SPEAKER_00
If your days off happen to be Saturday and Sunday every week, then you will not have a place at Corgi. I don't sleep a lot. I think the average night, probably three to four hours. So you literally live in the office? Yeah, I have a mattress there.
SPEAKER_01
Would you rather Corgi was a trillion dollar company, but you died at 50, or it was a fail and you lived till you were 80? I think the answer to that is pretty easy.
SPEAKER_00
Welcome to Corgi Insurance, the most insane workplace culture in America.
SPEAKER_01
Joining me in the hot seat today, their co-founder and CEO, Nico, who just closed their latest funding round, valuing them at a whopping two and a half billion dollars. Yeah, I get a lot of backlash. The death threats and the DMs. People think I'm nuts.
SPEAKER_00
I think the number of good companies is very small. Ready to go?
SPEAKER_00
Nico, dude, I am so excited for this. I was more excited, I have to admit, for this than I am almost any other show in the way that, one, I think we align.
SPEAKER_01
And two, I think we align on something that's rather different. So, one, thank you for joining me, dude. Yeah, thanks for having me. I'm often struck with great CEOs. What is it that motivates you? Is it the fear of losing or is it the thrill of winning? I think you can't be afraid of losses. Losses are beautiful because you can have asymmetric upside with winning.
SPEAKER_00
So I think you have to love winning and you have to love the victories.
SPEAKER_01
And yeah, I think Jeff Bezos said something a number of years ago that has always really stuck with me in that he gave it as a baseball analogy. Very American. In baseball, there's four bases and you can score a maximum of three bases and the home plate, but you can score a maximum of four runs when you're at bat.
SPEAKER_00
So if you go up to bat and every single time you swing, you try to hit the ball out of the park, that's a losing strategy in baseball a lot of the time because the upside is capped. You have maximum of four runs, but your probability of striking out of scoring nothing is quite high. In business, it doesn't quite work like that because instead of four runs resulting from a home run, a home run might result in actually infinite upside. It might result in something like AWS popping out of nowhere. So I really think seeking asymmetric upside or infinite upside, uncapped upside with capped downside is the core of business and taking a lot of shots on goal.
SPEAKER_00
And if you look at people who started important things, not every single thing they did work. Napoleon was the best general of all time, but he didn't win every single battle. He won more battles than average, certainly more than most other generals. I don't think the fear of losing can really motivate you because otherwise you just become this creature afraid of doing anything. I totally agree. I spoke to Josh Young on your team and he said that Nico is probably the most aggressive person I've ever met. He sets goals that might seem unrealistic to others.
SPEAKER_00
When you think about the most aggressive thing you've done, I was going to ask you, what did you do that was too aggressive? But I actually get asked that all the time. And I think that's totally the wrong framing because nothing's too aggressive. [SPEAKER_01] So I'm going to ask you instead, what were you not aggressive enough on with the benefit of hindsight?
SPEAKER_01
I think going to university, going to college, that was a big mistake. Why? You know, if you want to do big things, you need to go out in the wilderness a little bit and be humbled. You need to metaphorically get beat up. You need to go through the lows before you go through the highs. And I wasted some amount of time in my life doing that. [SPEAKER_00] Do you think university carries less weight than ever today?
SPEAKER_00
[SPEAKER_01] I don't know if it carries less weight or more weight. I don't really think about that because you make your own weight in life.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] You can go through the high-parated structure and you can just go out and make your own.
SPEAKER_00
So I think the process of going through a company is building that legitimacy. And I think that's why people try to point to things like the idea of tier one investors as a way to borrow that legitimacy. So universities, I suppose, the point is to give a credential that carries some legitimacy. Otherwise, you wouldn't do it.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] You can learn all the material online.
SPEAKER_00
You can learn all the material with an LOM much better than you can from some professor. But I don't think the credential of a university actually conveys the legitimacy that it ought to. I think it's a bit too naked on the nose. It almost reminds me of Marc Andreessen where he says essentially when a company is invested in by a fund, the fund is loaning them the brand and the validity that the brand name of the fund has until the company is big enough where then it transitions. And Corgi then loans the brand to Kanye or to JD at TCV. And it's the other way around. Do you see what I mean? [SPEAKER_01] It's the legitimacy of brand. [SPEAKER_01] Yeah. [SPEAKER_01] Yeah.
SPEAKER_00
[SPEAKER_01] I mean, he also says, do you want to be liked or do you want to win? [SPEAKER_01] So I think if you talk to a lot of founders, there's often a perception that capital is fungible.
SPEAKER_01
What we're seeing with the perception of funds and the idea of value add and tiers of investors is that perhaps capital isn't so fungible after all. [SPEAKER_00] Why does he say that? [SPEAKER_00] I don't think Apple was invested in by Sequoia, but I think it'd be very unlikely that Steve Jobs would ever go flexing that Apple was a Sequoia company. [SPEAKER_00] That would feel very strange. [SPEAKER_00] That'd be very unusual.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] But now it's not unusual to, when describing a company, say it's a tier one company or it's a YC company or it's this company or that company with the descriptor being their investors to signify something about the way that the company acts or ought to be. [SPEAKER_00] And it's a bit unusual because people will say that out of one side of their mouth.
SPEAKER_00
Then the other side of their mouth, they'll acknowledge that when they invest in companies, they can't do anything about their investment. If the team's incompetent or if they're making bad decisions, then that's a really hard thing to solve. No, that is 100% true. company or it's a YC company or it's this company or that company with the descriptor being their investors to signify something about the way that the company acts or ought to be.
SPEAKER_00
And it's a bit unusual because people will say that out of one side of their mouth. Then the other side of their mouth, they'll acknowledge that when they invest in companies, they can't do anything about their investment. If the team's incompetent or if they're making bad decisions, then that's a really hard thing to solve. No, that is 100% true. I have to ask you, you said that do you want to win or do you want to be liked? You and I both have a theory around work and work ethic and what it takes to win that's not always popular. Can you help me understand? You work seven days a week at the company and the company is expected to work seven days a week.
SPEAKER_00
[SPEAKER_01] Yeah. [SPEAKER_01] Can you help me understand why that is and how you thought through that as a decision? [SPEAKER_01] If you're solving the most important problems or if you want to dream big and scale up your ambition, presuppose that you want to do something big and not small. Whatever you can get done in five days, I promise you, you'll get more done in six and seven and so on and so forth.
SPEAKER_00
And I think if you're doing a startup and you're serious about it and you want to win, you want to do the biggest possible things, you want a sense of community and camaraderie and have brothers and sisters in arms with the people you're working with, then you should go all out. You shouldn't half-ass it. Five days, why not four or three or two or one, right? I think you should just do it properly if you're doing something. Do you not believe in the benefits of rest? I'm 100% with you on the work ethic and I do think having a day off can be helpful. Do you not think that rest does carry back?
SPEAKER_00
For some people, if they want to take a day off, they should take a day off. But there's nothing about the weekend that signifies they wouldn't have a place at Corgi. [SPEAKER_01] You can take a day off every now and then. That's all right. But if your days off happen to be Saturday and Sunday every week, then you will not have a place at Corgi. Dude, how does that go down in hiring? I would love to be able to do that. You could just say it and say, why? Because we want to build the biggest thing ever. And if you want to build the biggest thing ever, you need to win.
SPEAKER_00
[SPEAKER_01] And if you want to win, then it's something that I think attracts the right type of person and absolutely repels the wrong type of person. Because particularly for young people, I think there's a lot of people that want to dream big. They want to do something big with their lives and important with their lives.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] And if you want to do something important with your life, you're going to do it a lot and you're going to win. And if you want to be a winner, if you want to be a killer, then you can do that for 30 minutes a day. But I think doing it all the time is better. [SPEAKER_00] Do you have people who turn up to interview processes and think it's cool, but don't realize the intensity? [SPEAKER_00] Yeah. [SPEAKER_00] I mean, we have everyone do work trials. That scares them off. [SPEAKER_00] What do you mean work trials?
