Kauffman Fellows Podcast

Continuing his series on building an enduring investment firm, Mistral Venture Partners Founding Partner, Code Cubitt, sat down with JMI Equity Founder and Managing GP, Harry Gruner, to discuss his advice for building a firm for the long-term. Harry Gruner is the Managing Partner at JMI Equity, a growth equity firm focused on investing in leading software companies. He has been working with software companies for more than 30 years, having had the privilege of participating in the growth of the software industry from its infancy to where it is today.

Continuing his series on building an enduring investment firm, Mistral Venture Partners Founding Partner, Code Cubitt, sat down with Greenspring Associates Venture Capitalist, Chuck Newhall, to discuss the lessons learned building a 100-year firm. Chuck Newhall is a Chairman Emeritus at Greenspring Associates, a leading global venture capital investment firm that offers institutional and individual investors a comprehensive platform dedicated to the asset class.

Continuing his series on building an enduring investment firm, Mistral Venture Partners Founding Partner, Code Cubitt, sat down with Sozo Ventures Managing Director, Phil Wickham, to discuss what makes a winning VC culture. Phil Wickham is the Managing Director at Sozo Ventures, which invests in category leaders in advanced data technologies, eCommerce, enterprise cloud, fintech, IoT, and healthcare IT, among other emerging sectors. In addition to Sozo, Mr. Wickham serves as the Executive Chairman of the Kauffman Fellows.

Continuing his series on building an enduring investment firm, Mistral Venture Partners Founding Partner, Code Cubitt, sat down with Aligned Partners Co-Founder & Managing Partner, Susan Mason, to discuss how venture capital has evolved during her career. Susan Mason is the Managing Partner and Co-Founder at Aligned Partners, which invests in highly capital efficient start-ups in the IT area. Before co-founding Aligned Partners, she spent 15 years with ONSET Ventures, a venture capital firm with $1 billion under management focused on early-stage investing.

Continuing his series on building an enduring investment firm, Mistral Venture Partners Founding Partner, Code Cubitt, sat down with TorQuest Partners Sr. Managing Partner, Brent Belzberg, to discuss how he's developed and grown his investment team. Brent Belzberg is the Senior Managing Partner at TorQuest Partners, a Canadian-based manager of private equity funds with a proven track record in identifying and building value in a diversified portfolio of companies. With over $2 billion of equity capital under management, TorQuest Partners pursues investments in middle-market–later-stage companies with the goal of building value through opportune acquisitions, strategic leadership, and the timely use of financial expertise.

To kick off his series on building an enduring investment firm, Mistral Venture Partners Founding Partner, Code Cubitt, sat down with Floodgate Co-Founder and Partner, Mike Maples, to discuss his transition from entrepreneur to investor and how he got his start investing in lean startups. Mike Maples is the Co-Founder and Partner at Floodgate, which invests in the extraordinary top "point 1 percent" companies earlier than anyone else and provides as much help as possible in realizing extraordinary outcomes.

This series of interviews by Maggie Kenefake, Venture Partner with Royal Street Ventures, focuses on investing in the Midwest. In this episode, Maggie talks with John Tough, Managing Partner at Energize Ventures in Chicago, on his company's focus on digital transformation of energy and industrial markets and focus on emerging tech and capital-intensive industries.

This series of interviews by Maggie Kenefake, Venture Partner with Royal Street Ventures, focuses on investing in the Midwest. In this episode, Maggie talks with Ginger Rothrock, Senior Director at HG Ventures, a VC firm based in Indianapolis with the resources of 100 year-old multi-billion dollar industrial, Heritage Group Companies, behind it. Ginger invests in companies involved in software but also and most often in hardtech and physical innovation, including heavy construction materials, specialty chemicals, and environmental services. More specifically, the company invests in entrepreneurs working in those core industrial business areas, helping to connect the resources Heritage Group can give entrepreneurs to generate better outcomes and better returns.

