The MVP Show

Raising money from Apple Executives and Stephen Fry with Allen Liao | #21

For Spotify, Apple Podcasts and Youtube links go to: https://linktr.ee/MinimumViablePod [https://www.youtube.com/redirect?event=video_description&redir_token=QUFFLUhqblBHa1VXaENxMmxQMEwxWGtzekFJQjY4OW5KQXxBQ3Jtc0ttOTZuVGNyQm5rQ1A4SzNubFhFN1lEU2ZJeXBsczZMaXF3M3BvUUtnbGgzX0FpZzdTa2hmM2RYVFc4N3JRbTFaTEJnamxJSHFMYTRjVEZUMWlJQmtYTjhCWFlBUzVGMjNoN1JZUEtkMno2R0cxY2d6aw&q=https%3A%2F%2Flinktr.ee%2FMinimumViablePod&v=uPx_11Z661o]. Don't forget to SUBSCRIBE! Dropping out of uni to launch a start-up in his parent’s garage seemed crazy until some former Apple execs came knocking on this Aussie guy’s door. -- About Allen Liao After studying Electrical Engineering and Economics at the University of Sydney for two years, the 23-year-old dropped out and went to work in the basement of his familly home— building the world’s first unloseable sunglasses. After going viral on Time and WSJ, Allen and his team secured $60,000 worth of pre-orders in just 3 days. From there, he attracted some of the best investors in the world — Ron Johnson who built Apple retail from the ground up, Wordpress Founder Matt Mullenweg and even comedian Stephen Fry. -- Show Notes 0:00 Introduction 2:29 Genesis Story of Tzukuri 8:34 First Business, Prank Bills and NZ Federal Police 15:56 Kickstarting Tzukuri, $60k Pre-Orders in 3 days 20:18 Protyping Tzukuri v1 and Raising Capital From Apple Executives 28:48 Flying to Silicon Valley and Broken Prototypes 32:44 Constructing a Good Investor Story and Meeting with a16z 41:10 Manufacturing Complexity of Bluetooth in Sunglasses 45:32 Reflection, What Could Have Been Done Better? 50:57 Mental Health

How Eric Bahn Sold "Beat The GMAT" to The Daily Mail | #20

For Spotify, Apple Podcasts and Youtube links go to: https://linktr.ee/MinimumViablePod [https://www.youtube.com/redirect?event=video_description&redir_token=QUFFLUhqbnZ1RVpwX3hCbTlzbVVQLTVkNVItMVhjRjZKUXxBQ3Jtc0trYlVBVHFENHBJZTFHallmTTdCN0FjRHRmblZDbEthZjZEalhhUHQ0R2VBb1F5YnBVM1k0ZDhVbkZyeThEME5MMnFXSFN2WVRVeFZ5ZEdlbmRSUjNscEYxcWRzcjRDS3ptaHlRTW5OVUZXcV9zazJDTQ&q=https%3A%2F%2Flinktr.ee%2FMinimumViablePod&v=pX-CuG_xuGY]. Don't forget to SUBSCRIBE! About Eric Bahn Eric Bahn is a Co-Founder and General Partner at Hustle Fund, an early-stage venture capital firm based in San Francisco. Hustle Fund invests in software startups at the pre-seed and seed stages, backing founders who exhibit great execution and high velocity (aka, hustle). Previous to Hustle Fund, Eric was an angel investor and partner at 500Startups. And prior to becoming a professional investor, he spent over a decade as an operator (Facebook, Instagram) and entrepreneur (Beat The GMAT, The Hustle). Eric draws from his product and growth experience to advise his founders in scaling their own enterprises. Eric is a native of Detroit, Michigan and first arrived to Silicon Valley to attend Stanford University (BA, MA), which launched his career into software and startups. Eric is happily married with two kids. Show Notes 0:00 intro 1:05 What does great execution mean? 3:29 Tactical product building advice from Instagram and Facebook 7:41 How do you run a good experiment? 11:29 How to curb Novelty Effect? 14:34 Privilege in Silicon Valley and how to fix it 21:02 How important is it that a startup be based in San Francisco? 27:56 How Beat The GMAT started 33:22 How big is the GMAT market? 35:54 Rebuilding the GMAT today in a different vertical 39:34 The story of how Daily Mail bought Beat the GMAT 44:16 How do you view failure? 48:29 How to stand out amongst the crowd in the Hustle Fund screening process? 52:53 Fun questions to wrap up