SPEAKER_01
I think it's really important. People need to know what they're getting into on both sides. So before people come in, we really like to have them do mock work for one or several days, especially if it's over the weekend. And then they see the office full. That helps them very quickly learn that we're not joking around. [SPEAKER_00] That's a benefit of actually working weekends—people can do it in their jobs without taking time off.
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, it does make it easy to poach.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] What in a work trial impresses you most versus turns you off most? Because it is tough in a two day trial to have much impact on boarding.
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, I mean, the soft skills matter more than the hard skills for me. Because if someone really wants it, if they're all in, and if they want to do the maximum, the maximally hard thing, the ambitious thing with their lives, and they actually want to go all in, then you normally can find a place for someone like that. [SPEAKER_01] And it might not be exactly what they are applying for, what they think they're going to be doing. But I think you should solve hard problems, you should do hard things. And you can tell if someone's into that, or if they're into checking in and checking out. What questions do you find most revealing when you're interviewing people?
SPEAKER_00
I like to ask people what matters to them and why. I think they tend to answer that honestly. Do you find money is an alarming response? If I said to you, I'm hungry to make money, I want to make money for my family. Do you mind? [SPEAKER_01] I mean, I don't necessarily mind that. Normally it comes from a certain place. I think that answer normally would reveal that someone didn't have a lot of money. I think my answer for that is probably a little different. But I don't find that to be necessarily alarming. Although I think that being extremely money motivated leads you to short term, local minimum, local maximums that don't actually result in the most money being made.
SPEAKER_00
[SPEAKER_01] What is your answer to that? If it's not the money, we were chatting earlier, your sacrifice is unwavering to this business. We'll get onto more of it. What is the reason if it's not money?
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] I want to build the most important company in the world. I want to win. I admire the greats. I very much want to join them. I think that as people living in this time and circumstance, we're subject to the world historical conditions in which we're in. If we were alive 200 years ago, we'd probably be generals fighting some sort of wars or something. [SPEAKER_00] And that would be very simple. The winning would just mean killing your enemies. And unfortunately, you can't do that anymore.
SPEAKER_00
We'll get onto more of it. What is the reason if it's not money? I want to build the most important company in the world. I want to win. I admire the greats. [SPEAKER_01] I very much want to join them.
SPEAKER_01
I think that as people living in this time and circumstance, we're subject to the world historical conditions in which we're in. If we were alive 200 years ago, we'd probably be generals fighting some sort of wars or something. [SPEAKER_00] And that would be very simple.
SPEAKER_00
The winning would just mean killing your enemies. And unfortunately, you can't do that anymore. So I think that the next best thing and where we're at now is that you can actually in a positive way make a really big difference in the world. So I want us to always be solving the hardest problems possible. And I want to win. I want to add value. I heard from one of your investors that you live in the office. Yeah. What does that look like?
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] Do you actually live in the office?
SPEAKER_00
Yeah. I think it's one thing to say oh, why don't you guys work seven days a week and you're on some yacht somewhere hanging out at Ibiza or something. [SPEAKER_01] It's another thing if you're actually putting in the work. So I think symbols often really matter. The cosmetic stuff, having a sign on the building or something. [SPEAKER_01] We're going to get to the sign, dude, don't we? [SPEAKER_01] Yeah. The cosmetic stuff, I think it does matter. Symbolism matters. There's a reason why governments and religions and all of the really important things tend to care a lot about symbols.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] The flag is very important and all that.
SPEAKER_00
I think that the symbolism around working hard is quite different, leading the troops from the front line versus saying, oh, why don't you guys work hard and I won't.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] So you literally live in the office? [SPEAKER_00] Yeah.
SPEAKER_00
Yeah. I have a mattress there and that sort of thing. I don't spend every single night there anymore because I used to shower at only the Equinox, one street over and they close very early, 8 p.m. on Fridays. So that was unpleasant. [SPEAKER_01] We don't have a shower in our SF office. Our London office actually has a shower.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] So I had this in a founder's room.
SPEAKER_00
Is that what it's called? Some people have called it that, but normally people just say, oh, it's Nico's room.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] I got founder's room, showers at Equinox, works every waking hour. [SPEAKER_00] How long do you sleep for? [SPEAKER_00] I don't sleep a lot.
SPEAKER_00
[SPEAKER_01] I think the average night, a couple hours, probably three to four hours. [SPEAKER_01] But some nights I really do make an effort to try to sleep a little more because I find I'm a bit more... Have you ever had health scares? [SPEAKER_01] Candidly, I give everything to this. [SPEAKER_01] I have psoriasis and I had heart palpitations because I was just so all in. And I still am, but I do have to monitor my sleep. That's the one thing I really do.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] I think sleep is important and I encourage people to sleep a lot. I think I would rather measure my lifespan in victories than years. [SPEAKER_00] And I'm maximizing that.
SPEAKER_00
[SPEAKER_01] Buck, this is a hard question. [SPEAKER_01] Would you rather Corgi was a trillion dollar company, but you died at 50? Or it was a fail and you lived till you were 80? I mean, I think the answer to that is pretty easy. Because if I'm dying either way, but for now, life is short. We'll see what happens. [SPEAKER_01] It reminds me of Olympians. [SPEAKER_01] I don't know if you've ever seen this study. [SPEAKER_01] They say, would you rather live 10 years less, but have a gold medal? And 98% of them said unwaveringly yes. You need to want it. And that's presupposing that death is coming either way, which you never know. [SPEAKER_01] Brian Johnson has his way.
SPEAKER_01
You said if you're going to be a hyper growth startup and you're not working weekends, you're basically just quiet quitting.
SPEAKER_00
[SPEAKER_01] Yeah, I strongly believe that.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] But you're the only one doing it, aren't you? [SPEAKER_00] I don't know.
SPEAKER_00
[SPEAKER_01] I mean, if you visit very high growth AI companies, at least in San Francisco, you know, the offices are pretty full on the weekends. [SPEAKER_01] And I don't think it's a coincidence. It's easy to look at this and go, and people will. [SPEAKER_01] So unfair, harsh. You also have a chef seven days a week. Not anymore. Okay, talk to me about that. Why did you decide to have a chef seven days a week? [SPEAKER_01] And why do you not now? [SPEAKER_01] Yeah, so I loved our chef.
SPEAKER_01
I thought she was really great.
SPEAKER_00
[SPEAKER_01] I think that ordering food is a little more logistically easy. [SPEAKER_01] I think having food in the office is actually important. [SPEAKER_01] And because otherwise people lose a lot of time going out and getting food and coming back, which is just very inefficient. And people need to think about where they're going to buy the food. It's just extra cognitive load. You're spending more time doing that than you are doing something that's high leverage. I think I really dislike the culture of pampering everyone or taking care of them as if you're their parents.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] I think Google is the worst of that. [SPEAKER_00] Did it feel like you were pampering them when you had a chef seven days a week?
SPEAKER_00
Maybe a little bit, but that's not the reason why we don't have a chef anymore.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] Why don't you have a chef anymore? [SPEAKER_00] I think that we really liked the idea of having a chef.
SPEAKER_00
And the chef we got was awesome. I really liked having her. [SPEAKER_01] But I think that sometimes doing more that's not core can lead to logistical burdens.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] And it's better to focus your energy on things that directly lead to growth or indirectly lead to growth.
SPEAKER_00
[SPEAKER_01] Things that indirectly lead to growth.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] Yeah. [SPEAKER_00] So I actually said very excitedly the other night about our show to my girlfriend.
SPEAKER_00
And she said, huh, I just saw a job application. And I was like, well, I'm sure I'm not related. It's a San Francisco company. I think that we really liked the idea of having a chef.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] And the chef we got was awesome. [SPEAKER_00] I really liked having her. But I think that sometimes doing more that's not core can lead to logistical burdens.
