Podcasts about Lighter Capital

Cree Lawson combined his curiosity for technology with his career in the travel industry to create Travel Ad Network, which connects advertisers with travel-related audiences online. Travel advertisers were frustrated with the inability to track whether ad viewers actually visited the destinations they promoted, so Cree figured out a solution and started his second travel tech venture. Arrivalist was created in 2012 to provide offline visitor tracking and analytics to online advertisers in the travel industry. They bootstrapped and grew efficiently, with some revenue-based financing from Lighter Capital, not requiring big outside equity funding to build out their platform and acquire new customers.  They grew steadily and became was through 2019. After the COVID travel disruption faded, Cree sold Arrivalist to Alpine Investors, owners of AirDNA, another travel data company. John is no longer the CEO of Arrivalist, but he is still involved in the company as a board member and spokesperson. Quote from Cree Lawson, Founder of Arrivalist “New entrepreneurs need to answer three questions to see if they have a real business. Can you do it? Will people pay you to do it? Will you get paid more than it costs to do it? You can answer those without spending a lot of money. “Once you answer those three questions, you are off and running. I could answer those questions at Arrivalist, and we didn't need to raise outside funding. Bootstrapping was a bad word in 2011. People told me to stop calling myself a bootstrapper, but it worked well for us.” Links Cree Lawson on LinkedIn Arrivalist on LinkedIn AirDNA website Alpine Investors Podcast Sponsor – Full Scale This week's podcast is sponsored by Full Scale, one of the fastest-growing software development companies in any region. Full Scale vets, employs, and supports over 300 professional developers, designers, and testers in the Philippines who can augment and extend your core dev team. Learn more at fullscale.io. The Practical Founders Podcast Tune into the Practical Founders Podcast for weekly in-depth interviews with founders who have built valuable software companies without big funding. Subscribe to the Practical Founders Podcast using your favorite podcast app. Get the weekly Practical Founders newsletter and podcast updates at practicalfounders.com. 

John Stewart created and sold an engineering services business, then grew a Salesforce integration services company before building some early software products. One of their software experiments allowed Salesforce customers to see and interact with their customer data on a map. When customers paid for it and revenue grew, he and his co-founder wound down services and focused on their mapping product.  MapAnything grew quickly to over $2M ARR as a bootstrapped software company, with some revenue-based financing from Lighter Capital to help test their growth plans. When they focused on field service route optimization and grew quickly, MapAnything raised several rounds of venture capital to grow even faster by focusing its sales and marketing efforts within the Salesforce ecosystem.  MapAnything reached $22 million in ARR before Salesforce acquired the company for $250 million. John stayed on with Salesforce for six months before moving on. John and a co-founder launched Fastbreak.ai three years later, a sports schedule optimization platform for professional and amateur sports leagues.  Quote from John Stewart, former CEO of MapAnything “I tell founders most often that you really need to focus on sales and distribution. As a CEO of a startup in the tech space or SaaS, the only thing that really matters is revenue growth. Technology is technology. Even if you have unique IP right now, it won't be unique soon enough. “So you need to figure out your go-to-market motion. That's the single most important thing. Revenue cures all ills. It doesn't matter what's going on in the company as long as revenue is growing. It's all about revenue growth more than anything.” Links John Stewart on LinkedIn MapAnything on LinkedIn Salesforce website Fastbreak.ai website The Practical Founders Podcast Tune into the Practical Founders Podcast for weekly in-depth interviews with founders who have built valuable software companies without big funding. Subscribe to the Practical Founders Podcast using your favorite podcast app. Get the weekly Practical Founders newsletter and podcast updates at practicalfounders.com.   

Adam Brotman is the co-founder and co-CEO of Forum3, an organization committed to building and partnering with creators, brands, and projects that leverage the unique innovations and creativity unlocked by Web3. Prior to co-founding Forum3, Adam served as the Chairman and CEO of Brightloom and the CEO of J.Crew. He also served as the EVP for Global Retail Operations at Starbucks. Adam holds a BA in Classical Civilizations specializing in Business & Administration from UCLA and a JD from the University of Washington School of Law. Andy Sack is the co-CEO of Forum3. He also serves as a managing partner at KeenCapital—a fund of blockchain native venture funds—and co-founder and managing partner of Founders Co-op. He was the former CEO of The Body Shop Digital as well as the founder and Executive Chairman of Lighter Capital. Andy holds a BA from Brown University and received his MBA from Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Adam and Andy join me today to discuss cultivating brand loyalty through generative AI and other emerging technologies. They share insight on how companies can successfully navigate the rapidly evolving AI landscape. They illustrate how emerging tech has allowed Gen Z and Millennials to become a new generation of “creator-consumers.” They also highlight how generative AI can unlock creativity and help brands transition from transactional connections to emotional connections.   “As social media has evolved, today's consumer doesn't want to be marketed or sold to. The successful brands are the ones that invite consumers to participate and engage with them.” - Andy Sack   This week on Innovation Talks: ●     Adam and Andy's backgrounds and professional journeys ●     Using AI and emerging technology to tell your brand's story ●     Forum 3's mission and how it's creating Hive 3 to help brands and AI creators collaborate and tell stories ●     How brands like Starbucks, Balenciaga, and Heinz are exploring AI ●     Generative AI and the privacy of brands ●     The significance of AI and data-driven strategies in the evolving marketing landscape ●     Rapid AI development across various tech giants like Microsoft, Meta, Google, and Amazon ●     Challenges and opportunities for companies navigating the fast-paced AI landscape ●     The emotional shift in consumer behavior and the role of AI in fostering emotional connections ●     The importance of emotional connections in the digital age ●     Social media, influencers, and the evolving ways consumers express their feelings about brands ●     Starbucks' digital innovation, Starbucks Odyssey, and its impact on consumer engagement ●     Brand innovation amid rapid AI and tech development Connect with Adam Brotman: ●     Adam Brotman on LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/adambrotman/) ●     Email: adam@forum3.com   Connect with Andy Sack: ●     Andy Sack on LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/andysack/) ●     Email: andy@forum3.com   Connect with Forum3: ●     Forum3 (https://www.forum3.com/) ●     Forum3 on Twitter (https://twitter.com/Forum3_) ●     Forum3 on LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/company/forum3-com/about/) ●     Forum3 on Medium (https://medium.com/forum3) Connect with Hive3: ●     Hive3 (https://hive3.ai/) ●     Hive3 on Twitter (https://twitter.com/hive3_) ●     Hive3 on Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/hive3_/) ●     Hive3 on YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/@Hive3) ●     Hive3 on Discord (https://discord.com/invite/hive3) This Podcast is brought to you by Sopheon   Thanks for tuning into this week's episode of Innovation Talks. If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe and leave a review wherever you get your podcasts.   Apple Podcasts (https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/innovation-talks/id1555857396) | TuneIn (https://tunein.com/podcasts/Technology-Podcasts/Innovation-Talks-p1412337/) | GooglePlay (https://www.google.com/podcasts?feed=aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5ibHVicnJ5LmNvbS9mZWVkcy8xNDY1ODg1LnhtbA) | Stitcher (https://www.stitcher.com/s?fid=614195) | Spotify (https://open.spotify.com/show/1dX5b8tWI29YbgeMwZF5Uh) | iHeart (https://www.iheart.com/podcast/263-innovation-talks-82985745/) | Amazon (https://music.amazon.com/podcasts/6e12f112-fdc6-499e-be27-bcdd18505859/innovation-talks)   Be sure to connect with us on Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/SopheonCorp/) , Twitter (https://twitter.com/sopheon) , and LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/company/sopheon/) , and share your favorite episodes on social media to help us reach more listeners, like you.   For additional information around new product development or corporate innovation, sign up for Sopheon's newsletter where we share news and industry best practices monthly! The fastest way to do this is to go to sopheon.com (https://www.sopheon.com/) and click here (https://info.sopheon.com/subscribe) .