This episode finds Maggie Kenefake, Venture Partner with Royal Street Ventures, continuing her series of talks with Roy Bahat, a Partner at Bloomberg Beta. The company, Roy said, is a small firm that invests only for financial return, not as a strategic investor. They're exclusively focused on the future of work and everything relating to modern business.

In this series, Maggie Kenefake, Venture Partner with Royal Street Ventures, talked with investors about the untapped potential for venture capital in the Midwest. This episode features Google alum Mary Grove revealing why her newish startup, Bread and Butter Investors, focuses on three specific industries of food tech, health tech, and enterprise software.

In this episode, Maggie Kenefake, Venture Partner with Royal Street Ventures, talked with Victor Gutwein, M25 Founder and Managing Director on Venture in the Middle. Victor and M25 focus on very early-stage deals in the Midwest, starting with his first fund of $1 million in 2016 and moving through Fund 3 of $31 million in 2019. They've made more than 108 investments in 24 different cities and have found abundant opportunities with a geographic focus.

In this series, Maggie Kenefake, Venture Partner with Royal Street Ventures, talked with investors about the untapped potential for venture capital in the Midwest. In this episode, Founder and Managing Director of Exposition Ventures, Karen Kerr, talks with Maggie about her career in industrial tech, her firm's focus on the digital transformation of the industrial value chain and why she started her firm in Chicago.

In this series, Pinn Lawjindakul, venture investor at Lightspeed Ventures Partners, explores the challenges and best practices of venture building in emerging markets through conversations with leading investors and founders across India, China, Southeast Asia. In this episode, listen as Pinn talks with Bejul Somaia, Managing Partner at Lightspeed Ventures, India. Bejul got his first exposure to the VC world as an operator just before the dotcom boom and bust, started another company, and then leapt into the venture capital game with gusto.

In this series, Pinn Lawjindakul, venture investor at Lightspeed Ventures Partners, explores the challenges and best practices of venture building in emerging markets through conversations with leading investors and founders across India, China, Southeast Asia. In this episode, listen as Pinn talks with James Mi, founding partner of lightspeed China, a leading China focused venture investment firm with over $2 billion under management. James ranks 21st on the 2024 global top 100 VC Midas list.

In this series, Pinn Lawjindakul, venture investor at Lightspeed Ventures Partners, explores the challenges and best practices of venture building in emerging markets through conversations with leading investors and founders across India, China, Southeast Asia. In this episode, listen as Pinn talks with Vaibhav Gupta (VG), Co-founder of Udaan, India's largest B2B ecommerce platform. VG, Pinn noted, has been “annoyingly successful,” having established two unicorns in the last decade, in Udaan and Flipkart, which is the largest Indian B2C ecommerce platform.

In this series, Pinn Lawjindakul, venture investor at Lightspeed Ventures Partners, explores the challenges and best practices of venture building in emerging markets through conversations with leading investors and founders across India, China, Southeast Asia. This episode finds Pinn talking with Ritesh Agarwal, founder and CEO of OYO Hotels and Homes. The company is one of the leading technology and revenue growth platforms for over 100,000 small hotels and home owners globally.

In this series, Pinn Lawjindakul, venture investor at Lightspeed Ventures Partners, explores the challenges and best practices of venture building in emerging markets through conversations with leading investors and founders across India, China, Southeast Asia. This episode finds Pinn talking with Jenny Lee, Managing Partner at GGV Capital, which has funded many emerging-market success stories.

In this series, Pinn Lawjindakul, venture investor at Lightspeed Ventures Partners, explores the challenges and best practices of venture building in emerging markets through conversations with leading investors and founders across India, China, Southeast Asia. In this episode Pinn talks with Nick Nash, Managing Partner and Co-founder of Asia Partners. After starting his career with McKinsey, Nick moved to General Atlantic and was Group President of Sea, Greater Southeast Asia's leading internet company, where he led the internet company on a journey from a private company to the largest US IPO from Southeast Asia. Nick is a member of the global Kauffman Society for leadership in venture capital.