SPEAKER_00
And it's better to focus your energy on things that directly lead to growth or indirectly lead to growth. [SPEAKER_01] Things that indirectly lead to growth. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] So I actually said very excitedly the other night about our show to my girlfriend. [SPEAKER_00] And she said, huh, I just saw a job application. [SPEAKER_00] And I was like, well, I'm sure I'm not related. [SPEAKER_00] It's a San Francisco company.
SPEAKER_00
[SPEAKER_01] She's a lawyer in London. [SPEAKER_01] And she was like, no, no, it's the same one.
SPEAKER_01
Cafe expansion head. And I was like, that seems eerily similar to Corgi's role. And I was like, maybe it is.
SPEAKER_00
[SPEAKER_01] Talk to me.
SPEAKER_01
You have 24-7 Corgi Cafe.
SPEAKER_00
[SPEAKER_01] Why? [SPEAKER_01] You're an insurance company. [SPEAKER_01] Yeah. [SPEAKER_01] So when we rented out our building in San Francisco, we needed to get signage on the side of the building.
SPEAKER_01
And it was zoned or something. So when we got our primary floor, we were forced to take over the retail space. And it was like this empty barbershop. It was really dingy. [SPEAKER_00] It had been out of business for probably a couple of years. [SPEAKER_00] And so we moved in and everything was fine. [SPEAKER_00] And we have the sign on the side of the building.
SPEAKER_00
Great. But I'd walk in every day and I'd see this empty barbershop. And it would just piss me off because I'm paying for that. But there's nothing in it. It's a waste of everything. And at the same time, a huge complaint I have with San Francisco is that everything closes really early. It's a big problem, especially in the financial district where offices and there's a lot of really great startups that want to push themselves hard. But you cannot find a cafe. You can't even find a place to eat past 6, 7 p.m. most days. Things just are, it's a ridiculous situation. Clearly most restaurants don't have a growth mindset.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] And the other issue that I think we wanted to address is that for people that are serious about technology, about building things, about starting things, there's not actually, even in San Francisco, which is supposedly the center of technology for the world, there's not a lot of places where people can actually, who are serious about that can come together and have a place where they can work hard.
SPEAKER_00
And we decided to just open up a 24-7 cafe, it wasn't a big planned out thing, and it caught on a lot more than we thought it would.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] Now it's always full.
SPEAKER_00
There's people signing term sheets and getting deals done. How much money did it take to start a cafe? We spent under $100,000 opening it. Spent under $100,000 opening it. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] Has it been successful? [SPEAKER_00] I mean, it's always full. If you go there, you can go there at 3 a.m. and I'd recommend writing term sheets to everyone there because they're working hard. [SPEAKER_00] I can't tell you, it's probably over 20 people have told me, oh, I submitted my YC app at the Corgi Cafe and I got in or something along those lines or I signed a term sheet there. [SPEAKER_00] You should do Corgi Ventures, which operates from 3 a.m. to 5 a.m. And it's those founders that are there. Yeah, I mean, the problem is if anything becomes a measure of success, then it ceases to be a good measure once the alpha disappears very quickly.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] I totally get you. [SPEAKER_00] Does it make money? [SPEAKER_00] We lose money on the cafe with sponsorships because our drinks are sponsored and shout out to our drink sponsors. You have Brexpressos. Yeah, Brexpresso. [SPEAKER_00] We have Deal. We have a couple of them. What does Deal sponsor?
SPEAKER_00
The Deal Speed is a smoothie. [SPEAKER_01] Oh, I like that. Yeah. Fair enough. Deal love Deal Speed. Yeah. So with that, I think we're probably slightly profitable. If I was an investor, I'd say, Nico, I love you. Dude, I love the energy. This is a distraction. Yeah, they hated it at first. [SPEAKER_01] Why are you doing a cafe expansion? You sound exactly like our investors. [SPEAKER_01] I got a ton of calls and texts that said that before it opened. [SPEAKER_01] Oh, no, no, no.
SPEAKER_00
[SPEAKER_01] No, no. I did. [SPEAKER_01] No, no. I did. I promise you. [SPEAKER_01] I've learned that you don't get any credit for criticizing a founder. [SPEAKER_01] So I just don't. You know what I do? Bro, dude, I'm here for you.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] Well done.
SPEAKER_00
Well, our investors didn't get the memo. [SPEAKER_01] So I heard plenty of that.
SPEAKER_01
But dude, why are you doing it? I get it in SF.
SPEAKER_00
[SPEAKER_01] You're opening in London. Yeah. I mean, we have an office in London.
SPEAKER_01
I think I'm very bullish London, actually, in general. Why are you bullish London?
SPEAKER_00
I think the talent is exceptional, both British talent and European.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] And I think there's very few places in the world where if you tell someone to move pretty much anywhere, they're very happy to do so. [SPEAKER_00] I think San Francisco is one of those places.
SPEAKER_00
I think New York's one of those places, although I don't think that good companies tend to be in New York.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] And because of that, I think there's certain exceptional qualities that London has.
SPEAKER_00
And given the whole visa situation in the United States, I think there's actually a phenomenal opportunity for London to become a center of AI and a center of tech. So we opened a London office before we opened a New York office. We're very long London. Do you find it much cheaper to hire in London? It's a little bit cheaper. I think San Francisco is one of those places. I think New York's one of those places, although I don't think that good companies tend to be in New York. And because of that, I think that there's certain exceptional qualities that London has.
SPEAKER_00
And given the whole visa situation in the United States, I think there's actually a phenomenal opportunity for London to become a center of AI and a center of tech. So we opened a London office before we opened a New York office. We're very long London.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] Do you find it much cheaper to hire in London?
SPEAKER_00
It's a little bit cheaper.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] I think maybe we're paying above market, but we're not paying that much. [SPEAKER_00] The thing is, if you're working for a salary working at Corgi, you're doing something wrong. [SPEAKER_00] If you're super hyped about your cash comp, then probably.
SPEAKER_00
Are you more generous than others on equity?
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] Because you understand that you are asking for more of someone's life being seven days.
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, yeah. We're generous with top offs.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] What's top offs? [SPEAKER_00] After people are working, we give more equity based upon performance.
SPEAKER_00
[SPEAKER_01] That's where we're generous, more than the initial equity that people sign on. [SPEAKER_01] Okay. So it's accelerators on milestones hit. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] I mean, it's a little more ad hoc than that. [SPEAKER_00] But yeah, something like that. [SPEAKER_00] I love it. We said about distractions. A lot of founders angel invest.
SPEAKER_00
How do you think about founders actively angel investing? I don't angel invest.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] Why? I think it's a distraction. [SPEAKER_01] Yeah, I don't think it's core to winning. Have you sold secondaries?
SPEAKER_00
No, I haven't sold any secondaries. People are always trying to buy them, but I've yet to sell a single secondary. Why is that? Because our equity is going up. Maybe I shouldn't say that, but I believe our equity is going up and I'm voting with my feet. [SPEAKER_01] And if I have the scarcest asset that I could have any meaningful influence over. And I think we're going to keep doing well and keep kicking ass. Why would I sell that? You don't have huge rent to pay. That's for sure. That's true. I love that. Despite the bullishness on London, you're still super bullish on SF. Yeah, I love San Francisco. [SPEAKER_01] Why is the amount of great talent building in SF?
SPEAKER_00
[SPEAKER_01] Is it just there's nothing else to do there? [SPEAKER_01] That might be part of it, which is maybe a bit of a problem that London has. [SPEAKER_01] You know, things are actually open later in London and there's more people about too many pubs. [SPEAKER_01] That might be a problem. It's a lot of pubs. [SPEAKER_01] There are a lot of pubs.
SPEAKER_01
Do you drink? [SPEAKER_00] No, I don't drink.
