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00:25:24 · Kosta, Sam, James Foster
[00:25:24] S0: us. [00:25:24] S1: Okay. That's very kind. That's very kind. [00:25:25] S0: Let's kick off. James, it's first time on the show. Yes. Maybe a little bit of an intro where your focus is today. What's getting you excited in terms of trends? And then we can kick off with some questions. [00:25:36] S7: Cool. Absolutely. Well, I'm from The UK originally, actually. I grew up in Sheffield of all places and Sheff. Over time found my way to London, found my way to the startup ecosystem. In a past life, I founded a YC company similar to, you know, Amonzo or Revolut in East Africa, Rates VC, and then eventually moved over to San Francisco. And I've been at Andreessen the last two and a half years investing, especially at the seed and series a stage in b to b AI companies. But I really, really love early stage investing. And I have a soft spot for British founders as well. [00:26:17] S0: There you go. I love it. How has your investing thesis changed over time? I assume it looks a lot different today than it did maybe a year or two ago. Like, how are you adapting to what's happening right now in the whole world? [00:26:28] S7: Yeah. Mean, one thought is like we're in such a disruptive time that you really want to kind of some of it is sort of just like I mean, one mental model like for investing is you want to back the best founders in every credible market. And I think, you know, in periods of disruption like now, who knows what markets are going to look like in in five years time. [00:26:51] S0: A month time.
00:26:51 · Kosta, James Foster, S5
[00:26:51] S0: A month time. [00:26:52] S7: In a in a month time. Right? Just in terms of how industries are being reshaped, whether, you know, from SaaS pricing to outcome based pricing or, you know, companies that historically were, you know, just a HR software platform or just a system of record in a given vertical. They're actually expanding because it's so easy to build things. They're expanding much further beyond, like, you know, what their product would have been in the past. And so one lens I have is just actually it comes back to founders. Right? Is the founder encyclopedic about the market? Do they have like a sense of kind of going out for revenge into the world and the company that they're trying to build and just backing people that are just absolute learning machines and can adopt to those those changing [00:27:37] S5: I have to jump
00:27:37 · S5, Kosta
[00:27:37] S5: I have to jump [00:27:37] S0: in very quickly because you know what I'm gonna... I know. Like, when we were in Monaco, I can't remember how many months it was now, you gave an amazing speech right at the end of the the last night at the dinner. And I was getting the mic taken out of me for the whole time when we were on the trip because I kept telling everyone, was like, guys, this is reminding me a lot of Monte Carlo Monte Cristo. Yes. We're in the cove, you know, we're in this beautiful area. It's very old. And everyone was taking the mic out of me for it. They're like, you know, shut up. I wouldn't stop being all about the book. And then you stood up and gave a speech at the end of dinner. You mentioned this one of your favorite places because the areas because it reminds you of the book of the Count of Monte Cristo and the tale of revenge and how that can be applied to founders today. Can you just tell us a little bit about that thesis? Why do you think revenge can be used as a tool for good?
00:28:18 · James Foster
[00:28:18] S7: Yeah, absolutely. And, you know, this is borrowed from my partner, Alex Rampell, who is his favorite book. And I since have gone on to read it. And there's actually a recent remake of the film in the last few years. But, you know, the sort of rough story of The Count of Monte Cristo is is, you know, a man who essentially sort of loses everything. He loses his wealth. He loses his wife, and he gets locked away on this island, Île d'If, which is off the coast of France. And I'm not sure if it's fictionary or not, but he's there for either fourteen or eight years. Can't remember Fourteen. Exactly. And he spends those fourteen years sort of quietly plotting his his revenge. And when he's out after fourteen years, he he essentially sort of monomaniacally goes out and exacts that revenge out on... Into the world and righting every wrong that everyone has has done to them until it's completely finished. And I think it is true that the best founders have this quality as well. And sometimes, you know you know, people talk about maybe there is sort of something in in kind of your childhood. But I think that revenge can also look like, hey, I experienced this problem in this, you know, industry. I was building a company, and it was impossible to, you know, make payments or it was just like really, really hard to to, you know, kind of or actually a fantastic example is we have this company called LEO and they are building kind of absolutely phenomenal company. Started in Munich, went through YC. They're now kind of based across Europe and The US and a really fantastic example of, you know, how you can kind of get the best talent from both worlds. But you know what? Everyone hates procurement software. And Vlad and the team had spent time at BMW and Mercedes and experienced how bad procurement software is and like how painful it is to complete workflows on top of SAP and, you know, how much bureaucracy is caused within organizations buying things as simple as tables and chairs. And they were just like, this should not exist. And so they made it their revenge in the world to go and make sure that it it doesn't. Right? And you know what? Like, it's just... So I think that revenge can kind of come from from from any place.
00:30:47 · Sam, James Foster, Kosta
[00:30:47] S1: Yeah. Yeah. No. That's a great example. One of the tweets you wrote a few days ago was about British sporting slang. Yes. Weapon. Yes. And I read this tweet and I knew we were coming on this trip and I knew you were gonna come. And I I was like, I'm gonna ask you regardless of whether we're doing a show or not. What is what is being a weapon mean within a company? Yes. Like, what what is that person? Why does every company nowadays need a weapon? [00:31:13] S7: Yes. You know, absolutely. And in a way, like, you know, Keith Rabois talks about this idea of sort of barrels and and ammunitions. And in a way, like, weapons are sort of my my version of that. And I caused some controversy because, you know, some people were saying it has a negative connotation. But at least... [00:31:30] S0: In the Nor... In Western Europe, we would say a weapon is like, who is this idiot? Like... Yeah. But in the South [00:31:36] S7: In the South. A weapon is like, you know, you're on the football pitch, like, this person is an [00:31:40] S1: absolute Jude Bellingham is a weapon. He's an
00:31:40 · Sam, James Foster
[00:31:40] S1: absolute Jude Bellingham is a weapon. He's an [00:31:43] S7: absolute weapon. Yeah. Right? Because he gets the ball, he drives off the pitch. Yes. He he makes tackles. He scores goals. Like, he's extremely dangerous on the on the field, and he turns the the, you know, the course of games. And I guess in companies, for me, these are people... And I I actually talked about my my friend Emily Spector who's at this company called Chutor Robotics, deploying, you know, robotics across America and all over the world, which is a really, really hard thing to do. But but they are people who, you know, have unimaginable throughput. And so they just, you know, they're they're sort of autonomous missiles. They go and, you know, they set the target themselves and they go and execute on those things. And you don't have to worry about, you know, the thing getting done. It's already done. So they they're super, super productive. And I think the other things that they do is they they like create preferential attachment. And because they are, you know, them setting the bar for like what kind of high throughput in the company means, means that kind of other people raise themselves to that bar in the company. And they also, you know, other good people want to work with good people. And so then you start to get this, you know, this sort of network of of of really, really good talent that works within works within the company. [00:33:02] S1: Yeah, yeah. No, that's so interesting.