Are you confused about funding options for your tech company? On this episode of Tech Leader Talk, I am talking with Melissa Widner.  She is the CEO of Lighter Capital, which is a leader in revenue-based financing. Melissa has experience as a founder with multiple exits, an angel investor, and a VC investor.  This gives her an interesting perspective on how to fund startups. On this episode, Melissa and I discuss different types of funding options for tech startups – and the advantages & disadvantages of each option. We also talk about revenue-based financing and when that's a good option to consider. And, Melissa shares her thoughts on when founders should consider bootstrapping their business. “Startup entrepreneurs are the most fascinating people on the planet.” – Melissa Widner Today on the Tech Leader Talk podcast: - Different funding options for tech startups – and how to choose the best option - Raising capital without giving up equity or control - How to raise capital in today's business environment - When should you consider revenue-based financing - Bootstrapping your tech startup Connect with Melissa Widner: LinkedIn:  https://www.linkedin.com/in/melissawidner/ Website:  https://www.lightercapital.com/ Thanks for listening! Be sure to get your free copy of Steve's latest book, Cracking the Patent Code, and discover his proven system for identifying and protecting your most valuable inventions. Get the book at https://stevesponseller.com/book.

“We have been providing non-dilutive funding to B2B SaaS companies since 2010. And what that means is we provide funding we don't take any equity,” says Melissa Widner, Chief Executive Officer at Lighter Capital. “It's funding that's in the form of a loan. And the companies will pay us back a percentage of their revenue until the loan is paid off.” Recently, Telin, a leading player in the telecommunications industry, announced a strategic partnership with Lighter Capital, a seasoned financial ally dedicated to fostering the growth of businesses like yours. In this podcast Melissa Widner is joined by Spencer Lee of Telin, who tells us that not only is Telin offering this resource right on the partner portal, Telin is also a Lighter Capital client. “So, it was this past year, I was sitting down with Melissa, and I said, this makes a lot of sense for our partners too,” says Lee. “Like our partners are in the same situation where they're growing fast, they're heavily on a subscription service business model. They don't have heavy assets that are weighing them down, and they need growth capital. Through Lighter Capital, MSPs can experience a simple application process that's designed to take fifteen minutes less, and a financial partner that understands recurring revenue and is familiar with the UCaaS, and related, markets, space. MSPs can join the Telin MSP community and through the portal at console.telin.one. Related Articles: Toll Fraud Insurance: A Primer Telin Support & knowledge base Telin Partner Success Program | Telin | Unified Communications About Telin Telin is a unique telecom company that embraces a distinct distribution model. That is, we are your one source for all things unified communications. As a preferred provider of 3CX SIP trunks, 3CX hosting, and SNOM/VTECH solutions—backed by a team of experts with an extensive background in security, redundancy, and compliance—we help partners consolidate all the telecom infrastructure components they need to service and support their clients. With an unrivaled partner success program, Telin has spent the better part of three decades amassing a reputation for delivering the same white-glove service our VARs, MSPs, and 3CX partners offer their enterprise and small business customers—but at the wholesale level. More at https://telin.com/.

There are many options for raising growth capital for established startups. With all the attention paid to venture capital, we sometimes forget that the vast majority of companies are not funded that way. Revenue-based financing has been around for more than a decade and it is a good alternative for certain types of companies.My next guest on the Fintech One-on-One Podcast is Melissa Widner, the CEO of Lighter Capital, a pioneer in the revenue-based financing space. We learn all about how this space works, what types of companies it works best for and how Lighter Capital has become one of the market leaders.In this podcast you will learn:How she first got involved with Lighter Capital.What attracted her to the CEO role.What it is like running a fintech company from Australia.The different countries where they are set up to lend.How revenue-based financing works (that was pioneered by Lighter).The types of companies that are in their sweet spot.The size and terms of their financing.How their underwriting works.Why most revenue-based financing lenders are not really doing revenue-based finance.The impact of the venture capital downturn on Lighter Capital.How the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank impacted demand for capital.Their historical loss rate.How loan demand has been overall in 2023.What it was like renewing their credit facility in the summer.Melissa's vision for the future of Lighter Capital.Connect with Melissa on LinkedInConnect with Lighter Capital on LinkedInConnect with Fintech One-on-One: Tweet me @PeterRenton Connect with me on LinkedIn Find previous Fintech One-on-One episodes

There are many options for raising growth capital for established startups. With all the attention paid to venture capital, we sometimes forget that the vast majority of companies are not funded that way. Revenue-based financing has been around for more than a decade and it is a good alternative for certain types of companies.My next guest on the Fintech One-on-One Podcast is Melissa Widner, the CEO of Lighter Capital, a pioneer in the revenue-based financing space. We learn all about how this space works, what types of companies it works best for and how Lighter Capital has become one of the market leaders.In this podcast you will learn:How she first got involved with Lighter Capital.What attracted her to the CEO role.What it is like running a fintech company from Australia.The different countries where they are set up to lend.How revenue-based financing works (that was pioneered by Lighter).The types of companies that are in their sweet spot.The size and terms of their financing.How their underwriting works.Why most revenue-based financing lenders are not really doing revenue-based finance.The impact of the venture capital downturn on Lighter Capital.How the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank impacted demand for capital.Their historical loss rate.How loan demand has been overall in 2023.What it was like renewing their credit facility in the summer.Melissa's vision for the future of Lighter Capital.Connect with Melissa on LinkedInConnect with Lighter Capital on LinkedInConnect with Fintech One-on-One:Tweet me @PeterRentonConnect with me on LinkedInFind previous Fintech One-on-One episodes

Adam Brotman is the co-founder and co-CEO of Forum3, an organization committed to building and partnering with creators, brands, and projects that leverage the unique innovations and creativity unlocked by Web3. Prior to co-founding Forum3, Adam served as the Chairman and CEO of Brightloom and the CEO of J.Crew. He also served as the EVP for Global Retail Operations at Starbucks. Adam holds a BA in Classical Civilizations specializing in Business & Administration from UCLA and a JD from the University of Washington School of Law.Andy Sack is the co-CEO of Forum3. He also serves as a managing partner at KeenCapital—a fund of blockchain native venture funds—and co-founder and managing partner of Founders Co-op. He was the former CEO of The Body Shop Digital as well as the founder and Executive Chairman of Lighter Capital. Andy holds a BA from Brown University and received his MBA from Massachusetts Institute of Technology.Adam and Andy join me today to discuss cultivating brand loyalty through generative AI and other emerging technologies. They share insight on how companies can successfully navigate the rapidly evolving AI landscape. They illustrate how emerging tech has allowed Gen Z and Millennials to become a new generation of “creator-consumers.” They also highlight how generative AI can unlock creativity and help brands transition from transactional connections to emotional connections. “As social media has evolved, today's consumer doesn't want to be marketed or sold to. The successful brands are the ones that invite consumers to participate and engage with them.” - Andy Sack This week on Innovation Talks:●     Adam and Andy's backgrounds and professional journeys●     Using AI and emerging technology to tell your brand's story●     Forum 3's mission and how it's creating Hive 3 to help brands and AI creators collaborate and tell stories●     How brands like Starbucks, Balenciaga, and Heinz are exploring AI●     Generative AI and the privacy of brands●     The significance of AI and data-driven strategies in the evolving marketing landscape●     Rapid AI development across various tech giants like Microsoft, Meta, Google, and Amazon●     Challenges and opportunities for companies navigating the fast-paced AI landscape●     The emotional shift in consumer behavior and the role of AI in fostering emotional connections●     The importance of emotional connections in the digital age●     Social media, influencers, and the evolving ways consumers express their feelings about brands●     Starbucks' digital innovation, Starbucks Odyssey, and its impact on consumer engagement●     Brand innovation amid rapid AI and tech developmentConnect with Adam Brotman:●     Adam Brotman on LinkedIn●     Email: adam@forum3.com Connect with Andy Sack:●     Andy Sack on LinkedIn●     Email: andy@forum3.com Connect with Forum3:●     Forum3●     Forum3 on Twitter●     Forum3 on LinkedIn●     Forum3 on MediumConnect with Hive3:●     Hive3●     Hive3 on Twitter●     Hive3 on Instagram●     Hive3 on YouTube●     Hive3 on DiscordThis Podcast is brought to you by Sopheon Thanks for tuning into this week's episode of Innovation Talks. If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe and leave a review wherever you get your podcasts. Apple Podcasts | TuneIn | GooglePlay | Stitcher | Spotify | iHeart | Amazon Be sure to connect with us on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn, and share your favorite episodes on social media to help us reach more listeners, like you. For additional information around new product development or corporate innovation, sign up for Sopheon's newsletter where we share news and industry best practices monthly! The fastest way to do this is to go to sopheon.com and click here.