SPEAKER_00
Okay. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00
But I think San Francisco is a special place because particularly with people in the U.S., if you want to do something big with your life and you're not really quite sure where to go, San Francisco is an end destination where you can. If you're a bit nerdy and if you love technology, you love programming, you love these maybe slightly unpopular things. If you want to date. And that's the only real reason why they do. Same with Miami or all of these other places. If you're hardcore about startups and you're American, then I think you should go to San Francisco. Oftentimes, there's super great other cities. I do like Chicago and we have an office in Dallas. That's really great too. And if you're hardcore about startups outside of the United States, I think London is second to none as well. Although you got to avoid the pubs. The pubs are really getting it. I get you. We've spoken a lot about everything from chefs to signage on buildings to Corgi Cafe to work ethic. You're a little bit younger than me, but I do reflect on how I've built the company. When you reflect on what you did that you wish you hadn't done. I mean, there's a long list there. What was the biggest?
SPEAKER_00
I don't dwell on mistakes. And I think... How very Marc Andreessen of you. Yeah, I think if you dwell on mistakes, then you're... I look more at the victories than the losses because I think there's more to learn from the victories. And if you can emulate the things that have worked really well again and again. There's a brilliant commencement speech by Matthew McConaughey at the University of Texas or University of Houston. And he says, study success and the importance of lessons from success. If I would have then flip it and say, what success have you studied and what do you learn from it? What would you say that is?
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] I think that you need to look at the greats. And the greats are oftentimes outside of the context of startups, people like obviously there's obvious famous startup founders. But I think looking at everyone from Alexander the Great to Napoleon to so on and so forth is also very informative. Because if you want to change the world, if you want to do something important and you don't want to just be a memetic copy of everyone else or you want to be class president or something, that's fine. But if you want to actually do something big, then I think that being a student of the greats is great. And the important thing I think is probably not copying them. You should have your own style. But being a student of history is probably a pretty positive thing.
SPEAKER_01
If I were to ask you, what's Corgi's culture in one word? What would you say it is?
SPEAKER_00
[SPEAKER_01] We have a culture of winning. [SPEAKER_01] Winning. That's it. That's it.
SPEAKER_01
Okay. I mean, maybe in the past I would have answered ex-founder, hackers, other things. But I think all that's actually kind of fake. And we Do something big. Then I think that being a student of the greats is great. And the important thing I think is probably not copying them. You should have your own style. But being a student of history is probably a pretty positive thing. If I were to ask you, what's Corgi's culture in one word? What would you say it is? We have a culture of winning.
SPEAKER_00
[SPEAKER_01] Winning. That's it. That's it. [SPEAKER_01] Okay. I mean, maybe in the past I would have answered ex-founder, hackers, other things. But I think all that's actually fake. And we just like winning. How big is the team? Maybe a bit over 100 now.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] Can you maintain the intensity that you have today when you're at 1000 people?
SPEAKER_00
Yeah. Easy. Really? [SPEAKER_01] I think so. [SPEAKER_01] Why has no one else been able to do it? [SPEAKER_01] So naturally, there's roles, I think, that creep in. You get a lawyer and accountant that are not going to work in the same way that a software engineer might. Right. And that's just a fact of life. So if they don't want to work quite as hard, then you just need to hire more of them for the same work output, which is okay. It's just a return on investment calculation. [SPEAKER_01] The only reason I can think of is there's some point in which you need to take the off ramp of being super hardcore and you need to accept maybe lower growth, but less volatility.
SPEAKER_00
[SPEAKER_01] I personally, at least at the current stage I'm at, don't mind volatility. I think it's something that can produce alpha in a lot of ways. [SPEAKER_01] What would you say to people who say that you're exclusionary in the work culture and that parents couldn't do what you want? I mean, we have plenty of parents that work at Corgi. So life's about trade-offs and sacrifices.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] I think Corgi is a great place to work if you want a sense of community and camaraderie with the people you work with, if you want to have friends in the workplace, the social life attached to your workplace. [SPEAKER_00] If you want your work to be additive to your life as opposed to separate. [SPEAKER_00] And that applies whether you're married, whether you have kids, don't have kids. Some of our best people have a lot of children, but if you want to clock in and then just check out of work, then respectfully, there's infinite other jobs you can get. [SPEAKER_00] And that's okay. Corgi is not for everyone.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] Do you care about the backlash that you get when you speak about this? I get a lot of backlash.
SPEAKER_00
Yeah. I mean, I get a lot of backlash, the death threats and the DMs. People think I'm nuts.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] Do you care? [SPEAKER_00] Not really. No, I don't know.
SPEAKER_00
Have you ever cared? Yeah. I don't know. I think when you're a young person, particularly young men, you don't have that much support within society. And I think it's something that weighs on people, particularly if you don't have a lot of external validation or credibility yet. Credibility is something that is hard to get, which goes back to the crisis of legitimacy that I think is core to startups. Do you think you're legitimate yet? I know that sounds strange. Probably. I mean, we're more regulated than a bank and we make a lot of revenue and have raised money. I don't think we're quite legit yet. I think we're getting there.
SPEAKER_00
I think you're legitimate when you don't get fired for buying IBM. And in my context as a fund, if you're Andreessen or you name these great, large platforms. You don't get fired as an LP for doing Andreessen. Right. Can't like period. Yeah. That's probably exactly right. And the thing is in the fund context, Andreessen, Kleiner, or even Sequoia back in the day, at some point they were just a couple guys in some shitty room that didn't really know what they were doing and were making it up as they went along. [SPEAKER_01] And they were certainly pointing at other people and saying, one day we'll be legit like them.
SPEAKER_00
[SPEAKER_01] And the institutional LPs will take us seriously. I think there's always more legit, right? You can go from pension funds to university endowments to the government. That's the ultimate form of legitimacy. Probably because the government can just take people's money. What are your lessons on paying people? So what I've learned, for example, is that when people ask for more money, they tend to be very good. When they ask for more title, they tend to be very bad. Any lessons on salaries, benchmarking, comp?
SPEAKER_00
I think low cash comp is something good. Generally speaking, I think that who ends up doing extremely well, if people are doing well, you need to just give them more equity, especially. [SPEAKER_00] And make it so that if they're doing a very simple return on investment calculation, the highest EV thing they can do is work in their current role. [SPEAKER_00] And if you can't provide that upside, there's no reason for them to continue working super hard and they should be doing something else. [SPEAKER_00] Whether that's working for someone else or starting their own thing or whatever.
SPEAKER_00
[SPEAKER_00] I think separate from the comp and the simple EV calculation is that you need to actually be solving big problems. And if you're not solving big problems, then no matter how much you pay people, you're not going to retain them if they're actually good. I think you can probably split any organization into three parts. You can have people that are really good, people that are fungible and mediocre, and then people that are bad. [SPEAKER_01] And I think getting rid of the bad very quickly is important. Even if it makes a lot of noise. Do you keep the mediocre?
SPEAKER_00
[SPEAKER_01] I wouldn't put it like that, but I think in any organization, there's people that you wouldn't be devastated if they left. But the question I always ask is knowing what you know now, would you hire them again? [SPEAKER_01] It's the most important question. I mean, there's a lot of people where the answer might be yes, but you're not going to be sobbing and punching the wall if they're no longer with you. Fundraising is a big part of your job as a CEO. Do you keep the mediocre? [SPEAKER_01] I wouldn't put it like that, but I think in any organization, there's people that you wouldn't be devastated if they left.
SPEAKER_00
But it's brilliant. The question I always ask is knowing what you know now, would you hire them again?
SPEAKER_01
It's the most important question. [SPEAKER_00] There's a lot of people where the answer might be yes, but you're not going to be sobbing and punching the wall if they're no longer with you. [SPEAKER_00] Fundraising is a big part of your job as a CEO. You recently raised 1.5? [SPEAKER_00] 1.3? [SPEAKER_00] 1.3 from TCV. Love TCV. Love John Doran. Spoke to him before the show. [SPEAKER_00] What are your single biggest lessons on fundraising? Having raised now across pre-regulated, post-regulated? [SPEAKER_00] Revenue scaling very fast. What are the most non-obvious lessons you have from raising several hundred million dollars?
SPEAKER_00
I don't know if I'm actually an expert there or anything.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] Do you think you're a good fundraiser?
