took on a loan to start Rah Rah. This is what I call skin in the game. Cooper talks about how he got started when he knew it was time to quit his job and how he raised $2.8 million from Angels. If this is the first time listening to foundersmart, we make podcasts about entrepreneurship that are fun and informative. Hit subscribe so that you don’t miss any of our episodes and consider giving us 5 stars. And now without further due, give it away to Cooper Jones of Rah Rah.

Just imagine, you graduated from Harvard in Theology and become a pastor. And then, you leave everything behind and start a software company that is providing language and translation services. You raise venture capital, move from Texas to California and are all in on your start-up. From pastor to start-up founder sounds crazy to you? Well, this is exactly what Josh Daneschfruuz, co-founder and CEO of Lango did! Josh talks to us about how he found his first customers and how he managed to raise a seed round of $2 million US dollars, and also why the path he took from pastor and entrepreneur is actually not that far apart as we might think.

Thank you for tuning into Founder Smart. Your podcast about entrepreneurship. Finding the right co-founder, and validating your idea without spending a fortune are two topics that are really important for anyone who is getting serious about starting their own business. The one question I always get when I talk about my journey as an entrepreneur is: how did you meet your co-founders and where can I find my co-founder? This week, we talked to Alessandra Henderson, CEO, and co-founder of Elektra about how she met her co-founder, how she validated her start-up idea, and what it means to run a company smashing the taboo of menopause.

Hello and welcome to another founder smart episode. Today, we’re talking to Todd Heine a successful US immigration attorney turned founder! Forbes Magazine crowned Todd the US Visa Whisperer, as he helped many founders with their work visa. Todd is now going strong with his company Legalpad, and recently raised a $10 million Series A. In this episode, Todd will give us some hints which Visas may be a fit for foreign founders who want to start their company in the US; he also talks about his fundraising process - he raised $10 million - he knows how to do that - and also shares his wisdom of hiring the right team members. Have fun with this episode!

It’s Wednesday and you know exactly what’s coming: a new episode of founder smart! Today, our guest is Jose Herrera, co-founder, and CEO of Hire Horatio. Jose is talking about how his job at Wall Street prepared him to run his startup. Horatio also made money from day one, so he and his co-founders had their destiny in their own hands and didn’t have to rely on investors giving them money to build and grow their startup. Now, Horatio has 200 employees and is going from strength to strength. 

Welcome to another founder smart episode, this time with Daniela Corrente, who is the CEO & co-founder of Reel, a fintech startup that helps consumers to save up, so that they don’t have to take on debt when they shop. In this episode, Daniela explains that Reel was initially just a side hustle and why she decided that Reel was something she wanted to do full time eventually. As an entrepreneur who raised millions for her start-up, she will also talk about how she approached fundraising and how she transitioned her team from the HQ office in Los Angeles to a company with a remote working culture. If this is the first time listening to our podcast, Patrick and Susanne are entrepreneurs based out of Los Angeles in the United States. We make podcasts about entrepreneurship that are informative and cover founder and investor stories. If you like our podcast, please subscribe so that you don’t miss any of our future episodes and now have fun with Daniela’s story!

It’s Wednesday, we all know what this means: a new Founder Smart episode. Today, our guest is Michael Maylan, co-founder and COO of Stasis Labs and a fellow Forbes 30 under 30. Stasis is a really awesome company in the digital health space, that is actually saving lives. Learn how Michael raised millions for Stasis Labs, what he thinks about team building and recruitment and what he wished he would have known before he started his company.  Now have fun with Michael’s story.

It is time for another Founder Smart episode. Today our guest is Ariel Elizarov, Co-Founder and CEO of Lazarus, a startup in the digital health space that helps doctors to catch cancer early. We talked with Ariel about how he used data and machine learning to build his first product. We also discuss fundraising strategy and best practice when it comes to hiring first employees. This episode will be a little bit more technical, but it’s still fun and I’m sure you will learn a lot from Ariel, who went to the prestigious Columbia University in New York to study Neuroscience and later dropped out of Harvard to work full-time on Lazarus.

Today we’re talking to Brandon Fassberg, Founder of the Avocado Club.