Melissa Widner is the CEO of Lighter Capital, the pioneer and leader in revenue-based financing for tech startups, founders, and companies. Seattle-based Lighter Capital is backed by National Australia Bank and Silicon Valley Bank as well as US VCs.  Previously, Melissa was the Managing Director of NAB Ventures, the VC arm of the National Australia Bank, and a General Partner at Seattle based SeaPoint Ventures. She was the founder and CEO of 7Software, a Silicon Valley based enterprise software company acquired by Concur (Nasdaq: CNQR, acquired by SAP). She was also the CEO of Northwest Industrial Supply. Under her leadership, both companies generated over a 10X return to investors. She is the co-founder and Chairperson of Sydney-based Heads Over Heels, an organization that supports women entrepreneurs running companies with high growth potential.

Bootstrapping your startup without relying on raising capital and loans is an ideal strategy, especially given the current investor and banking landscape.Our guest, Melissa Widner, has the best advice to help you launch and build your startup, without raising capital.She's the CEO of Lighter Capital, the pioneer and leader in revenue-based financing for tech startups, founders, and companies. Previously, Melissa was the Managing Director of NAB Ventures, the VC arm of the National Australia Bank, and a General Partner at Seattle based SeaPoint Ventures. A seasoned founder, Melissa has first-hand experience building a business from the ground up. She was the founder and CEO of 7Software, a Silicon Valley based enterprise software company acquired by Concur (Nasdaq: CNQR, acquired by SAP). Melissa is also the co-founder and Chairperson of Sydney-based Heads Over Heels, an organization that supports women entrepreneurs running companies with high growth potential.To learn more about Lighter Capital, please visit: https://www.lightercapital.com/To learn more about Heads Over Heels, please visit: https://www.headsoverheels.com.au/Follow Lighter Capital via these social platforms:LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/melissawidner/ and https://www.linkedin.com/company/lighter-capital/Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lightercapital/Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/LighterCapital/Twitter: https://twitter.com/LighterCapitalThank you for carving out time to improve your Founder Game - when you do better, your startup will do better - cheers from Boston!Ande ♥https://andelyons.com#bestyoutubechannelforstartups #startupstories #raisingcapital JOIN STARTUP LIFE LIVE MEETUP GROUPGet an alert whenever I post a new show!https://bit.ly/StartupLifeLIVEWBENC APPLICATION SUPPORTLearn more here: https://bit.ly/GetWBENCSend me an email: ande@andelyons.comCONNECT WITH ME ONLINE: https://twitter.com/AndeLyonshttps://www.linkedin.com/in/andelyons/ https://www.instagram.com/ande_lyons/ TikTok: @andelyonsANDELICIOUS ANNOUNCEMENTSJoin Innovation Women here: https://bit.ly/AndeInnoWomenArlan's Academy: https://arlansacademy.com/Scroobious - use Ande15 discount code: https://www.scroobious.com/How to Raise a Seed Round: https://bit.ly/AAElizabethYinTune in to Mia Voss' Shit We Don't Talk About podcast here: https://shitwedonttalkaboutpodcast.com/SPONSORSHIPIf you resonate with the show's mission of amplifying diverse founder voices while serving first-time founders around the world, please reach out to me to learn more about making an impact through sponsoring the Startup Life LIVE Show! ande@andelyons.com.Ande ♥#raisingcapital #femalefounders #bootstrapstrategies #startupstrategiesandadvice

In this podcast episode, Melissa Widner, CEO of Lighter Capital, sits down with Tiger Safarov, the founder of ZenSupplies, to discuss his entrepreneurial journey and the valuable lessons he's learned along the way. ZenSupplies is a technology platform designed to streamline the day-to-day operations of dental practices, and Tiger's story of how he started the company from scratch is truly inspiring.

Melissa Widner is the CEO of Lighter Capital, the pioneer, and leader in revenue-based financing for tech start-ups and scales ups. Lighter Capital is backed by National Australia Bank, Silicon Valley Bank, and Voyager Capital. Melissa has a deep understanding of both the entrepreneur's journey and the role a funding partner can provide. AS CEO, Melissa led two companies to successful exits returning over a 10x return to her investors. Here's what you're going to learn from Melissa: How startups can be more capital efficient in a tight market. The alternative funding sources available to startups. How revenue-based financing works. How to use customer service as a differentiator for your business. Get 5-Min Growth Playbooks Weekly HERE Explore Membership HERE

If you've ever thought about getting outside capital to fund your business but weren't sure what your options were or what the process entails, my conversation with Lighter Capital CEO & Heads Over Heels  co-founder & chairperson, Melissa Widner, will help answer a lot of those questions.  In this episode, you'll learn about the different financing options for founders and how Melissa is contributing to the expansion of opportunities available, especially for female founders. You'll gain new insights from Melissa's years of experience, not only as an entrepreneur, but also from her work in angel investing, venture capital, and revenue-based financing. You'll also hear how she started an Australian non-profit to help women entrepreneurs get more support and access to networks and capital.Melissa walks us through how she came to work in revenue-based financing and explains what the difference is between that and venture capital. She helps us understand the pros and cons of equity-based financing compared to debt-based financing, situations where one type might be a better fit than the other for a business, and how to know when you should consider seeking outside funding for your business.Melissa delves into how Lighter Capital supports entrepreneurs, what their financing process is, what a typical financing arrangement might look like, and how revenue-based financing can be a pivotal first step before seeking venture capital. She also shares examples of the many successes her Lighter Capital clients have achieved. Finally, Melissa tells us the observation she made that inspired her to form her Australian non-profit Heads Over Heels to help female entrepreneurs, what she says is the reality of the business world compared to what we hear, and how you can apply for financing with Lighter Capital.Skip to topic:4:19 - The difference between venture-based capital and revenue-based financing business models7:27 - How revenue-based financing works9:56 - How Lighter Capital helps entrepreneurs11:55 - Recognizing an opportunity and launching a business while in college13:56 - Being acquired by a larger business 19:12 - When you should take equity over debt financing21:33 - The range of funding Lighter Capital provides its customers24:47 - How to know when you should seek revenue-based funding for your business27:28 - How to know when you should seek venture capital funding for your business28:36 - Using revenue-based financing as a starting point before going for venture capital30:56 - Starting her non-profit Heads Over Heels to support female entrepreneurs running high-growth potential companies36:03 - What Melissa says is real in the business world vs. what we hear40:41 - Where to go if you're interested in applying for funding with Lighter CapitalFind Melissa at:Website: https://www.lightercapital.comLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/melissawidner/Apply for Lighter Capital funding at: https://lightercapital.com/applyFree startup valuation calculator: https://www.lightercapital.com/valuation-calculatorVisit Stephanie at: https://stephaniehayes.biz/Follow me on Instagram | Facebook | LinkedIn | TwitterSupport the show

Having started her career in finance 20 years ago when she was frequently the only woman at the conference, not just in the room, Melissa Widner has blazed the trail as a leader and the CEO of Lighter Capital, the pioneer  in revenue-based financing for tech start-ups and scales ups.  In this episode we talk about: What revenue based financing is and whether or not it's an option for you business Who is a good candidate for venture capital funding Why more women are needed in leadership roles How Lighter is bringing their remote team together to build stronger relationships. What it's like to work and live bi-contentally   CONNECT WITH MELISSA WIDNER Website: https://www.lightercapital.com/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/melissawidner/ If you liked this episode of the Women Who Build Empires, please LEAVE A 5-STAR REVIEW, like, share, and subscribe!   Tired of feeling overwhelmed? Download my free guide: The Aligned Entrepreneur: How to Break All the Rules in Business and Still Be Wildly Successful   CONNECT WITH EMI KIRSCHNER Website Facebook Instagram LinkedIn Listen to all of the episodes of Women Who Build Empires, the leading podcast for women entrepreneurs on Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to podcasts.

