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Hiroki Takeuchi, the co-founder and CEO of GoCardless started in 2011. GoCardless is a star of the blossoming UK FinTech scene- last valued at $2.1b, the business is on a mission to take the pain out of payments for businesses of all shapes and sizes – from your local gym collecting monthly membership right through to the Uk's biggest utility companies. Payment collection is a problem as old as time, and in creating a global bank debit network to rival the card networks like Visa and Mastercard , it is also an incredibly complex ecosystem to navigate and operate in. But Go Cardless has seen tremendous success – it currently processes over $35b in payments annually from close to 100,000 customers. Aside from regulatory complexity that is only heightened when you throw cross border payments into the mix, the challenge of scaling a business that form day one has had such a variety of customer shapes and sizes gives rise to some wonderful lessons for operators. Hiroki's personal story is incredibly inspiring. The founder's journey always involves a level of grit and determination to overcome adversity, but Hiroki takes it to a new level; five years into the Go Cardless journey, a bike accident resulted in a spinal cord injury. If anything, it gave him a him a perspective on life and leadership that has enabled Go Cardless to flourish like it has. Show Notes: (02:12): Founding Story (06:45): Why direct debit? (10:03): Unraveling the complexity around cloud-based payments (12:31): Navigating the rules and regulations on collecting payments (14:02): GoCardless' competitive advantage (19:00): Scaling challenges when expanding internationally (21:52): G2M success via partnerships (24:21): GoCardless' culture journey (26:55): Embedding and living company values (28:26): Leading the business post bicycle accident (31:10): Evolution of leadership when scaling a business --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/tdm-growth-partners/message
“There is no entrepreneurial gene, I don't think,” says James Wise, partner at VC firm Balderton Capital and author of Start-Up-Century.He adds:“I don't think it is in your DNA. But certainly, your upbringing and the role models you have around you do make a big difference.”Wise gives us the full skinny on his new book, Start-Up Nation, which offers a fresh look at the rise in entrepreneurship and startups and how they are changing the world of work as well as what the changing economy means for the future.He talks about fintech luminaries, such as GoCardless founder Hiroki Takeuchi who was “integral” to some of the thinking behind the book.On Monzo co-founder Tom Blomfield and Revolut co-founder Nikolay Storonsky, Wise said:“If you look at the backgrounds of Tom and Nikolay, they are both incredibly competitive, entrepreneurial people.”Wise also offers his view on some of the latest fintech trends.
In this episode of Career Chats, we interview Steve Ingham, Chief Executive Officer of PageGroup, and Hiroki Takeuchi, Chief Executive Officer of GoCardless. Steve and Hiroki talk about their journeys to the CEO position, how they have grown as leaders and their experiences with disability in the business world. PageGroup is a FTSE 250, global recruitment leader with over 6500 employees and operations in 37 different countries. GoCardless is an innovative fintech with backing from leading investors; processing more than $60 billion dollars in transactions every year, the company is a trusted partner to 60,000 businesses. In our new interview series, Career Chats, Page Executive host a series of inspirational leaders from across industries and sectors. We discuss their paths, explore the challenges they have faced and growth they have achieved, and provide crucial insights into the traits aspiring leaders should cultivate to achieve success.