SPEAKER_00
I think I'm all right at it. I've had to do it for years now. [SPEAKER_01] If you have to do anything for years. What do you know now that you wish you'd known when you started? When I started, my pitch was not very good. I remember my first pitch. I took a red eye. Who was it to? It was my first pitch. Probably First Round Capital was my first pitch.
SPEAKER_00
Okay. Way back in the day. The very first VC I ever talked to was at Google Ventures. But my first pitch for Corgi, I think was maybe First Round Capital. And I remember I took a red eye the night before. My eyes were actually red. I looked like I was high or something. I was so nervous because we had to get $5 million and we had 24 hours. I flew back Thursday night. I was like, "We'll get the money to you in a couple of days. You know how the banks are. It'll take some time to transfer the money." So I started pitching Friday.
SPEAKER_00
[SPEAKER_01] We had Saturday, Sunday and had to get the money by Monday. And I think the pitch was not very good. Honestly, it was a lot of "just trust me." I wasn't telling them the name of the insurance carrier because I was afraid they'd call them and ruin it. I think the first set of pitches I did weren't that good. The thing about raising on a 10, we were raising a 5 on a 28 with that one. And that was 2024. So that wasn't super easy. That was recently.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] I mean, it was like two years ago. [SPEAKER_00] What was the best VC meeting you had? The worst are when it's super structured and when they start asking me about our balance sheet or getting into the nitty gritty. I'm not that type of guy. [SPEAKER_00] I think the best ones tend to be when someone is very growth minded or product minded and we just get to vibe about where we're going and how we're going to win. [SPEAKER_00] So what was the best VC meeting that didn't invest? [SPEAKER_00] I've had plenty of great ones that didn't invest. I'm not going to put them on the spot because they might invest later on. [SPEAKER_00] What was the worst?
SPEAKER_00
I've had some really bad ones. Have you had some really bad ones? I've had some super bad ones. What was the worst? [SPEAKER_01] I've had people, especially in the first round, like early stage investors, be disrespectful. I've had people flossing their teeth in the meeting, chowing down food, barbecue ribs or something, getting it all over their face. I've seen it all. What did you say? [SPEAKER_01] I said, "Please finish flossing. It's okay." [SPEAKER_01] I had one on FaceTime where the guy was hitting his vape and I thought he was asleep because he had his eyes closed, leaning against the wall. I've had some crazy pitches, particularly at the early stage.
SPEAKER_00
[SPEAKER_01] What are your biggest advice to founders on price? [SPEAKER_01] Price is a difficult one. I think price, Brian Chesky told me one time to never take the highest price and I've taken that to heart. So we never take the highest price ever. I think that's just a good rule of thumb. [SPEAKER_01] We always go with the second or third highest price. I don't do a lot of negotiating on price. I just see where the market's at. And then if something seems reasonable, I just stick with it. And you know, we could raise all of our rounds at higher prices, but we never do. How long does it take to raise rounds for you normally?
SPEAKER_00
A couple of days at most. If you're in the market for a long time, it's a bad thing. Maybe it's a good thing for your valuation or for the amount of money you're raising. But I think it's a bad thing for the company because you start to optimize for selling equity instead of selling your goods and services. And fundraising is super distracting. And we could raise all of our rounds at higher prices, but we never do. How long does it take to raise rounds for you normally?
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] A couple of days at most. [SPEAKER_00] If you're in the market for a long time, it's a bad thing.
SPEAKER_00
And it's a bad thing. Maybe it's a good thing for your valuation or for the amount of money you're raising. But I think it's a bad thing for the company because you start to optimize for selling equity instead of selling your goods and services. And fundraising is super distracting. It's not quite as bad as audits after you get the term sheet, but it is pretty distracting. Couple of days at most. I hear you. I'm on the other side of that deal. And I'm like, dude, I'm with you.
SPEAKER_00
You don't want to do it. I don't want to be in a fundraise process with you either. But I do want to get to know you.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] And I do want you to know me.
SPEAKER_00
Well, VCs always say that. But the thing is, they could put in the work to get to know you, but they never do.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] So again, this is interesting because we're totally on the other side of the table.
SPEAKER_00
[SPEAKER_01] We try.
SPEAKER_01
And you know what we get?
SPEAKER_00
Thanks so much for your email. [SPEAKER_01] We're heads down. Yeah. Well, what the fuck? I am heads down. Because if you're working on an important deal that's going to double your revenue, the last thing you want to do is meet with some VC. I get it. But then help me understand. [SPEAKER_01] You know what an investor told me one time? He said, good companies get deals done.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] And at first I was mad.
SPEAKER_00
[SPEAKER_01] I was pissed to hear that. [SPEAKER_01] It was a backhanded compliment, I guess it was just an insult. [SPEAKER_01] He was implying that we weren't a good company because we weren't getting deals done. And I've actually taken it to heart because I think it's true. Good companies do get deals done. And since then we've shifted our approach and we've started getting deals done. We've stopped being such absolutists and we move with haste. Time kills all deals. And as a company, we get deals done. That's the key.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] And I think a venture capital firm is a lot of things. [SPEAKER_00] It's a brand, it's a lifestyle business.
SPEAKER_00
But one thing it certainly is, is a company and good companies get deals done. [SPEAKER_01] And I think that applies to venture capital firms too. [SPEAKER_01] Some deals are made in times of crisis. [SPEAKER_01] The venture deals that I respect most are the ones that I hear about from my funds where their company was not doing well at all. And a VC came in and saved them. And the amount of gratitude that founders have for something like that is extreme. [SPEAKER_01] And the amount of courage it takes to do something where the company might be contentious or controversial, or the metrics might be going in the wrong direction, not the right direction.
SPEAKER_00
And that type of behavior is hard. And I think doing the hard thing in venture is rare, unfortunately. But genuinely, you would rather do a deal with someone you don't really know if it's in a few days. I mean, one thing I know about them is they can get deals done quickly. Right. Sure. That's their role. So they can also be assholes. That's true. And I've had plenty of bad investors in my life. Bad investors are much worse than no investor.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] And it's hard to get rid of them. [SPEAKER_00] The thing is, if you're doing well, and if you're pricing your company cheap, and if you go out to market, you can get a deal done very quickly. [SPEAKER_00] It's just fact. [SPEAKER_00] And why would you waste time doing that? [SPEAKER_00] Do you think you price your deal, your company cheaply? [SPEAKER_00] Yeah.
SPEAKER_00
We price all our deals cheaply. [SPEAKER_01] Why? [SPEAKER_01] I mean, people might not think that when they see our stuff posted, but I think every round that we raised, we could raise at a higher valuation. [SPEAKER_01] I'm very sure of that. [SPEAKER_01] Are you not doing a disservice to your existing investors by not? [SPEAKER_01] I don't think so. [SPEAKER_01] They all got good deals too.
SPEAKER_01
You know, if we were a public company, we'd probably be worth less because the public markets don't know how to evaluate high growth or potential. [SPEAKER_00] Well, talk to me about that. [SPEAKER_00] Yeah. I mean, look at the financial services companies on the public markets. They're all terrible.
SPEAKER_00
[SPEAKER_01] They all don't grow. [SPEAKER_01] But they're good. So are they mispriced or are they actually accurately priced because they don't grow and they have poor margins? I mean, some of them have good margins. They make money. I think that private markets feel to me like they're a vehicle for valuing growth. Whereas public markets feel like they're a vehicle for valuing cashflow. [SPEAKER_01] In the past we'd call that dividend stocks. [SPEAKER_01] And maybe that's not so favorable.
SPEAKER_00
If you're looking for asymmetric upside and are an investor because you don't have access to private deals as much, but certainly from a company perspective, do you not think at some point, all companies are an embodiment of their future I think that private markets feel to me like a vehicle for valuing growth. Whereas public markets feel like they're a vehicle for valuing cashflow. [SPEAKER_01] In the past we'd call that dividend stocks.