Being a female founder is hard. Raising capital and retaining control of your company is harder when only 2.6% of all venture capital goes to female-founded startups. And the cost of getting that capital is giving up your equity in your company. That's why I sat down with My Good Woman, Melissa Widner, the CEO of Lighter Capital. Melissa deeply understands the entrepreneur's journey and the role a funding partner can play in developing a business. As CEO, Melissa led two companies to successful exits returning more than 10 X to her investors. She was the founder and CEO of Silicon Valley-based 7 Software and the Managing Director of NAB Ventures, the VC arm of the National Australia Bank. She led NAB's investments into high-growth fintech, including Lighter Capital, the pioneer and leader in revenue-based financing for tech startups and scale-up.  And if that isn't awesome enough for you, Melissa is also the co-founder and chairperson of Sydney- based Heads Over Heels, an organization supporting women entrepreneurs running companies with high growth potential. In this episode, Melissa and I discussLeveling the playing field for female foundersEquity or debt? Which is better when you're building your business?How revenue-based financing works as opposed to venture financingHow to retain ownership of your company amidst rapid growthThis episode at a glance:[04:54] There are people that become very successful entrepreneurs, even in their forties or fifties, who wouldn't have seemed to have had an entrepreneurial bone in their body as a kid. [13:10] Revenue-based financing leverages the strength of women. Women tend to be good at creating relationships, which means they can build community. That would build on that angel funding.[20:54] I realized timing is something you can't control, but often it's what determines success.[26:23] We connect our companies to senior business leaders willing to open up their networks because they want to see the numbers change. They want to see more women growing their businesses.  Resources and links:Lighter CapitalHeads Over HeelsSilicon Valley BankNational Australia BankCanvaYou might also like4 Must-Read Leadership BooksAnnual Business Goals WorkbookWhy Female Leaders Supporting Each Other Is The FutureMore about the “My Good Woman” podcastMy Good Woman is a podcast for bold female leaders hosted by me, Dawn Andrews! Grab a seat at the table for candid conversations with culture-shifting, glass-ceiling-busting, trailblazing women who are leading enterprises that are making a change in the world. Follow along so you never miss an episode. And before you go, leave us a review!

Melissa Widner currently serves as the CEO of Lighter Capital. She has extensive experience as an entrepreneur seeking funding and as a venture capitalist. When it comes to funding for your business, there is no one-size-fits-all approach. Melissa is a former venture capitalist and entrepreneur who has facilitated several high-value exits throughout her impressive career. She is also the co-founder of Heads Over Heels. The company helps female entrepreneurs that run high-growth companies connect to resources. In our conversation, Melissa details Lighter Capital's approach to financing early-stage companies. As well as how they create conditions for friendly debt funding. She expands on some of the biggest lessons she's learned about leadership. Melissa reflects on the challenges of balancing motherhood and professional life. We discuss the importance of downtime and learn the ways Lighter Capital encourages employees to disconnect and recharge too. Melissa shares her advice for her early-stage entrepreneurs and how to choose investors with care. Today's episode is a must-listen!Check out some of our most popular episodes:Chicken S#!it CEOs w. Mogens SmedLeadership Lessons from Louis Vuitton, Samsonite, and Now, EVCP Growth EquityCanada's Best Venture Partner w. Bruce CroxonFor more information on our sponsor, please visit Olympia Trust CompanyStay in the know and follow along:Connect with our host, Cory Cleveland on LinkedInVisit The Insider's Guide to Finance WebsiteFollow us on LinkedInSubscribe to our YouTube channelSubscribe to The Knowledge Bank Letter - a periodic letter of actionable insights, interviews, and quality curations

This week I am speaking to Melissa Widner, CEO of Lighter Capital. She has an incredible story of going from operator to capital allocator. Now she takes the helm of the largest brands in revenue based financing in the world. Melissa Widner is the CEO of Lighter Capital, the pioneer and leader in revenue-based financing for tech startups, founders, and companies. Seattle-based Lighter Capital is backed by National Australia Bank and Silicon Valley Bank as well as US VCs.Previously, Melissa was the Managing Director of NAB Ventures, the VC arm of the National Australia Bank, and a General Partner at Seattle based SeaPoint Ventures. She was the founder and CEO of 7Software, a Silicon Valley based enterprise software company acquired by Concur (Nasdaq: CNQR, acquired by SAP). She was also the CEO of Northwest Industrial Supply. Under her leadership, both companies generated over a 10X return to investors.She is the co-founder and Chairperson of Sydney-based Heads Over Heels, an organization that supports women entrepreneurs running companies with high growth potential.What You Will Learn:- Alternatives to Equity- Identifying Shark VCs- Debt vs. Revenue Based Financing

As a CEO, Melissa Widner has led two companies to successful acquisitions that provided over a 10X return to investors.  Do you need money to grow your company, without giving up equity?  David talks with Melissa about funding your company's growth and the challenges financial folks see in entrepreneurs.  Every startup leaders have a different journey, but there are key similarities that separate high-growth visionaries from those who get stuck.  Money for growth can be a tipping point. Melissa has a deep understanding of the entrepreneur's journey and the importance of growth capital.  If you're looking for alternative methods to finance your next big move, then join this conversation! Melissa Widner is the CEO of Lighter Capital, the pioneer and leading provider of revenue-based financing to SAAS companies.  Previously, she was the Managing Director of NAB Ventures, the venture capital arm of National Australia Bank, where she invested in and served as a director for several global fintech companies, including Lighter Capital. Melissa served as a general partner at SeaPoint ventures, a US-based venture capital firm focused on mobile technologies and SaaS enterprise software solutions.  She is an active angel investor who served on the board of the US-based Alliance of Angels, one of the longest-running and most active angel groups in the world.  She was a lecturer on the subjects of Venture Capital and Entrepreneurship at the University of Washington's MBA program. In 2009, Melissa relocated to Sydney with her Australian husband.  She is the co-founder and chair of Heads Over Heels, an organization that works with women entrepreneurs leading high-growth companies.  She served on the boards of AIC (The Australian Investment Council--formerly AVCAL), and currently serves on the board of the Shore Foundation and Heads Over Heels.  She is the proud mother of four boys. Spotify Apple Podcast Google Podcast Manage2Win ------- This Manage 2 Win Podcast episode is brought to you by Habitly.  I (David) review Habitly best practices regularly, and teach these essential people skills to clients weekly.  This advice has changed my life, and made millions for our clients. I started developing Habitly content in 2004.  Habitly's powerful best practices have now been taught to thousands of people worldwide.  For instance, you can learn how to Create time in your day;  Get more from meetings;  Stay calm;  Achieve significant targets;  and Become a great leader.  Simply study and apply the expert knowledge provided in Habitly courses and micro-learning episodes. Whether you're just out of college, or someone with over 20 years work experience, learn the habits of highly successful people on Habitly.  First 7 days free, including access to the entire Habitly knowledgebase – www.habitly.com.