Tom Blomfield, wow what an entrepreneur. This guy has founded multiple multi-million-pound companies, that have become monumental disrupters in the industry. And let's face it, Monzo, one of the companies Tom founded and led, is the one of the most forward-thinking, innovative, fastest-growing companies there is. Tom was born in Hong Kong and lived with his father and mother. His father was a business-minded civil engineer and his mother was an artist. When Tom was a child, he moved to London to attend grammar school in Amersham, Buckinghamshire then moving on to study Law at Oxford. Whilst studying at Oxford, at the age of 21, he co-founded Boso.com an “eBay for students”. After a few internships with law firms he decided being a lawyer wasn't for him and followed the entrepreneurial journey instead. In January 2011 Blomfield co-founded the UK-based company GoCardless, an automated payment method that processes Direct Debit payments on behalf of other businesses and organisations. Blomfield stayed in Silicon Valley during his three years at the company, it raised around £35 million of investment and hired 100 people. When GoCardless appointed Hiroki Takeuchi as CEO in 2013, he left (keeping a "very small share" in the £50-100m valued company) Tom moved to New York to work for dating site Grouper social club as their Head of Growth. Blomfield left Grouper in 2014, and it closed in 2016. Following his departure from Grouper Social Club Blomfield joined Anne Boden's Starling bank as the CTO. Startling was, at that point one of the first digital banking companies. Tom left the company in early 2015 after reports of disagreements at Starling, telling the Financial Times that "he could not comment under the terms of his departure". Today we learn about what really happened at Starling. In 2015, he founded challenger bank Monzo, operating with no branches and instead offering accounts online In its first fundraising round, the company raised "£1 million in 96 seconds”. In April, Blomfield announced he would forgo his salary for one year to help his company during the COVID-19 pandemic In May, he announced that he was stepping down as CEO of Monzo and taking on the role of president of the company. In January 2021 he announced he was leaving the company permanently. This conversation today takes us through Tom's wild entrepreneurial journey expressing the highs and lows of running a business. He also talks about the disagreements at Starling bank and ultimately his reason for starting Monzo in the first place. His stories are unique, and more importantly honest. Unbelievably honest. He tells you the mistakes he made, his deepest insecurities, his biggest challenges and the things he wish he knew. Wow this is a good one. Why entrepreneurship? What made you want to disrupt an industry? Monzo & Starling rivalry Starting Monzo Wanting to be seen to be a success What were the good times at Monzo? What were the bad times at Mozo? Was the business model of Monzo bad? Leaving Monzo Not sleeping because of the stress of the business How was holding down a relationship while running the business? The “red phone” in your bedroom What was your life like outside of the business? The road to leaving Monzo The urge to go back Death Threats Enjoying the small things in life and relationships Your purpose in life Crypto currencies The good things about being a CEO Tom: https://twitter.com/t_blom https://www.linkedin.com/in/tomblomfield Sponsors: https://uk.huel.com/ https://fiverr.com/ceo
On this episode of Think Like a Founder, SNP Co-Founder & CEO, Maureen Taylor, speaks with Hiroki Takeuchi, Co-Founder and CEO of GoCardless. They talk about catching the startup bug, not outsourcing your core value, and the excitement of the unknown. From small businesses to enterprises, GoCardless makes it easy to collect payments from customers worldwide. By simplifying the transaction process, they help reduce operational costs and improve cash flow to help businesses grow. Before founding GoCardless in 2011 with Matt Robinson and Tom Blomfield, Hiroki worked as a business analyst at McKinsey & Company. GoCardless is now valued at nearly one billion dollars. Think Like A Founder is produced by SNP Communications in San Francisco, California. Learn more about the Think Like a Founder podcast and curriculum by visiting us at https://now.snpnet.com/tlaf or connect with Maureen Taylor on LinkedIn to continue the conversation there. Series Producer: Roisin HuntSound Design: Marc Ream Content and Scripting: Mike Sullivan and Jaselin DrownProduction Coordinator: Natasha ThomasThanks also to Selena Persiani-Shell, Jordan Bailey, Matt Johnson, Eli Shell, John Hughes, and Renn Vara.