We talk about how to start a food business and what you need to know when considering crowdfunding such as Kickstarter for your startup.

We hope you enjoy this week's episode and we will see you next time!

Today we’re doing something a little different. BBC host Quentin Cooper spoke to Susanne about how we transitioned from MindMate to Citruslabs. We talk about all highs and lows and what you can do when facing the decision should I continue or pivot to a new idea. As always, if you like this episode please subscribe so you don’t miss out on any future episode. And now have fun with this week’s episode.

On today's podcast, we welcome Sara Bates, Co-Founder & CEO of MamaMend the go-to resource for childbirth, recovery, and postpartum health. We talk about bootstrapping, when it’s the right time to raise a round and how Sara, who’s background is actually in finance ended up founding a women’s health startup, after spending some time at Wall Street! As always enjoy this weeks episode and share the love :) 

For this week's episode, we talked to Anuj Bhalla, Founder & CEO of servicemob. Anuj is an ex-management consultant turned entrepreneur. He has over 10 years of consulting work under his belt and shares in this episode how he handled the transition from high salary to no salary; how his background benefits his startup now and why he thinks that doing an MBA at MIT - Massachusetts Institute of Technology before starting his business was helpful.

Our guest today is Jay Kapoor, a Venture Capitalist, Angel Investor, and an all-around great guy. Today we talk fundraising with a special focus on your first round of venture capital. What are investors looking for in startups, hint, Jay looks at the team, product, and opportunity; and could it be better to wait a little longer to raise your round? Learn all this and much more in this week’s founder smart episode.

Today we’re talking to Maex Ament. Maex is a successful serial entrepreneur with multiple exits under his belt. Maex, a founder with multiple exits under his belt, shares his take on Silicon Valley, why he went there in the first place, and also why he left again, and also covers strategies that entrepreneurs in highly regulated industries like the Fintech industry can do to make their lives easier.

Our guest today is Alyssa Petersel, who is CEO and Co-Founder of MyWellbeing a leading platform in the mental health space. Today we talk about starting a business as a solo founder and how to take care of your mental health during the ups and downs of startup life. We hope you enjoy this episode as much as we did. 

Today we are talking to Matt Volm about his experience of shutting down his startup Tali.

Matt shares the mistakes he made and talks about strategies on what founders can do to spot problems early.

He also talks about how he landed on his feet and how he is now a scout investor at one of his previous investors.

Have fun!

Today we are talking to Ben Taylor, who is the co-founder and CEO of Softledger, a FinTech startup in the accounting space.

With Ben, we talk about how to start a business in a highly regulated industry, why he thinks accelerators can make a difference and how he thinks the future of FinTech will look like.

Have fun!

Our guest today is Monique Villa, who is an investor with Mucker Capital, a venture fund based out of Los Angeles. One of Mucker's capitals portfolio companies Honey just was sold for $4 billion to PayPal.

Today we’re talking about what investors are looking for in startups and strategies on how to approach investors the right way.

Monique also shares why raising investment should not be the main focus of any startup.

Have fun!

Our guest today is Yashar Faranjani, who is co-founder and CEO of dental hardware startup smiletronix.

We talk about the difficulties of starting a hardware startup and discuss strategies on how to overcome those difficulties.

We also talk about the exciting and upcoming startup hub Barcelona which offers an amazing value for money in comparison to many European and US cities.

Last but not least, we discuss strategies on how to raise investment during a pandemic.

Have fun!

Heute geht es um das Thema: Krise! Der Coronavirus legt gerade überall auf der Welt das soziale Leben und die Wirtschaft lahm. Einige Wirtschaftsgurus sagen bereits eine größere Krise als die im Jahr 2008 voraus. Wir wollen heute darüber reden, was ihr als Gründer machen könnt, um gestärkt aus diesen harten Zeiten hervorzukommen.