INvested Series: Melissa is the CEO of Lighter Capital, the leader in revenue-based financing for SAAS companies. As founder/CEO, Melissa sold two companies generating 10X+ returns to investors. She's been an angel investor and VC in the US and Australia. She's the chair of HeadsOverHeels, an organization supporting women entrepreneurs.TOPICS DISCUSSEDVenture capital strategies & revenue-based financing optionsExtending your runway with flexible non-dilutive growth capitalLeadership for challenging marketsWhere to find the “dry powder” (available cash in the market)Visit https://www.highgrowthventures.com.au/invested to download the white paper and for more insights and resources designed specifically for startups and scale-ups. ……Connect with Marc >>>  Website | LinkedIn | Instagram | TwitterDrop a review and let me know what's resonating with you about the show!Thanks as always for listening and have the best day yet! Show Credits 

Few founders or investors like the prospect of devaluing a business; but with market sentiment cooling how do you raise enough to continue to run and grow the business while avoiding a down round? Melissa Widner, CEO at Lighter Capital, is an experienced entrepreneur and investor who has lived life on both sides of the equation. We discuss the concept of revenue-based financing and how it's being leveraged by businesses to enable continued growth between valuations. Lighter Capitalhttps://www.lightercapital.com/ SHANE'S FREE E-BOOKThe Platform Owner's Guidebookhttp://www.platformdiaries.com/foundersSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Money is king when you're planning to start or grow your business, but acquiring funds, or paying venture capital funds, can be very onerous to entrepreneurs which makes some fail and exit the business. In this episode, Melissa Widner, CEO of Lighter Capital, explains how their non-diluted and debt type of funding can help entrepreneurs grow without having to worry about the onerous part of paying the loan, and how it could help entrepreneurs have more time to #getnoticed by getting more traction without taking dilution.Melissa also shares how non-diluted funding is easier to acquire and settle compared to venture capital funding and cites some case studies and examples of their customers. She also shares how their customers' success stories help get the word out and educate the marketing, and most importantly, get Lighter Capital to #getnoticed.AI Writer - Content writing made easierGenerate Accurate, Relevant & Quality Content in 2 MinutesPeppertype - Virtual Content AssistantGenerate better content copies in seconds.Riverside - Your online recording studioThe easiest way to record podcasts and videos in studio quality from anywhere. All from the browser.Podcastpage.ioLaunch your podcast website in minutes.Post-production, transcript and show notes by XCD Virtual Assistants Support the show

Money is king when you're planning to start or grow your business, but acquiring funds, or paying venture capital funds, can be very onerous to entrepreneurs which makes some fail and exit the business. In this episode, Melissa Widner, CEO of Lighter Capital, explains how their non-diluted and debt type of funding can help entrepreneurs grow without having to worry about the onerous part of paying the loan, and how it could help entrepreneurs have more time to #getnoticed by getting more traction without taking dilution.Melissa also shares how non-diluted funding is easier to acquire and settle compared to venture capital funding and cites some case studies and examples of their customers. She also shares how their customers' success stories help get the word out and educate the marketing, and most importantly, get Lighter Capital to #getnoticed.AI Writer - Content writing made easierGenerate Accurate, Relevant & Quality Content in 2 MinutesPeppertype - Virtual Content AssistantGenerate better content copies in seconds.Riverside - Your online recording studioThe easiest way to record podcasts and videos in studio quality from anywhere. All from the browser.Podcastpage.ioLaunch your podcast website in minutes.Post-production, transcript and show notes by XCD Virtual Assistants Support the show

 Why Non-Dilutive Revenue-Based FInancing is an Alternative to VC with Melissa Winder S5 Ep.2                                                                                                                                                                                                                 Melissa Widner is an entrepreneur, investor, and CEO of Lighter Capital, the pioneer and leader in revenue-based financing for tech startups, founders, and companies. She was the founder and CEO of 7Software, a Silicon Valley-based enterprise software company acquired by Concur. She was also the CEO of Northwest Industrial Supply and is the co-founder and Chairperson of Sydney-based Heads Over Heels an organization that supports women entrepreneurs running companies with high growth potential. Previously, Melissa was the Managing Director of NAB Ventures, the VC arm of the National Australia Bank, and a General Partner at Seattle-based Seapoint Ventures. In this episode we discussed: The benefits of revenue-based financing The advantages and disadvantages of different types of capital What is mean to bootstrap a business and why founders are doing so; and The hallmarks of success for a bootstrapped business To my listeners, I hope you enjoyed this episode. If you liked it, leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts, or share this episode with other people who need to hear it.  Click here to review: https://kite.link/where-E2-80-99s-the-funding-3FSubscribe to the podcast on the ALIVE Podcast Network: https://alivepodcastnetwork.com/wtf/ to get access to bonus content. Keep tuning in on your favorite podcast streaming platforms like Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Spotify, and more and follow or subscribe to the show to get notified when new episodes drop.To be a guest or sponsor the podcast, email whereisthefunding@gmail.com. Follow the podcast on Instagram at whereisthefunding_podcast and on LinkedIn at WHERE'S THE FUNDING? PODCAST.Follow me, your host Michelle J. McKenzie on LinkedIn. Join me next Friday for another episode.

Why Non-Dilutive Revenue-Based FInancing is an Alternative to VC with Melissa Winder S5 Ep.2 Melissa Widner is an entrepreneur, investor, and CEO of Lighter Capital, the pioneer and leader in revenue-based financing for tech startups, founders, and companies. She was the founder and CEO of 7Software, a Silicon Valley-based enterprise software company acquired by Concur. She was also the CEO of Northwest Industrial Supply and is the co-founder and Chairperson of Sydney-based Heads Over Heels an organization that supports women entrepreneurs running companies with high growth potential. Previously, Melissa was the Managing Director of NAB Ventures, the VC arm of the National Australia Bank, and a General Partner at Seattle-based Seapoint Ventures.In this episode we discussed: The benefits of revenue-based financing The advantages and disadvantages of different types of capital What is mean to bootstrap a business and why founders are doing so; and The hallmarks of success for a bootstrapped business To my listeners, I hope you enjoyed this episode. If you liked it, leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts, or share this episode with other people who need to hear it. Click here to review: https://kite.link/where-E2-80-99s-the-funding-3FSubscribe to the podcast on the ALIVE Podcast Network: https://alivepodcastnetwork.com/wtf/ to get access to bonus content.Keep tuning in on your favorite podcast streaming platforms like Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Spotify, and more and follow or subscribe to the show to get notified when new episodes drop.To be a guest or sponsor the podcast, email whereisthefunding@gmail.com.Follow the podcast on Instagram at whereisthefunding_podcast and on LinkedIn at WHERE'S THE FUNDING? PODCAST.Follow me, your host Michelle J. McKenzie on LinkedIn.Join me next Friday for another episode.

 Why Non-Dilutive Revenue-Based FInancing is an Alternative to VC with Melissa Winder S5 Ep.2                                                                                                                                                                                                                 Melissa Widner is an entrepreneur, investor, and CEO of Lighter Capital, the pioneer and leader in revenue-based financing for tech startups, founders, and companies. She was the founder and CEO of 7Software, a Silicon Valley-based enterprise software company acquired by Concur. She was also the CEO of Northwest Industrial Supply and is the co-founder and Chairperson of Sydney-based Heads Over Heels an organization that supports women entrepreneurs running companies with high growth potential. Previously, Melissa was the Managing Director of NAB Ventures, the VC arm of the National Australia Bank, and a General Partner at Seattle-based Seapoint Ventures. In this episode we discussed: The benefits of revenue-based financing The advantages and disadvantages of different types of capital What is mean to bootstrap a business and why founders are doing so; and The hallmarks of success for a bootstrapped business To my listeners, I hope you enjoyed this episode. If you liked it, leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts, or share this episode with other people who need to hear it.  Click here to review: https://kite.link/where-E2-80-99s-the-funding-3FSubscribe to the podcast on the ALIVE Podcast Network: https://alivepodcastnetwork.com/wtf/ to get access to bonus content. Keep tuning in on your favorite podcast streaming platforms like Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Spotify, and more and follow or subscribe to the show to get notified when new episodes drop.To be a guest or sponsor the podcast, email whereisthefunding@gmail.com. Follow the podcast on Instagram at whereisthefunding_podcast and on LinkedIn at WHERE'S THE FUNDING? PODCAST.Follow me, your host Michelle J. McKenzie on LinkedIn. Join me next Friday for another episode.