In 2011, Hiroki Takeuchi launched his first business GoCardless with his co-founders. Just under one decade later, they are processing over $15b in payments every year! Takeuchi’s first business began as a service to help streamline the messy process of collecting payments informally. Over the next several years, funding, scaling, and pivoting led him to create a simple service that helped collect recurring and one-off payments from customers. Takeuchi’s approach to business is inspiring. Not only was he a first-time entrepreneur scaling a global business without experience, but he also knows the pains of imposter syndrome and anxiety over hiring overqualified experts. This interview with Nathan Chan serves to remind us all that greatness isn’t just past experience, it’s the willingness to learn that makes someone a great entrepreneur. Key Takeaways How Takeuchi launched GoCardless in 2011 as his first business, and how he developed the idea Evolving the initial business idea from something that sought to solve the problem of collecting payments informally, to a global fintech empire The importance of having a complimentary co-founder, and how Takeuchi first began planning with his co-founders Why Takeuchi decided to leverage existing services in order to streamline launch Demo day, and overcoming getting 64 “no’s” before they got a “yes” The importance of focus on a singular product, especially in a global powerhouse like finances and payment How Takeuchi approached scaling, planning, and proactive growth in a high-demand industry The challenges faced by an international business and scaling How Takeuchi tackles imposter syndrome, and how he continues to focus on learnings The importance he places on his team and the people Takeuchi surrounds himself with What you need to ignore if you want to hire the best of the best for your business Why you should never underestimate the length of the journey ahead of you, and why you need to be ready for the challenge of being an entrepreneur
For any CEO, one of their most important challenges is to hire extraordinary people - Game Changers - to join their senior leadership team. Notion research has shown that one of the most fundamental differences between the most successful tech companies and the rest is largely to do with the quality of the hiring into the senior leadership team. Paul Papadimitriou and Stephen Millard discuss this with Hiroki Takeuchi, Founder and CEO, GoCardlessHighlights:- That one thing that has enabled us to get to where we are today has been thanks to hiring some really fantastically talented people along the way.- If you plan to hire Game Changers onto your leadership team, then you had better get comfortable feeling uncomfortable because they are so much better than you.- I look for five things when hiring a game changer. Of all of these an insatiable hunger to build a massive business is the most important.- Always raise the bar in terms of the quality of people you hire, if not it’s a slippery slope.- In the early days we paid a high price for a lack of diversity and an unwillingness to value experience.- We encourage people from diverse backgrounds to join us and do the best work of their lives.Hiroki Takeuchi is the founder and CEO of GoCardless. GoCardless processes billions in transactions every year and helps tens of thousands of companies around the world take recurring payments using a global direct debit infrastructure. With Paul Papadimitriou and Stephen Millard.Read more: https://notion.vc/resources/five-things-saas-founders-should-look-for-when-hiring-game-changers/
In this episode, we speak to Hiroki Takeuchi, Founder and CEO of GoCardless, about how he scaled his business - fast! The young entrepreneur shares his experience of dealing with imposter syndrome, sourcing talent in the tech ecosystem, and how changing the trajectory of his business helped accelerate growth. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
If you’ve ever wondered how entrepreneurs without a specific idea go on to found a unicorn startup from their bedrooms, then this episode of Secret Leaders is for you. “One of the things that really strikes me that's changed over the course of the last 10 years is the level of awareness of what's possible. When we decided to start GoCardless, most of our friends just thought we were unemployed and couldn't get a job.”Today’s guest is one third of the British equivalent of the PayPal mafia, Hiroki Takeuchi, co-founder and CEO of payment giant GoCardless. GoCardless is a global payment network taking the pain out of getting paid for more than 50,000 businesses worldwide from multinationals to SMB, processing over $15 billion of payments annually across more than 30 countries.Hiroki and his fellow co-founders Matt Robinson (who now runs successful property tech startup Nested) and Tom Bloomfield (who has recently stepped aside as CEO of challenger bank giant Monzo) have raised over $120 million across 7 rounds of funding, securing $75 million in their latest series E.But it’s not been an easy ride. “The first round of investment that we raised was definitely the hardest. I think we had something like 64 ‘no’s’ before we got our first ‘yes’.”Hiroki has been on a real journey, not just professionally, but personally too, having to physically rebuild his body after a horrific cycling accident in 2016 that left him paralysed from the waist down, drastically altering how he manages himself and the business day to day.We chat about:The hardest part of starting a businessThe hockey stick growth curveHow to mentally prepare to fundraiseWhen co-founders leave the businessChoosing a CEO and building a leadership teamThe future vision for GoCardlessLinks:NestedMonzoWant to receive our podcast on a weekly basis? Subscribe to our newsletter!