Continuing her series on women leading deep tech investments, VP at Boost VC, Maddie Callander, sat down with Future Ventures Co-Founder and Partner, Maryanna Saenko, to discuss everything that makes deep tech so fascinating. Maryanna Saenko is the Co-Founder and Partner at Future Ventures, an early-stage venture capital fund focused on frontier technology investments. She has an academic background that mixes material science, biomedical engineering, and robotics, having worked on everything from lunar rovers to long-range, low-frequency communication, and all sorts of interesting robots.

Continuing her series on women leading deep tech investments, VP at Boost VC, Maddie Callander, sat down with Grit Ventures Managing Partner, Christy Cardenas, to discuss how universities have been so valuable for sourcing deep tech investments. Christy Cardenas is the Managing Partner at Grit Ventures, which funds pre-seed and seed-stage deep tech investments in robotics, AI, and energy startups disrupting major industries like construction, agriculture, transportation, and logistics. She has ten years and $12 billion in investment banking, private equity, and venture capital transaction experience, including M&A, debt, equity, fundraising, and fund management.

Continuing her series on women leading deep tech investments, VP at Boost VC, Maddie Callander, sat down with BVP Partner, Tess Hatch, to discuss the similarities and differences in deep tech and other investments. Tess Hatch is a Partner at Bessemer Venture Partners, helping founders lay enduring foundations to create companies that matter, starting with seed and Series A investments and sticking with companies at every stage of their growth. Hatch imagines a future where we travel to space with the frequency we currently travel in an aircraft and wants to partner with deep tech founders who believe in that future as well!

Continuing her series on women leading deep tech investments, VP at Boost VC, Maddie Callander, sat down with LDV Capital Partner, Abby Hunter-Syed, to discuss deep tech for visual data. Abby Hunter-Syed is a Partner at LDV Capital, investing in people building businesses powered by visual tech. LDV Capital thrives on collaborating with deep technical teams that leverage computer vision, machine learning, and artificial intelligence to analyze visual data.

Continuing her series on women leading deep tech investments, VP at Boost VC, Maddie Callander, sat down with Lux Capital Partner, Deena Shakir, to discuss her journey to venture and how she approaches solving some of the world's biggest problems. Deena Shakir is a Partner at Lux Capital, where she invests in transformative technologies streamlining analog industries and improving lives and livelihoods. She is particularly interested in intersectional and polymath entrepreneurs building breakthrough companies and accelerating advances and equity in human and population health.

To kick off her series on women leading deep tech investments, VP at Boost VC, Maddie Callander, sat down with Prime Movers Lab General Partner, Suzanne Fletcher, to discuss her passion for deep tech and the opportunities that it presents. Suzanne Fletcher is a General Partner at Prime Movers Lab, which invests in breakthrough scientific startups founded by the world's prime movers – the inventors who transform billions of lives across energy, transportation, infrastructure, manufacturing, human augmentation, and agriculture. Fletcher started her career at Morgan Stanley as an analyst in the tech and BioTech spaces and spent a decade on the LP side before moving to the direct investing side, where she remains to this day.

This week, Mighty Capital Founding Partner and host of the series on The Age of Product, SC Moatti, sat down with NextView Partner, Melody Koh to discuss where product meets investing. Melody Koh is a Partner at NextView Ventures, which is a C-stage focused firm. She has experience both in Consumer B2B and marketplace investments. Before joining NextView Ventures, Koh was Head of Product at Blue Apron. She joined Blue Apron as their first product hire and helped scale the business, built out their product management function, and more.

This week, Mighty Capital Founding Partner and host of the series on The Age of Product, SC Moatti, sat down with Hummingbird Founding CEO, Joe Robinson to discuss the power of networks. Joe Robinson is the Founding CEO of Hummingbird, a platform fighting financial crime. Before Hummingbird, he spent time at various financial institutions, including Square, where he served as a product manager. Robinson was also the VP of Product at Circle, an early cryptocurrency exchange. He also founded Designers + Geeks, one of the largest communities of technologists.