Why Non-Dilutive Revenue-Based FInancing is an Alternative to VC with Melissa Winder S5 Ep.2 Melissa Widner is an entrepreneur, investor, and CEO of Lighter Capital, the pioneer and leader in revenue-based financing for tech startups, founders, and companies. She was the founder and CEO of 7Software, a Silicon Valley-based enterprise software company acquired by Concur. She was also the CEO of Northwest Industrial Supply and is the co-founder and Chairperson of Sydney-based Heads Over Heels an organization that supports women entrepreneurs running companies with high growth potential. Previously, Melissa was the Managing Director of NAB Ventures, the VC arm of the National Australia Bank, and a General Partner at Seattle-based Seapoint Ventures.In this episode we discussed: The benefits of revenue-based financing The advantages and disadvantages of different types of capital What is mean to bootstrap a business and why founders are doing so; and The hallmarks of success for a bootstrapped business To my listeners, I hope you enjoyed this episode. If you liked it, leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts, or share this episode with other people who need to hear it. Click here to review: https://kite.link/where-E2-80-99s-the-funding-3FSubscribe to the podcast on the ALIVE Podcast Network: https://alivepodcastnetwork.com/wtf/ to get access to bonus content.Keep tuning in on your favorite podcast streaming platforms like Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Spotify, and more and follow or subscribe to the show to get notified when new episodes drop.To be a guest or sponsor the podcast, email whereisthefunding@gmail.com.Follow the podcast on Instagram at whereisthefunding_podcast and on LinkedIn at WHERE'S THE FUNDING? PODCAST.Follow me, your host Michelle J. McKenzie on LinkedIn.Join me next Friday for another episode.

Why Non-Dilutive Revenue-Based FInancing is an Alternative to VC with Melissa Winder S5 Ep.2 Melissa Widner is an entrepreneur, investor, and CEO of Lighter Capital, the pioneer and leader in revenue-based financing for tech startups, founders, and companies. She was the founder and CEO of 7Software, a Silicon Valley-based enterprise software company acquired by Concur. She was also the CEO of Northwest Industrial Supply and is the co-founder and Chairperson of Sydney-based Heads Over Heels an organization that supports women entrepreneurs running companies with high growth potential. Previously, Melissa was the Managing Director of NAB Ventures, the VC arm of the National Australia Bank, and a General Partner at Seattle-based Seapoint Ventures.In this episode we discussed: The benefits of revenue-based financing The advantages and disadvantages of different types of capital What is mean to bootstrap a business and why founders are doing so; and The hallmarks of success for a bootstrapped business To my listeners, I hope you enjoyed this episode. If you liked it, leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts, or share this episode with other people who need to hear it. Click here to review: https://kite.link/where-E2-80-99s-the-funding-3FSubscribe to the podcast on the ALIVE Podcast Network: https://alivepodcastnetwork.com/wtf/ to get access to bonus content.Keep tuning in on your favorite podcast streaming platforms like Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Spotify, and more and follow or subscribe to the show to get notified when new episodes drop.To be a guest or sponsor the podcast, email whereisthefunding@gmail.com.Follow the podcast on Instagram at whereisthefunding_podcast and on LinkedIn at WHERE'S THE FUNDING? PODCAST.Follow me, your host Michelle J. McKenzie on LinkedIn.Join me next Friday for another episode.

Why Non-Dilutive Revenue-Based FInancing is an Alternative to VC with Melissa Winder S5 Ep.2 Melissa Widner is an entrepreneur, investor, and CEO of Lighter Capital, the pioneer and leader in revenue-based financing for tech startups, founders, and companies. She was the founder and CEO of 7Software, a Silicon Valley-based enterprise software company acquired by Concur. She was also the CEO of Northwest Industrial Supply and is the co-founder and Chairperson of Sydney-based Heads Over Heels an organization that supports women entrepreneurs running companies with high growth potential. Previously, Melissa was the Managing Director of NAB Ventures, the VC arm of the National Australia Bank, and a General Partner at Seattle-based Seapoint Ventures.In this episode we discussed: The benefits of revenue-based financing The advantages and disadvantages of different types of capital What is mean to bootstrap a business and why founders are doing so; and The hallmarks of success for a bootstrapped business To my listeners, I hope you enjoyed this episode. If you liked it, leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts, or share this episode with other people who need to hear it. Click here to review: https://kite.link/where-E2-80-99s-the-funding-3FSubscribe to the podcast on the ALIVE Podcast Network: https://alivepodcastnetwork.com/wtf/ to get access to bonus content.Keep tuning in on your favorite podcast streaming platforms like Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Spotify, and more and follow or subscribe to the show to get notified when new episodes drop.To be a guest or sponsor the podcast, email whereisthefunding@gmail.com.Follow the podcast on Instagram at whereisthefunding_podcast and on LinkedIn at WHERE'S THE FUNDING? PODCAST.Follow me, your host Michelle J. McKenzie on LinkedIn.Join me next Friday for another episode.

Why Non-Dilutive Revenue-Based FInancing is an Alternative to VC with Melissa Winder S5 Ep.2 Melissa Widner is an entrepreneur, investor, and CEO of Lighter Capital, the pioneer and leader in revenue-based financing for tech startups, founders, and companies. She was the founder and CEO of 7Software, a Silicon Valley-based enterprise software company acquired by Concur. She was also the CEO of Northwest Industrial Supply and is the co-founder and Chairperson of Sydney-based Heads Over Heels an organization that supports women entrepreneurs running companies with high growth potential. Previously, Melissa was the Managing Director of NAB Ventures, the VC arm of the National Australia Bank, and a General Partner at Seattle-based Seapoint Ventures.In this episode we discussed: The benefits of revenue-based financing The advantages and disadvantages of different types of capital What is mean to bootstrap a business and why founders are doing so; and The hallmarks of success for a bootstrapped business To my listeners, I hope you enjoyed this episode. If you liked it, leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts, or share this episode with other people who need to hear it. Click here to review: https://kite.link/where-E2-80-99s-the-funding-3FSubscribe to the podcast on the ALIVE Podcast Network: https://alivepodcastnetwork.com/wtf/ to get access to bonus content.Keep tuning in on your favorite podcast streaming platforms like Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Spotify, and more and follow or subscribe to the show to get notified when new episodes drop.To be a guest or sponsor the podcast, email whereisthefunding@gmail.com.Follow the podcast on Instagram at whereisthefunding_podcast and on LinkedIn at WHERE'S THE FUNDING? PODCAST.Follow me, your host Michelle J. McKenzie on LinkedIn.Join me next Friday for another episode.

Why Non-Dilutive Revenue-Based FInancing is an Alternative to VC with Melissa Winder S5 Ep.2 Melissa Widner is an entrepreneur, investor, and CEO of Lighter Capital, the pioneer and leader in revenue-based financing for tech startups, founders, and companies. She was the founder and CEO of 7Software, a Silicon Valley-based enterprise software company acquired by Concur. She was also the CEO of Northwest Industrial Supply and is the co-founder and Chairperson of Sydney-based Heads Over Heels an organization that supports women entrepreneurs running companies with high growth potential. Previously, Melissa was the Managing Director of NAB Ventures, the VC arm of the National Australia Bank, and a General Partner at Seattle-based Seapoint Ventures.In this episode we discussed: The benefits of revenue-based financing The advantages and disadvantages of different types of capital What is mean to bootstrap a business and why founders are doing so; and The hallmarks of success for a bootstrapped business To my listeners, I hope you enjoyed this episode. If you liked it, leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts, or share this episode with other people who need to hear it. Click here to review: https://kite.link/where-E2-80-99s-the-funding-3FSubscribe to the podcast on the ALIVE Podcast Network: https://alivepodcastnetwork.com/wtf/ to get access to bonus content.Keep tuning in on your favorite podcast streaming platforms like Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Spotify, and more and follow or subscribe to the show to get notified when new episodes drop.To be a guest or sponsor the podcast, email whereisthefunding@gmail.com.Follow the podcast on Instagram at whereisthefunding_podcast and on LinkedIn at WHERE'S THE FUNDING? PODCAST.Follow me, your host Michelle J. McKenzie on LinkedIn.Join me next Friday for another episode.