Interview with Hiroki Takeuchi, CEO of GoCardless
In today's episode, we bring you an interview with Taavet Hinrikus, co-founder and chairman at TransferWise and Hiroki Takeuchi, CEO at GoCardless. In November 2019 it was announced that GoCardless and TransferWise would be joining forces to enable better cross-border global payments. In this episode of Fintech Insider Interviews, Jason Bates caught up with the pair to discuss payments, partnerships and future plans. Tune in for industry insights, a wealth of experience and much much more! This podcast is brought to you by Stake (https://hellostake.com/), the digital brokerage app bringing you unrivalled access to the US market. Invest in over 3,500 US stocks and ETFs, including game-changing companies like Google, Amazon and Tesla. Trading is instant, direct and commission-free, and with a fully digitised sign-up, you’ll be in the market in minutes. Visit hellostake.com or search ‘Stake Trade’ to seize the US market’s 31 trillion dollars-worth of opportunity today. Love fintech? Then sign up for our newsletter, Fintech in Five. A snack-sized selection of the week's biggest stories, longer reads, soundbites and more. Just visit this link to sign up! 11fs.com/newsletter Fintech Insider by 11:FS is a podcast dedicated to all things fintech, banking, technology and financial services. Hosted by a rotation of 11:FS experts including David Brear, Simon Taylor, Jason Bates, Leda Glyptis and Sarah Kocianski and joined by a range of brilliant guests, we cover the latest global news, bring you interviews from industry experts or take a deep dive into subject matters such as APIs, AI or digital banking. If you enjoyed this episode, don't forget to subscribe and please leave a review Follow us on Twitter: www.twitter.com/fintechinsiders where you can ask the hosts questions, alternatively email podcasts@11fs.com! Special Guests: Hiroki Takeuchi and Taavet Hinrikus.
Small Biz Matters – a half hour program each week where you can work ON your business rather than IN it.with Alexi Boyd, broadcaster, advocate and small business owner.Date: 19 November 2019 What is it about successful Fintech companies that makes their evolution so exciting and inspiring? Is it because in an industry of stale, boring business models anything new is considered innovative and so we find it fascinating? Or is it because of that fabulous term, Unicorn? That being said, no one can argue that FinTech companies solving the problems of small business is a refreshing change to the dinosaur behaviour of Finance. Take GoCardless for example who recently launched the first global network for recurring payments. They describe it as a totally new way of collecting international payments without the hassle and admin. It means you can now collect international recurring payments through one bank account. Here to share with us a unique journey from idea to global company is the CEO and Founder of GoCardless, Hiroki Takeuchi. Welcome to the show Hiroki. Topics we’ll be covering: Tell the listeners about your personal GoCardless journey and the problems you’re trying to solve for Small Businesses around the world As a Fintech company what comparisons between entering the Australian market and somewhere like the US? Why are payment terms such a pain point for small businesses all over the world and how do solutions like GoCardless support them? Why are advisors the best partners for payment services? What solutions are out there for cashflow problems and what has changed in the Fintech space that has made companies like GoCardless so successful in recent years? To find out more go to their website: https://gocardless.com
Join Tim and Dan live from Xerocon as we chat to Hiroki Takeuchi the co founder and CEO of Go Cardless! Hear Hiroki discuss the journey of Go Cardless from initial idea through silicon valley accelerators to the multinational business it is today. We also discuss ATO warnings about diversification of investments in SMSFs and Tim's tight ass tip! To find out how you can integrate Go Cardless in your systems and for more information go to their website! https://gocardless.com/en-au/
This week, Peter and Paul discuss the economy with CommSec's Ryan Felsman and fintech company GoCardless with its co-founder Hiroki Takeuchi. Plus an interview with Martin North from Digital Finance Analytics from our new property show on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/switzermedia
This week we have some great stories for you as David and Simon are joined by a few great guests: Hiroki Takeuchi, CEO of GoCardless Solange Dive-Chamberlain, Head of Commercial Banking Strategy at LBG Chris Maddern, Co-founder & CPO at Button, formerly of Venmo Niall Cameron, Global Head of Corporate and Institutional Digital at HSBC We kick off the episode by taking a look at Station F, could it be France’s F-You to London’s fintech hub? Opened in June 2017, Station F is the world’s largest startup incubator. Station F acts as a statement of ambition. France wants to become the number one country for tech in Europe. Hiroki notes that Paris is five years behind London in terms of fintech environment and David's not a huge fan of the name...(02:50) We speak to Oscar Williams-Grut, who wrote the story, for a bit more insight (03:34). Next up, we talk about the evolution of the US prepaid card ecosystem. There were 10.7 billion prepaid card transactions worth $290 billion in 2016, according to The Federal Reserve. Business Insider Intelligence expects that to grow to $396 billion by 2022. Solange notes that prepaid cards impact on the way people interact with money and each other - driving customer behaviour (13:15). Other stories include: N26’s Viennese whirl Turning the Tide on business registrations Stripe’s new SCA acquisition Robinhood shoots for a banking charter T-Mobile’s Take 2 on digital banking And finally, The Germans hoard more gold than the Bundesbank All this and so much more on today's show. Don't forget to subscribe so you never miss an episode, leave a review on iTunes and let us know your thoughts on the stories @FintechInsiders on Twitter where you can also ask the hosts questions, or email podcasts@11fs.com This week's episode was produced by Laura Watkins and edited by Alex Woodhouse. Special Guests: Chris Maddern, Hiroki Takeuchi, Niall Cameron, and Solange Dive-Chamberlain.