Building a Million Person Startup City with Michael Batko (Startmate CEO) | #19

For Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Youtube and Website Links go to: https://linktr.ee/MinimumViablePod. Don't forget to SUBSCRIBE! About Michael Batko Michael started as a business student following the traditional path into consulting and corporate life (Amex, PwC, KPMG) ...but then fell in love with the startup world growing two start-ups from a team of 2 to 5 (madpaws.com.au) and 10 to 50+ (expert360.com), including a $AUD 13M Series B capital raise. He then joined Startmate as their Head of Operations and is now CEO.  Shownotes 0:00 Introduction 0:52 From Intern to Startmate CEO in 4 Years 7:25 Startmate Business Model 15:20 Relationship between Blackbird and Startmate 18:39 Building a 1 million person startup city 27:28 BatkoOS and Productivity Hacks, Emoji Shortcuts and What CEO's Do 30:28 Emoji Shortcut 34:00 What does a CEO do? 36:00 Difference between CEO of 2 and 20 38:36 Clearly communicating vision and strategy to 30 people 45:25 Who do you think of when you hear the word successful?

#18 - The Art And Science Of Valuation with 10K-Diver

This week's episode is sponsored by https://gems.closingbell.co. Sign up to this free newsletter for undervalued stocks w/ momentum and conversations from pro investors.  For Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Youtube and Website Links go to: https://linktr.ee/MinimumViablePod. Don't forget to SUBSCRIBE! -- For Episode 18 of The MVP Show I talk with a very special and different guest - 10k Diver.  With over 230k followers, 10k Diver has become the go to educational resource for finance and investing.  In this episode we cover: 0:00 State of the public markets 10:32 Is inflation here to stay 14:36 Breaking down Financial Statements 19:05 Float in Businesses (i.e. Starbucks) 28:02 Normalising financials 35:26 Things novice investors overlook in the Balance Sheet 40:23 Management, Capital Allocation, and Buybacks 48:51 Match.com 52:04 Who do you think of when you hear the word successful? You can follow 10K Diver on: - https://twitter.com/10kdiver [You can follow 10K Diver on: - https://twitter.com/10kdiver, and - https://10kdiver.com/twitter-threads/], and  - https://10kdiver.com/twitter-threads/ [ https://10kdiver.com/twitter-threads/]

#17 - How to build a hiring process like Canva | Mahesh Muralidhar

For Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Youtube and Website Links go to: https://linktr.ee/MinimumViablePod. Don't forget to SUBSCRIBE! --  Currently focussed on supporting and developing the New Zealand startup ecosystem via Phase One Ventures.  Mahesh has held multiple executive roles in some of Australia's most iconic startups. He has experienced how to build a global Unicorn from ground up as an early employee and the first Head of People at Canva (SAAS) helping to scale to 200+ people. He had the opportunity to drive operational excellence, helping Airtasker (marketplace) become profitable, go global and go public. He was the COO at Simply Wall St (Fintech), as it hit an inflection point setting up the right foundations for it to accelerate and grow.  You can follow along with Mahesh here: - https://www.linkedin.com/in/maheshmuralidhar [https://www.linkedin.com/in/maheshmuralidhar] - https://www.phaseone.ventures/ [https://www.phaseone.ventures/] --  In this episode, we talk about: - Mahesh's relentless hustle, getting Uber as a client through Tim Tams - Getting hired by Mel and Cliff at Canva to run their People Operations - Canva's hiring process, how to hire an A+ team  - Setting expectations w/ the Board, getting alignment - Working at Airtasker as VP People Operations and Simply Wall Street as COO - Supporting the NZ Startup Ecosystem and more...