And maybe that's not so favorable. [SPEAKER_00] If you're looking for asymmetric upside and are an investor because you don't have access to private deals as much, but certainly from a company perspective, do you not think at some point all companies are an embodiment of their future free cashflow? [SPEAKER_00] That is what a company valuation is. There's certainly value in that, but I don't think so because, maybe at some terminal point from a theoretical perspective, but brand is worth something and identity is worth something.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] Why do you buy a Rolex watch instead of a Chinese copy of a Rolex watch? [SPEAKER_00] They might be the same materials or the same, whatever. Both tell the time.
SPEAKER_00
If I give you unlimited money, what would you do that you're not doing today? For example, I'd be on the side of an F1 car.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] I would be opening Japan. [SPEAKER_00] If you had unlimited money, I think you'd have bigger things to do than be on the side of an F1 car. [SPEAKER_00] Right. But I mean, there's a lot of things I'd love to do. [SPEAKER_00] Within the context of Corgi, every single super regulated financial institution type right now is run on fax machines with boomers. We'd like to have those not waste people's time and charge less fees and make everything a little more protected and a little more efficient, a little more profitable. [SPEAKER_00] Outside of that context, I'm a techno optimist.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] I believe very strongly in the power of technology to make the world a better place across a wide variety of industry sectors. [SPEAKER_00] Corgi is a bet mostly on the most regulated sectors, but I think there's very few problems that technology can't solve. [SPEAKER_00] There's a lot of areas that are exciting, like in medicine and mental health. There are crises in a lot of concurrent areas where I think technology can make things a lot better.
SPEAKER_00
What role do we not have today that you think we will have and be very commonplace in five years' time?
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] I don't know if it's a role in particular, but I think that AI makes sales and marketing much more important than it was in the past.
SPEAKER_00
[SPEAKER_01] In the past, I think if you had a really solid, super hardcore engineering and product team, you could come out with something that would blow everyone away. It'd be faster. It'd be better.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] Now you can make something faster and better. [SPEAKER_00] If you don't have people to sell it or to market it or to tell people that it exists, it's not really worth a whole lot.
SPEAKER_00
The organic network effects around particularly B2B product launches don't really exist in the same way that they used to. Do you think traditional B2B marketing is good? I think traditional B2B sales is good. [SPEAKER_01] I think marketing is awful. Why? There's a lot that B2B could learn from consumer. The conferences are not it. [SPEAKER_01] I'm not a fan of going and hanging out with a bunch of sweaty people in a room. I don't really like that. Consumer companies have perfected marketing and B2B companies have perfected sales. Much like in a company where you have a dominant product, that becomes the company.
SPEAKER_00
It's hard to care that much about auxiliary revenue streams. As an industry, if you're selling B2B products, you're going to get very good at sales and marketing will tend to be an afterthought in most instances. I do want to move into a quick fire where I say a short statement. [SPEAKER_01] You give me your immediate thoughts. [SPEAKER_01] Does that sound okay? Yeah, sure. I think changing one's mind is important. What have you changed your mind on in the last 12 months? There's a lot I've changed my mind on. I've grown to value experience a lot more.
SPEAKER_00
In the past, I've probably made certain statements around boomers being slow and bad, or I've definitely undervalued people that have been doing something for a long time. A lot of times there are little nuances or edge cases that when you do something for a long time, you pick up, and maybe you're not as fast or as efficient or as able to use the latest tools. [SPEAKER_01] But there's an extraordinary amount of knowledge that lives in the older generations, especially the retiring ones. I think it's a big problem, and there's trillions of dollars to make getting that knowledge out and putting it inside computers that can think and talk.
SPEAKER_00
I don't think I viewed those problems in that lens.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] I just considered old people using fax machines, moving at two miles per hour, to be something uniformly bad. But now I see that there's value in their knowledge.
SPEAKER_00
[SPEAKER_01] Who do you not have on the board that you would most like to have on the board?
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] I don't like boards.
SPEAKER_00
Why? getting that knowledge out and putting it inside of computers that can think and talk. And, you know, I don't think I viewed those problems in that lens. You know, I think I just considered old people using fax machines, [SPEAKER_01] moving at two miles per hour, to be something uniformly bad. [SPEAKER_01] But now I see that there's value in their knowledge. [SPEAKER_01] Who do you not have on the board that you would most like to have on the board? I don't like boards.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] Why?
SPEAKER_00
I believe in executive decision-making. Our board's great and yada, yada, yada, all the disclaimers, but I think you just need to be able to decide and you need to be able to do things. Do you think Elon Musk or Mark Zuckerberg are carrying what their board thinks or you think that they're going to huddle up and make a decision? Every committee decision I think is BS. Sometimes you need to be able to take an unpopular stance and you just need to be able to plant your flag in the ground. There's a border check the box.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] I think so a little bit. It's a little theatrical, I guess. It's good to make sure you're not a scam or doing blatantly legal stuff. But if management is unethical or unscrupulous enough to scam people or do illegal stuff, then they're going to do it anyways, probably with or without a board. And that's a management problem. [SPEAKER_00] You can buy OpenAI or Anthropic today, both at the same price, $900. Which one do you choose?
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, I'm going to get in trouble for this probably. But the disclaimer is this might be a stated preference versus a revealed preference, given that we spend maybe $400,000 per month on Anthropic and $0 on OpenAI at the moment. But I think that spiritually, OpenAI is a little more pure because they created this idea of an AI lab as a company, dating all the way back to YC research. And Anthropic is a result of employees that didn't like the management or the direction. There were complaints about profit and ethics and all that. And the EA movement and all of that. When your origins are that impure, it's a little hard to overtake the king. Right now, Anthropic frankly has been out executing OpenAI. Their products are much better. We use the best product in every category—at least from an enterprise or workflow automation perspective, Anthropic's better. So OpenAI needs to lock in.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] How easy is it for you to switch back?
SPEAKER_00
I don't think it'd be that hard. Although all of the labs are always trying to make us sign contracts. If they give us a big enough discount on tokens, then we'd consider it. What is no one talking about that you're spending more and more time thinking about?
SPEAKER_00
To me, there's good companies and there's everyone else. I think the number of good companies is very small. A good company that wants to win is world historic—will be talked about in a hundred years. Those companies—there's just not many of them because people don't want to win. They don't want to put in the work. And that's okay. It's okay to be average and part of the mediocre masses. But the cultural and internal character of companies that are good companies is something that's not appreciated enough. From a metaphysical level, there's a really big difference between Andrew and Anthropic. Those are super different companies. I think both of those could be good companies. But I don't think people really understand the philosophy behind the management teams that they're investing in.
SPEAKER_00
Who do you think is the most underappreciated CEO? When you look at your style, who most aligns to your style?
SPEAKER_00
My style is my own style. I try to do me. I think there's plenty of super underappreciated CEOs. One area where I think is important, more than venture-backed companies, what I would love to see more of is venture funds speaking out about important topics. I know startup founders love to clown on VCs for chiming in about topics that they might not know a lot about. But I think venture funds are in a strong position to influence the way the startup ecosystem looks because they're setting the incentives, and incentives often drive behavior. One thing I would love to see are the CEOs or people running venture funds actually take a more active stance in aligning their deployed capital with changes that they'd like to see in the world. And to me, that's perhaps a more important issue than any particular company's CEO or management team broadly speaking.
SPEAKER_00
Would you blame VCs for the dramatic increase we've seen in fraud, especially around ARR? You know, we put so much emphasis on zero to a hundred million in X amount of time.
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, I think a lot of the issues with fraud we've seen are downstream of credentialism or that quest for legitimacy in a lot of ways. I'm not going to speak about specific frauds, but I'm sure some come to mind that check those boxes. I think VCs are partially responsible, but as a venture investor, after you invest in a company, there's very little you can do. If the management is unscrupulous or scamming people or the product doesn't actually work, then I don't think you're really responsible for that management team committing fraud. On the extreme, you have—if you go back in time a couple of years, a lot of crypto investors would encourage company founders to take on quite a lot of personal liability, including criminal liability in many cases. And basically they'd be arbitraging that and pumping the tokens or whatever.