This week, Mighty Capital Founding Partner and host of the series on The Age of Product, SC Moatti, sat down with Virta Health Founding CEO, Sami Inkinen to discuss the investor relationships that build winning products. Sami Inkinen is Founding CEO of Virta Health, a healthcare technology company. He is also a Co-Founder of Trulia, a real estate marketplace. Inkinen likes creating positive disruptive change in business and personal performance through new technologies and hard work.

This week, Mighty Capital Founding Partner and host of the series on The Age of Product, SC Moatti, sat down with one of the first CPOs (Chief Product Officers) in the world, Logitech fmr CPO, now Products That Count CPO, Renee Niemi to discuss the evolution of product and investing. Renee Niemi is a lifelong connoisseur of great products that make a difference in people's lives. She has spent the last 30 years as the top product and business leader for leading companies like Logitech, Plantronics, and Google. Niemi has led teams primarily at the intersection of computing and mobility and was one of the first Chief Product officers. She is also a Partner at Mighty Capital.

This week, Mighty Capital Founding Partner and host of the series on The Age of Product, SC Moatti, sat down with Amplitude Founding CEO, Spenser Skates to discuss how companies can compete against FAANGs (Facebook, Apple, Amazon, Netflix, and Google). Spenser Skates is the Founding CEO of Amplitude, a digital acceleration platform that recently filed to go public ーI'm proud that he's also in the Mighty Capital portfolio. Before Amplitude, he worked at DRW Trading Group as an algorithmic trader. Skates studied Bioengineering at MIT where he twice won Battlecode, MIT's largest programming competition.

This week, Mighty Capital Founding Partner and host of the series on The Age of Product, SC Moatti, sat down with Homebrew Partner, Satya Patel to discuss disruption and investing. Patel is a Co-founding Partner at Homebrew, a seed-stage venture capital firm. Before starting Homebrew, he was VP of Product at Twitter. Patel has hopped between investing and product roles during his career, including a stint in product management at Google.

Finishing his series on the journey to net-zero, Contrarian Ventures Founder & Managing Partner, Rokas Peciulaitis, sat down with Union Square Ventures Managing Partner, Albert Wenger, to discuss why it's so important to invest in climate.

Continuing his series on the journey to net-zero, Contrarian Ventures Founder & Managing Partner, Rokas Peciulaitis, sat down with The Engine CEO & Managing Partner, Katie Rae, to discuss investing in impactful founders and companies at the university and lab levels.

Continuing his series on the journey to net-zero, Contrarian Ventures Founder & Managing Partner, Rokas Peciulaitis, sat down with 2150 Founding Partner, Christian Jølck, to discuss a way to invest that builds a better world.

Continuing his series on the journey to net-zero, Contrarian Ventures Founder & Managing Partner, Rokas Peciulaitis, sat down with Obvious Ventures Managing Director, Andrew Beebe, to discuss sustainable systems and net-zero investing.

Continuing his series on the journey to net-zero, Contrarian Ventures Founder & Managing Partner, Rokas Peciulaitis, sat down with Lowercarbon Capital Partner, Clay Dumas, to discuss how he is bringing his government policy understanding into climate investing and helping to solve the climate crisis at large.

To kick off this series on the journey to net-zero, Contrarian Ventures Founder & Managing Partner, Rokas Peciulaitis, sat down with Material Impact Founder and member at Breakthrough Energy Ventures (BEV), Carmichael Roberts, to discuss resilient technology and how he's pursued his passions through venture capital.

Closing out his series on the human side of investing and company building, Outliers Venture Capital Founder & Managing Partner, Mohammed Almeshekah, sat down with Sorenson Ventures Co-Founder & Partner, Ken Elefant, to discuss the importance of networking in venture capital and how to hone it as a superpower.

Continuing his series on the human side of investing and company building, Outliers Venture Capital Founder & Managing Partner, Mohammed Almeshekah, sat down with Emergence Capital Founder & General Partner, Jason Green, to discuss early-stage investing and what founders and investors should look for in one another.

Continuing his series on the human side of investing and company building, Outliers Venture Capital Founder & Managing Partner, Mohammed Almeshekah, sat down with Hustle Fund General Partner, Elizabeth Yin, to discuss the mindset of successful investors and founders.