The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on Hiroki Takeuchi, founder of GoCardless, the payment processor and biggest fintech company you have never heard of, to talk about starting at Y Combinator 8 years ago (3:00), the first idea he had with Tom Blomfield and Matt of Monzo (6:00), switching ideas (9:20), why big businesses didn’t so this themselves (11:30), laying the payment plumbing of the Internet (13:55), raising $75m in venture capital funding (16:25), growing up in Swindon (18:30), meeting his co-founders at Oxford (19:25), losing his co-founders (20:30), the dark moments of running a startup (22:30), the rise of the London fintech scene (25:30), the cycling accident that paralysed him (28:20), how it changed his focus (31:30), and the next five years (33:20). See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.
Two years ago, Hiroki Takeuchi was paralyzed from the waist down in a cycling accident. It was just weeks after he and his wife, Rachel Swidenbank, got married. When we first spoke in early 2017, Hiroki was still figuring out the basics of day-to-day life in a wheelchair: how to drive an adapted car, how to get up and down stairs, how to use the bathroom on his own. Rachel stopped working to care for Hiroki in those early days. There were a lot of unknowns about the future, and what Hiroki's body would and wouldn't be capable of. When we spoke recently, they told me that Hiroki is now fully independent when it comes to his daily routines, and that they're both back to work. "It's been progress, progress, progress, progress," Rachel said. "And then like maybe the last three, four months it's kind of flattened out in terms of what you would classify as progress." One thing that they haven't yet fully figured out: sex. "We definitely have a lot of intimacy and you know, a lot of closeness," Hiroki told me. "But...I think that there's so much baggage around it." Rachel and Hiroki did recently find out that having a child together is possible via IVF. While they're not ready to start that process quite yet, it was exciting news for them—and it's made Hiroki think about what being a father might look like for him. "One of the things that really worried me was that I wouldn't be able to be a proper dad to our children," he said. "I think there's a level of like you know redefining what fatherhood means through a different lens. It doesn't mean it's worse, it's just different." Traveling for the holiday this week? Take our Podcasts We're Thankful For playlist — with episode suggestions from podcast hosts like PJ Vogt, Tracy Clayton, Phoebe Judge and Kelly McEvers — along with you!
Hiroki Takeuchi is the Founder and CEO of GoCardless, a London-based fintech that simplifies recurring payment collection for businesses. GoCardless has raised $47m to date and is backed by the likes of Balderton, Accel Partners, Passion Capital and Notion Capital. Hiroki and his co-founders, including Tom Blomfield, now of Monzo, who joined us on the podcast way back in episode 17, went through Y Combinator in early on and have some interesting stories about that experience. Today's conversation covers a number of topics, some of which are quite challenging. I'd highly encourage you to listen through to the end. Hiroki is an exceptional entrepreneur with a powerful story. Check out the show notes at www.bankingthefuture.com for links to the articles mentioned in today's conversation. If you enjoy today's episode, please subscribe on iTunes, or your podcast platform of choice. Thank you very much for joining us today. Please welcome Hiroki Takeuchi.
Three weeks after Rachel Swidenbank and Hiroki Takeuchi got married, an accident changed everything. Become a monthly sustaining member of Death, Sex & Money. Sign up now. Stay in touch! Sign up for Death, Sex & Money's weekly newsletter here: deathsexmoney.org/newsletter. Follow the show on Twitter @deathsexmoney and Facebook at facebook.com/deathsexmoney. Email us any time at deathsexmoney@wnyc.org.
Hiroki Takeuchi is the Co-Founder and CEO of GoCardless a payments company, making collecting recurring payments simpler. They collect over $2 Billion worth of payments through their network. Hiroki spoke with Alex Theuma on The SaaS Revolution show with a sales focused episode on strategies selling to SMB and Enterprise that have contributed to GoCardless' growth.