SPEAKER_00
partially responsible, but as a venture investor, after you invest in a company, there's very little you can do. So if the management is unscrupulous, is going to be scamming people or the product doesn't actually work or whatever, then I don't think you're really responsible for that management team committing fraud. I think on the extreme you have, if you go back in time a couple of years, a lot of the crypto investors would encourage company founders to take on quite a lot of personal liability, including criminal liability in many cases. And they'd be arbitraging that and pumping the tokens or whatever. And that was in hindsight, I guess that was the wrong type of tokens to work on.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_01] But I think in those cases, probably venture investors bear more responsibility, but I think that people blaming YC or whatever for some of their companies being frauds is probably not directionally correct because internally, it's not like any venture fund really wants to invest in a fraud and people that are doing these things. They're very good at wrapping it up and disguising it in such a way that it will pass muster, especially if a round is moving quick, which most good companies rounds do. [SPEAKER_00] Who was your first believer with Corgi?
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] It was probably Jared Friedman from YC. Yeah. There's been times where he was our only believer. Everyone else is a doubter, is a naysayer. But Jared, Jared's always been there for us. [SPEAKER_00] Would you do YC again? [SPEAKER_00] Yeah, I'd do it again.
SPEAKER_00
Final thing for you. What are you most excited for when you look forward to the next 10 years? What are you this I can't wait for?
SPEAKER_00
You know, it's a little hard to say because if you asked that 10 years ago, the technology that people were really excited about didn't exist yet. Right. It was only late 2022 that people actually started getting with ChatGPT 3.5, that large language models were obviously very important and very exciting. I think within the next 10 years, technology will solve a lot of problems. Perhaps it'll create some too, but I think it'll solve a lot more than it creates. And I think that there's certain areas where venture investing hasn't worked before, where there could be category defining outcomes and where there could be new kind of industries where smart people are actually interested in going into. Biology is one that comes to mind. And I really strongly believe that we're going to probably see more ChatGPT moments, maybe a couple of years from now that will really shake things up. Dude, I have to say it's been so wonderful having you on the show. As I said at the beginning at some of my most unpopular beliefs, you align with completely. And so it's nice to have a kindred friend. Thank you so much for joining me today, man.
SPEAKER_00
Thanks for having me. Thank you.
SPEAKER_01
[SPEAKER_00] Thank you. or controversial, or the metrics might be going in the wrong direction, not the right
SPEAKER_00
direction. And, you know, that, that type of behavior I think is, is, is, is, is hard. And, and I think doing the hard thing in venture is, is, is, is, is rare, unfortunately. But genuinely then you would rather do a deal with someone you don't really know if it's in a few days. I mean, one thing I know about them is they can get deals done quickly. Right. Sure. That's their role. So they can also be assholes. That's true. And we, I, you know, I've, I've had plenty of bad investors in my life. Bad investors, much worse than no investor. And it's hard to get rid of them. The thing is, you know, if, if you're, if you're doing well, and if you're pricing your
SPEAKER_00
company cheap, and if you go out to market, you can get a deal done very quickly. It's just the fact. And why would you waste time doing that? Do you think you price your deal, your company cheaply? Yeah. We price all our deals cheaply.
SPEAKER_01
Why? I mean, people might not think that when they see like our, our stuff posted, but I think, you know, we, every round that we raised, we could raise at a higher valuation. I'm very sure of that. Are you not doing a disservice to your existing investors by not? I don't think so. They all got good deals too. You know, if we, if we were a public company, we'd probably be worth less because the, the,
SPEAKER_00
the public markets don't know how to evaluate high growth or potential. Well, talk to me about that. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01
I mean, look, look at, look at the financial services company on the companies on the public markets are all terrible. They all don't grow. But they, you know, they're, they're good.
SPEAKER_00
So are they mispriced or are they actually accurately priced because they don't grow and they have poor margins? I mean, some of them have good margins. Um, you know, they make money. Um, you know, I, I think that, uh, private markets feel to me like, like they're, uh, a vehicle for, for valuing growth. Um, whereas public markets feel like they're a vehicle for, for valuing like cashflow.
SPEAKER_01
In the past we'd call like dividend stocks. And, uh, you know, maybe that's, that's not so favorable.
SPEAKER_00
Um, you know, if you're looking for, for asymmetric, uh, upside, uh, and, and are an investor because you don't have access to, you know, private deals as much, but certainly from a company perspective, do you not think at some point, all companies are a embodiment of their future free cashflow? That is what a company evaluation is. There's certainly value in, in, uh, no, I, I don't think so because I mean, maybe at some terminal point, like from a theoretical perspective, but brand is worth something and identity is worth something, you know? Like why, why do you buy a Rolex watch instead of a Chinese copy of a Rolex watch?
SPEAKER_00
They might be the same materials or the same, whatever, um, both tell the time. If I give you unlimited money, what would you do that you're not doing today? So for example, I'd be on the side of an F1 car. I would be opening Japan. I mean, if, if you, if you had unlimited money, I think you'd have, uh, you know, bigger things to do than, than be on the side of an F1 car. Um, right. But, um, I mean, there, there's a lot of things I'd, I'd love to do. Um, like I think within the context of Corgi, um, like every single, like super, super regulated, like financial institution type where right now it's like run on like fax machines and
SPEAKER_00
with like boomers, like we'd like to like, you know, have those, not waste people's time and, and charge less fees and, you know, make everything a little more protected and a little more efficient, a little more profitable. Um, I think outside of that context, um, like I'm a, I'm a techno optimist. I believe very strongly in the power of technology to make the world a better place across a wide variety of like industry sectors. Corgi is a bet mostly on like the most regulated sectors, but, um, I think that there's very few problems that technology can't solve. And, um, and, and probably there's, you know, a lot of areas that are exciting, like in medicine
SPEAKER_00
and mental health.
SPEAKER_01
Um, I think, and, and, you know, there's, there's crises in a lot of like concurrent areas where
SPEAKER_00
I think technology can make things a lot better. What role do we not have today that you think we will have and be very commonplace in five years time? I don't know if it's like a role in particular, but I think that, um, that actually AI makes sales and marketing much more important, um, than, than it was in the past.
SPEAKER_01
And, uh, in the past, I think if you had a, like a really rock solid, like super hardcore engineering
SPEAKER_00
and product team, you could come out with something that would just like blow everyone away. It'd be faster. It'd be better. Um, now you can make something faster and better. And, um, you know, if you don't have people to sell it or to market it or to tell people that it exists, um, it's not really worth the whole lot. And, um, I think the, the like organic network effects around, um, particularly B2B product,
SPEAKER_01
uh, launches, um, just don't really exist in the same way that they used to.
SPEAKER_00
Do you think traditional B2B marketing is good? I think traditional B2B sales is good.
SPEAKER_01
I think marketing is awful.
SPEAKER_00
Why? Um, you know, there's a lot that B2B could learn from consumer. Um, I think that like the, the conferences are not it.
SPEAKER_01
Like I, I'm, I'm not a fan of, you know, going and hanging out with a bunch of like sweaty,
SPEAKER_00
like people in like a room. Like, I don't, I don't really like that. I think that like consumer companies are, have, have, you know, perfected marketing and B2B companies have perfected sales. And, uh, much like in a company where you have like a dominant product, how that kind of becomes the company. And like, it's hard to like really care that much about auxiliary revenue streams. Um, you know, as an industry, um, if you're selling B2B products, like you're going to get very good at sales and marketing will tend to be an afterthought in most instances. I do want to move into a quick fire where I say a short statement.
SPEAKER_01
You give me your immediate thoughts. Does that sound okay?