Why Non-Dilutive Revenue-Based FInancing is an Alternative to VC with Melissa Winder S5 Ep.2 Melissa Widner is an entrepreneur, investor, and CEO of Lighter Capital, the pioneer and leader in revenue-based financing for tech startups, founders, and companies. She was the founder and CEO of 7Software, a Silicon Valley-based enterprise software company acquired by Concur. She was also the CEO of Northwest Industrial Supply and is the co-founder and Chairperson of Sydney-based Heads Over Heels an organization that supports women entrepreneurs running companies with high growth potential. Previously, Melissa was the Managing Director of NAB Ventures, the VC arm of the National Australia Bank, and a General Partner at Seattle-based Seapoint Ventures.In this episode we discussed: The benefits of revenue-based financing The advantages and disadvantages of different types of capital What is mean to bootstrap a business and why founders are doing so; and The hallmarks of success for a bootstrapped business To my listeners, I hope you enjoyed this episode. If you liked it, leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts, or share this episode with other people who need to hear it. Click here to review: https://kite.link/where-E2-80-99s-the-funding-3FSubscribe to the podcast on the ALIVE Podcast Network: https://alivepodcastnetwork.com/wtf/ to get access to bonus content.Keep tuning in on your favorite podcast streaming platforms like Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Spotify, and more and follow or subscribe to the show to get notified when new episodes drop.To be a guest or sponsor the podcast, email whereisthefunding@gmail.com.Follow the podcast on Instagram at whereisthefunding_podcast and on LinkedIn at WHERE'S THE FUNDING? PODCAST.Follow me, your host Michelle J. McKenzie on LinkedIn.Join me next Friday for another episode.

Why Non-Dilutive Revenue-Based FInancing is an Alternative to VC with Melissa Winder S5 Ep.2 Melissa Widner is an entrepreneur, investor, and CEO of Lighter Capital, the pioneer and leader in revenue-based financing for tech startups, founders, and companies. She was the founder and CEO of 7Software, a Silicon Valley-based enterprise software company acquired by Concur. She was also the CEO of Northwest Industrial Supply and is the co-founder and Chairperson of Sydney-based Heads Over Heels an organization that supports women entrepreneurs running companies with high growth potential. Previously, Melissa was the Managing Director of NAB Ventures, the VC arm of the National Australia Bank, and a General Partner at Seattle-based Seapoint Ventures.In this episode we discussed: The benefits of revenue-based financing The advantages and disadvantages of different types of capital What is mean to bootstrap a business and why founders are doing so; and The hallmarks of success for a bootstrapped business To my listeners, I hope you enjoyed this episode. If you liked it, leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts, or share this episode with other people who need to hear it. Click here to review: https://kite.link/where-E2-80-99s-the-funding-3FSubscribe to the podcast on the ALIVE Podcast Network: https://alivepodcastnetwork.com/wtf/ to get access to bonus content.Keep tuning in on your favorite podcast streaming platforms like Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Spotify, and more and follow or subscribe to the show to get notified when new episodes drop.To be a guest or sponsor the podcast, email whereisthefunding@gmail.com.Follow the podcast on Instagram at whereisthefunding_podcast and on LinkedIn at WHERE'S THE FUNDING? PODCAST.Follow me, your host Michelle J. McKenzie on LinkedIn.Join me next Friday for another episode.

Why Non-Dilutive Revenue-Based FInancing is an Alternative to VC with Melissa Winder S5 Ep.2 Melissa Widner is an entrepreneur, investor, and CEO of Lighter Capital, the pioneer and leader in revenue-based financing for tech startups, founders, and companies. She was the founder and CEO of 7Software, a Silicon Valley-based enterprise software company acquired by Concur. She was also the CEO of Northwest Industrial Supply and is the co-founder and Chairperson of Sydney-based Heads Over Heels an organization that supports women entrepreneurs running companies with high growth potential. Previously, Melissa was the Managing Director of NAB Ventures, the VC arm of the National Australia Bank, and a General Partner at Seattle-based Seapoint Ventures.In this episode we discussed: The benefits of revenue-based financing The advantages and disadvantages of different types of capital What is mean to bootstrap a business and why founders are doing so; and The hallmarks of success for a bootstrapped business To my listeners, I hope you enjoyed this episode. If you liked it, leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts, or share this episode with other people who need to hear it. Click here to review: https://kite.link/where-E2-80-99s-the-funding-3FSubscribe to the podcast on the ALIVE Podcast Network: https://alivepodcastnetwork.com/wtf/ to get access to bonus content.Keep tuning in on your favorite podcast streaming platforms like Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Spotify, and more and follow or subscribe to the show to get notified when new episodes drop.To be a guest or sponsor the podcast, email whereisthefunding@gmail.com.Follow the podcast on Instagram at whereisthefunding_podcast and on LinkedIn at WHERE'S THE FUNDING? PODCAST.Follow me, your host Michelle J. McKenzie on LinkedIn.Join me next Friday for another episode.

Why Non-Dilutive Revenue-Based FInancing is an Alternative to VC with Melissa Winder S5 Ep.2 Melissa Widner is an entrepreneur, investor, and CEO of Lighter Capital, the pioneer and leader in revenue-based financing for tech startups, founders, and companies. She was the founder and CEO of 7Software, a Silicon Valley-based enterprise software company acquired by Concur. She was also the CEO of Northwest Industrial Supply and is the co-founder and Chairperson of Sydney-based Heads Over Heels an organization that supports women entrepreneurs running companies with high growth potential. Previously, Melissa was the Managing Director of NAB Ventures, the VC arm of the National Australia Bank, and a General Partner at Seattle-based Seapoint Ventures.In this episode we discussed: The benefits of revenue-based financing The advantages and disadvantages of different types of capital What is mean to bootstrap a business and why founders are doing so; and The hallmarks of success for a bootstrapped business To my listeners, I hope you enjoyed this episode. If you liked it, leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts, or share this episode with other people who need to hear it. Click here to review: https://kite.link/where-E2-80-99s-the-funding-3FSubscribe to the podcast on the ALIVE Podcast Network: https://alivepodcastnetwork.com/wtf/ to get access to bonus content.Keep tuning in on your favorite podcast streaming platforms like Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Spotify, and more and follow or subscribe to the show to get notified when new episodes drop.To be a guest or sponsor the podcast, email whereisthefunding@gmail.com.Follow the podcast on Instagram at whereisthefunding_podcast and on LinkedIn at WHERE'S THE FUNDING? PODCAST.Follow me, your host Michelle J. McKenzie on LinkedIn.Join me next Friday for another episode.

Why Non-Dilutive Revenue-Based FInancing is an Alternative to VC with Melissa Winder S5 Ep.2 Melissa Widner is an entrepreneur, investor, and CEO of Lighter Capital, the pioneer and leader in revenue-based financing for tech startups, founders, and companies. She was the founder and CEO of 7Software, a Silicon Valley-based enterprise software company acquired by Concur. She was also the CEO of Northwest Industrial Supply and is the co-founder and Chairperson of Sydney-based Heads Over Heels an organization that supports women entrepreneurs running companies with high growth potential. Previously, Melissa was the Managing Director of NAB Ventures, the VC arm of the National Australia Bank, and a General Partner at Seattle-based Seapoint Ventures.In this episode we discussed: The benefits of revenue-based financing The advantages and disadvantages of different types of capital What is mean to bootstrap a business and why founders are doing so; and The hallmarks of success for a bootstrapped business To my listeners, I hope you enjoyed this episode. If you liked it, leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts, or share this episode with other people who need to hear it. Click here to review: https://kite.link/where-E2-80-99s-the-funding-3FSubscribe to the podcast on the ALIVE Podcast Network: https://alivepodcastnetwork.com/wtf/ to get access to bonus content.Keep tuning in on your favorite podcast streaming platforms like Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Spotify, and more and follow or subscribe to the show to get notified when new episodes drop.To be a guest or sponsor the podcast, email whereisthefunding@gmail.com.Follow the podcast on Instagram at whereisthefunding_podcast and on LinkedIn at WHERE'S THE FUNDING? PODCAST.Follow me, your host Michelle J. McKenzie on LinkedIn.Join me next Friday for another episode.