Heute geht es das Thema Start-up Accelerator. Im Detail wollen wir uns auf den Accelerator Techstars fokussieren, der einer der besten Accelerator Progamme der Welt ist. Wir haben das Programm in 2016 erfolgreich durchlaufen und wollen euch heute mehr über das Programm erzählen und euch Tipps und Tricks verraten wie ihr bei Techstars oder anderen Accelerator erfolgreich bewerben könnt und das Maximum aus dem Programm für euer Startup herausholen könnt.. Viel Spass bei der heutigen Folge

Auch beim Thema des heutigen Podcasts geht es wieder um Investment. Letztes mal haben wir die Top 10 Fragen die Investoren gerne stellen besprochen. Heute geht es um die Fragen die du einem Investor stellen solltest.

Und heute geht es um die Investoren Fragerunde, die Q&A nach dem Pitch und wir reden um die Top 10, die Top 10 Fragen die die Investoren euch stellen werden, UND, warum die Investoren das fragen. Heißt, was wollen die da von euch eigentlich wissen?

In der heutigen Sendung geht es um das Thema Fundraising mit dem Fokus auf die perfekte Vorbereitung. Wir sprechen über:

• Was ist Due Diligence
• Welche Materialien brauche ich für Investoren
• Wie sieht das perfekte Pitch Deck aus
• Brauche ich eine Financial Model 
• Wie finde ich die richtigen Investoren
• Wie bekomme ich eine Meeting mit einem Investor
• Und vieles mehr...

Viel Spass bei der heutigen Folge wünschen euch Susanne & Patrick

In der heutigen Folge geht es um das Thema "das erste Investment". Wir besprechen unter anderem:

• Was ist der Unterschied zwischen einer Pre-seed Runde und einer Seed-Runde
• Welche Typen von Investoren investieren kann ich für das erste Investment ansprechen
• Was wollen Investoren von mir wissen
• Und vieles mehr...

Heute geht es um das Thema: Silicon Valley. Sehnsuchtsort vieler deutscher Startup Gründer. Aber: muss man wirklich ins Silicon Valley um erfolgreich zu sein? Patrick und ich haben dazu sehr viel zu sagen und werden das Thema Silicon Valley diskutieren. Wir haben 5 Themen ausgewählt die wichtig sind wenn man sich für ein Standort für sein Startup entscheidet. 

• Kosten
  
• Mitarbeiter
  
• Talent
  
• Investment
  
• Netzwerk
  
• Genereller Vibe der Stadt

Heute geht es um das Thema: Der erste Kunde. Wir fokussieren uns under anderem auf:

• Eine Schritt für Schritt Anleitung wie wir den ersten Kunden gewonnen haben
• Welche Sales Tools haben wir verwendet?
• Was mache ich wenn mein erster Kunde ein Flop ist?
• Was sind die grössten Fehler die wir bisher gemacht haben?
• Und vieles mehr...

Heute geht es um das Thema Produkt. Wir befassen uns mit den Fragen:

• Wie komme ich von einer Idee zu einem Produkt?
• Wie kann ich einen Prototypen kostengünstig entwickeln?
• Wie validiere ich meine Hypothesen mit meinem Prototypen?
• Wie bekomme ich den ersten Kunden?
• Und vieles mehr...
  
  
  

Du hast eine gute Startup Idee, bist dir aber nicht sicher, ob du lieber alleine gründen solltest oder einen Mitgründer an Board holen sollst? Du hast bereits jemanden gefunden mit dem du ein Startup gründen möchtest? 

Patrick und Susanne diskutieren die wichtigsten Punkte rund um das Thema Mitgründer / Co-Founder: 

- Solopreneur vs. Co-Founder Team - was ist besser?
- Kompetenzen des Gründungsteams
- Rollen & Titelverteilung im Gründungsteam
- Unternehmensanteile: wie viel Prozente bekommen die Gründungsmitglieder?
- Wie feuert man einen Co-Founder und was muss ich sonst noch so beachten, wenn man einen Co-Founder anstellt (Vertrag, Vesting etc.)

Wie started man eigentlich ein Unternehmen? Wie findet man eine Idee und braucht man gleich Investment? Die beiden Unternehmer Susanne Mitschke und Patrick Renner sprechen über Motivationen, Ideenfindung sowie alternative Investment-Möglichkeiten und erklären wie der Start bei ihnen so verlaufen ist und was sie anderen Gründern raten würden.