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, sure. So I think changing one's mind is important. What have you changed your mind on in the last 12 months? There's a lot I've changed my mind on. Um, you know, I, I, I think I've, I've grown to value experience a lot more. Um, in, in, in the past, um, you know, I've, I've probably made certain statements around, uh, you know, boomers being slow and bad or, or, or, you know, like I've, I've definitely, uh, you know, probably undervalued, um, people that have been doing something for a long time. Um, because a lot of times there's like these like little nuances or edge cases that, um,
SPEAKER_01
when you do something for a long time, you, you pick up and maybe you're not as fast or as efficient or as, as, you know, able to use the latest tools. But there's an extraordinary amount of knowledge that, uh, lives in, in, in, in kind of the
SPEAKER_00
older generations, especially the retiring ones. And I think it's a big problem, uh, and that there's, there's trillions of dollars to make getting that knowledge out and putting it inside of, um, inside of computers that can think and talk. Um, and, uh, you know, I, I, I don't think I viewed those problems in, in, in that lens. Uh, you know, I, I think I just considered, uh, you know, old people using fax machines,
SPEAKER_01
moving at two miles per hour, uh, to be like, you know, something uniformly bad. But now I see that there's value in their knowledge. Who do you not have on the board that you would most like to have on the board?
SPEAKER_00
I don't like boards. Why? I believe in executive decision-making, you know, our board's great and yada, yada, yada, all the disclaimers, but I think you just need to be able to decide and you need to be able to do things. And like, you think Elon Musk or Mark Zuckerberg are carrying what their board thinks or their board, you know, you think that they're like, all right, guys, let's huddle up. Let's like make a decision. Like every committee decision I think is like BS. Like sometimes you need to be able to take an unpopular stance and you just need to be able to plant your flag in the ground. There's a border check the box.
SPEAKER_00
I think so a little bit, like it's, you know, a little theatrical, I guess it is, it's good to make sure you're not like a scam or like doing like blatantly legal stuff. But I mean, if, if management is like unethical or unscrupulous enough to scam people or do illegal stuff, then they're going to do it anyways, probably with or without a board. And that's a management problem. You can buy OpenAI or Anthropic today, both at the same price, $900. Which one do you choose? Yeah, I'm going to get in trouble for this probably. But I guess the disclaimer is this might be a stated preference versus a revealed preference, given that we spend maybe like $400,000 per month
SPEAKER_00
on Anthropic and $0 on OpenAI at the moment. But I think that like spiritually, like OpenAI is, is, I guess a little more pure because they kind of created, you know, this idea of like a AI lab as
SPEAKER_01
a company, dating all the way back to YC research. And, you know, Anthropic is a result of, you know, employees that didn't like the management or the direction. There were complaints about profit and
SPEAKER_00
ethics and all this other stuff. And, and, you know, the, the EA movement and all of that. And, you know, I, I think when you're like, when your origins are that impure, it's a little hard to, to, you know, to, to overtake, to overtake the king. And, you know, right now, Anthropic, frankly speaking, has been out executing OpenAI, their products much better. You know, we, we use the best product in every category, at least from a, from an enterprise or like workflow automation perspective, Anthropic's better. So OpenAI needs to lock in. How easy is it for you to switch back? I don't think it'd be that hard. Although, you know, all, all of the labs are always trying to make
SPEAKER_00
us signed contracts. And if they give us a big enough discount on, on tokens, then we'd, we'd consider it. What is no one talking about that you're spending more and more time thinking about? To me, there's good companies and there's, and there's, you know, everyone else. And I think the
SPEAKER_01
number of good companies is very small and a good company wants to win is like world historic will
SPEAKER_00
be talked about in like a hundred years. Those companies, you know, there's just not many of them because people don't want to win. They don't want to put in the work. They don't want to,
SPEAKER_01
you know, and that's okay. Like it's okay to be average and part of the mediocre masses or whatever.
SPEAKER_00
That's all right. But I think that the, the kind of cultural, you know, or internal kind of character of the companies that are good companies is something that's not appreciated enough. Like from a, from a, you know, a, a, a metaphysical level, there's a really big difference between Andrew and like Anthropic, right? Those are like super different companies. And I think, I think both of those could be good companies. But I don't think people really understand the philosophy behind the management teams that they're investing in. Who do you think is the most underappreciated CEO stay when you look at your style, who most aligns to your style?
SPEAKER_00
Well, my style is my own style. I try to just try to just do me. I think there's plenty of super underappreciated CEOs that like one area where I think to, to more, more than kind of venture backed companies. What I would love to see more of our venture funds, you know, speaking out about, about these sort of important topics. And I know like, like startup founders loved to clown on VCs
SPEAKER_01
for chiming in about like topics that they might not know a lot about. But I think that venture funds are actually in, you know, despite the fact that they're, you know, need to raise from LPs and LPs, you know, can crack the whip or whatever. Like, I think that venture funds are in a really strong
SPEAKER_00
position to influence the way that the startup ecosystem looks because they're setting the
SPEAKER_01
incentives and incentives often drive behavior. And I would love, one thing I would love to see are the CEOs or the people that are running venture funds actually take a more active stance
SPEAKER_00
in, in aligning their, their, you know, deployed capital with what the changes that they'd like to see in the world. And, and to me that that's, that's perhaps a more important issue than like any particular company, any particular company's CEO or management team, broadly speaking. Would you blame VCs for the dramatic increase we've seen in fraud, especially around ARR? You know, we put so much emphasis on zero to a hundred million in X amount of time. Yeah. I mean, I think like a lot of the issues with fraud we've seen are downstream of like credentialism or that quest for like legitimacy in a lot of ways. You know, I'm not going to speak
SPEAKER_00
about specific frauds, but I'm sure some come to mind that kind of check those boxes. I think VCs are partially responsible, but you know, as a venture investor, after you invest in a company, there's very little you can do. So if the management is unscrupulous is, is, you know, is, is going to be scamming people or the product doesn't actually work or whatever, then I don't think you're really responsible for that management team. You know, committing fraud. I think on the extreme you have, like, if you go back in time, a couple of years, a lot of the crypto investors would encourage
SPEAKER_00
company founders to take on quite a lot of personal liability, including criminal liability in many cases. And, you know, basically they'd be like arbitraging that and like pumping the, the tokens or whatever. And, you know, that was in hindsight, I guess that was the wrong type of tokens to work on.
SPEAKER_01
But, you know, and I think in those cases, probably venture investors bear more responsibility,
SPEAKER_00
but like, I think that people blaming like, you know, YC or whatever for, for, for some of their
SPEAKER_01
companies being frauds is probably not like directionally correct because like internally,
SPEAKER_00
it's not like any venture fund really wants to like invest in a fraud and people that are like doing these things. They're very good at wrapping it up and disguising it in such a way that, that it will pass muster, especially if a round is moving quick, which most good companies rounds do. Who was your first believer with Corgi? It was probably Jared Friedman from YC. Yeah. There's been times where he was our only believer, you know, everyone else is a doubter, is a naysayer. But Jared, Jared's always been there for us. Would you do YC again? Yeah, I'd do it again. Final thing for you. What are you most excited for when you look forward to the next 10 years?
SPEAKER_00
What are you like, this I can't wait for? You know, it's a little hard to say because if you, if you asked that 10 years ago, the technology that people were really excited about didn't exist yet. Right. It was only late 2022 that people actually started getting with ChatGPT 3.5, that large language models were obviously very important and very exciting. I think like within the next 10 years, technology will solve a lot of problems. Perhaps it'll create some too, but I think it'll solve a lot more than it creates. And I think that there's certain areas where venture investing hasn't worked before, where,
SPEAKER_00
where there could be like category defining outcomes and where there could be, you know,
SPEAKER_01
new kind of industries where smart people are actually interested in going into. Like biology is one that comes to mind. And I really strongly believe that, you know, we're going to probably
SPEAKER_00
see more like ChatGPT moments, you know, maybe, maybe a couple of years from now that, that will really shake things up. Dude, I have to say it's been so wonderful having you on the show. As I said at the beginning at some of my most unpopular beliefs, you align with completely. And so it's nice to have a kindred friend. Thank you so much for joining me today, man. Thanks for having me.
SPEAKER_00
Thank you. Thank you.