Continuing his series on the human side of investing and company building, Outliers Venture Capital Founder & Managing Partner, Mohammed Almeshekah, sat down with Susa Ventures GP, Leo Polovets, to discuss the process for learning and being a great investor.

Continuing his series on the human side of investing and company building, Outliers Venture Capital Founder & Managing Partner, Mohammed Almeshekah, sat down with GV GP, M.G. Siegler, to discuss how VCs can best support investors.

To kick off his series on the human side of investing and company building, Outliers Venture Capital Founder & Managing Partner, Mohammed Almeshekah, sat down with Bullpen Capital General Partner, Duncan Davidson, to discuss how to navigate people and personalities in venture capital.

In this series called Vet to Venture, Wayne Moore, Managing Partner at Alumni Ventures Basecamp Fund, talks with veterans about their unique path in the military to a career in venture and technology. In this episode, Wayne talks with Larsen Jensen, Co-founder and General Partner at Harpoon Ventures about how his “unplanned” path from a military career into VC has worked out so well.

In this series called Vet to Venture, Wayne Moore, Managing Partner at Alumni Ventures Basecamp Fund, talks with veterans about their unique path in the military to a career in venture and technology. In this episode, Wayne talks with Bradley Harrison, General Partner with Scout Ventures, about how veterans are well positioned to transition from the military into entrepreneurial life.

In this series called Vet to Venture, Wayne Moore, Managing Partner at Alumni Ventures Basecamp Fund, talks with veterans about their unique path in the military to a career in venture and technology. In this episode, Wayne talks with Zachary Ellis, Managing Partner with HTX Fund, on thriving in VC after his military career and how he got into the VC universe.

In this series called Vet to Venture, Wayne Moore, Managing Partner at Alumni Ventures Basecamp Fund, talks with veterans about their unique path in the military to a career in venture and technology. In this episode, Wayne and Sherman Williams, Managing Partner of the Academy Investor Network, a virtual platform created for U.S. Service Academy Graduates to invest in venture-backed startups in two areas of investment focus: dual-use technology startups and the veteran-led startups.

In this series called Vet to Venture Capital, Wayne Moore, Managing Partner at AVG Basecamp Fund, talks with veterans about their unique path in the military to a career in venture and technology. In this episode, Wayne and Todd Connor, Navy veteran and founder of Bunker Labs and author of Third Shift Entrepreneur, talk about how vets transition out of the strong direction of the military and into the self direction of the entrepreneur life.

In this series called Vet to Venture Capital, Wayne Moore, Managing Partner at Alumni Ventures Basecamp Fund, talks with veterans about their unique path in the military to a career in venture and technology. In this episode, Wayne and Tyson Clark, General Partner at GV, formerly Google Ventures, talk about his history at Stanford, ROTC, serving on a nuclear fast-attack submarine officer, business school, and entering the business world.

Grove Ventures General Partner Renana Ashkenazi digs into the topic of winning the deal, the before and the after. She's finishing the series with Adam Goulburn, Partner at Lux Capital, who invests with the idea of “no idea too early and no idea too crazy.” Adam's areas of focus include biotech, and he always considers the question, “Is this a science project? Or is this science and technology ready for primetime?”

Grove Ventures General Partner Renana Ashkenazi digs into the topic of winning the deal, the before and the after. In this episode Renana talks with with Ann Miura-Ko on the idea of conviction through gut feeling. Venture investing is a “head and heart” approach, and some investors feel that due diligence is a process where you try to convince your head of what your gut said in the very first meeting. All the data in the world isn't enough to do that, as what you really want is to feel that conviction.

Grove Ventures General Partner Renana Ashkenazi digs into the topic of winning the deal, the before and the after. In this episode Renana digs deep into the idea of conviction. Venture investing is a “head and heart” approach, and some investors feel that due diligence is a process where you try to convince your head of what your gut said in the very first meeting. This episode finds Renana with Wen Hsieh, Partner at Kleiner Perkins, and get into his five requirements for conviction.