Why Non-Dilutive Revenue-Based FInancing is an Alternative to VC with Melissa Winder S5 Ep.2 Melissa Widner is an entrepreneur, investor, and CEO of Lighter Capital, the pioneer and leader in revenue-based financing for tech startups, founders, and companies. She was the founder and CEO of 7Software, a Silicon Valley-based enterprise software company acquired by Concur. She was also the CEO of Northwest Industrial Supply and is the co-founder and Chairperson of Sydney-based Heads Over Heels an organization that supports women entrepreneurs running companies with high growth potential. Previously, Melissa was the Managing Director of NAB Ventures, the VC arm of the National Australia Bank, and a General Partner at Seattle-based Seapoint Ventures.In this episode we discussed: The benefits of revenue-based financing The advantages and disadvantages of different types of capital What is mean to bootstrap a business and why founders are doing so; and The hallmarks of success for a bootstrapped business To my listeners, I hope you enjoyed this episode. If you liked it, leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts, or share this episode with other people who need to hear it. Click here to review: https://kite.link/where-E2-80-99s-the-funding-3FSubscribe to the podcast on the ALIVE Podcast Network: https://alivepodcastnetwork.com/wtf/ to get access to bonus content.Keep tuning in on your favorite podcast streaming platforms like Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Spotify, and more and follow or subscribe to the show to get notified when new episodes drop.To be a guest or sponsor the podcast, email whereisthefunding@gmail.com.Follow the podcast on Instagram at whereisthefunding_podcast and on LinkedIn at WHERE'S THE FUNDING? PODCAST.Follow me, your host Michelle J. McKenzie on LinkedIn.Join me next Friday for another episode.

Why Non-Dilutive Revenue-Based FInancing is an Alternative to VC with Melissa Winder S5 Ep.2 Melissa Widner is an entrepreneur, investor, and CEO of Lighter Capital, the pioneer and leader in revenue-based financing for tech startups, founders, and companies. She was the founder and CEO of 7Software, a Silicon Valley-based enterprise software company acquired by Concur. She was also the CEO of Northwest Industrial Supply and is the co-founder and Chairperson of Sydney-based Heads Over Heels an organization that supports women entrepreneurs running companies with high growth potential. Previously, Melissa was the Managing Director of NAB Ventures, the VC arm of the National Australia Bank, and a General Partner at Seattle-based Seapoint Ventures.In this episode we discussed: The benefits of revenue-based financing The advantages and disadvantages of different types of capital What is mean to bootstrap a business and why founders are doing so; and The hallmarks of success for a bootstrapped business To my listeners, I hope you enjoyed this episode. If you liked it, leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts, or share this episode with other people who need to hear it. Click here to review: https://kite.link/where-E2-80-99s-the-funding-3FSubscribe to the podcast on the ALIVE Podcast Network: https://alivepodcastnetwork.com/wtf/ to get access to bonus content.Keep tuning in on your favorite podcast streaming platforms like Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Spotify, and more and follow or subscribe to the show to get notified when new episodes drop.To be a guest or sponsor the podcast, email whereisthefunding@gmail.com.Follow the podcast on Instagram at whereisthefunding_podcast and on LinkedIn at WHERE'S THE FUNDING? PODCAST.Follow me, your host Michelle J. McKenzie on LinkedIn.Join me next Friday for another episode.

Why Non-Dilutive Revenue-Based FInancing is an Alternative to VC with Melissa Winder S5 Ep.2 Melissa Widner is an entrepreneur, investor, and CEO of Lighter Capital, the pioneer and leader in revenue-based financing for tech startups, founders, and companies. She was the founder and CEO of 7Software, a Silicon Valley-based enterprise software company acquired by Concur. She was also the CEO of Northwest Industrial Supply and is the co-founder and Chairperson of Sydney-based Heads Over Heels an organization that supports women entrepreneurs running companies with high growth potential. Previously, Melissa was the Managing Director of NAB Ventures, the VC arm of the National Australia Bank, and a General Partner at Seattle-based Seapoint Ventures.In this episode we discussed: The benefits of revenue-based financing The advantages and disadvantages of different types of capital What is mean to bootstrap a business and why founders are doing so; and The hallmarks of success for a bootstrapped business To my listeners, I hope you enjoyed this episode. If you liked it, leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts, or share this episode with other people who need to hear it. Click here to review: https://kite.link/where-E2-80-99s-the-funding-3FSubscribe to the podcast on the ALIVE Podcast Network: https://alivepodcastnetwork.com/wtf/ to get access to bonus content.Keep tuning in on your favorite podcast streaming platforms like Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Spotify, and more and follow or subscribe to the show to get notified when new episodes drop.To be a guest or sponsor the podcast, email whereisthefunding@gmail.com.Follow the podcast on Instagram at whereisthefunding_podcast and on LinkedIn at WHERE'S THE FUNDING? PODCAST.Follow me, your host Michelle J. McKenzie on LinkedIn.Join me next Friday for another episode.

What I Love About Revenue-Based Financing with Melissa Widner S.5 Ep.2                                                                                                                                                                                                                                     Melissa Widner is an entrepreneur, investor, and CEO of Lighter Capital, the pioneer and leader in revenue-based financing for tech startups, founders, and companies. She was the founder and CEO of 7Software, a Silicon Valley-based enterprise software company acquired by Concur. She was also the CEO of Northwest Industrial Supply and is the co-founder and Chairperson of Sydney-based Heads Over Heels an organization that supports women entrepreneurs running companies with high growth potential. Previously, Melissa was the Managing Director of NAB Ventures, the VC arm of the National Australia Bank, and a General Partner at Seattle-based Seapoint Ventures. In this episode we discussed:The benefits of revenue-based financingThe advantages and disadvantages of different types of capitalWhat is mean to bootstrap a business and why founders are doing so; andThe hallmarks of success for a bootstrapped businessTo my listeners, I hope you enjoyed this episode. If you liked it, leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts, or share this episode with other people who need to hear it.  Click here to review: https://kite.link/where-E2-80-99s-the-funding-3FSubscribe to the podcast on the ALIVE Podcast Network: https://alivepodcastnetwork.com/wtf/ to get access to bonus content. Keep tuning in on your favorite podcast streaming platforms like Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Spotify, and more and follow or subscribe to the show to get notified when new episodes drop.To be a guest or sponsor the podcast, email whereisthefunding@gmail.com. Follow the podcast on Instagram at whereisthefunding_podcast and on LinkedIn at WHERE'S THE FUNDING? PODCAST.Follow me, your host Michelle J. McKenzie on LinkedIn. Join me next Friday for another episode.

Why Non-Dilutive Revenue-Based FInancing is an Alternative to VC with Melissa Winder S5 Ep.2 Melissa Widner is an entrepreneur, investor, and CEO of Lighter Capital, the pioneer and leader in revenue-based financing for tech startups, founders, and companies. She was the founder and CEO of 7Software, a Silicon Valley-based enterprise software company acquired by Concur. She was also the CEO of Northwest Industrial Supply and is the co-founder and Chairperson of Sydney-based Heads Over Heels an organization that supports women entrepreneurs running companies with high growth potential. Previously, Melissa was the Managing Director of NAB Ventures, the VC arm of the National Australia Bank, and a General Partner at Seattle-based Seapoint Ventures.In this episode we discussed: The benefits of revenue-based financing The advantages and disadvantages of different types of capital What is mean to bootstrap a business and why founders are doing so; and The hallmarks of success for a bootstrapped business To my listeners, I hope you enjoyed this episode. If you liked it, leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts, or share this episode with other people who need to hear it. Click here to review: https://kite.link/where-E2-80-99s-the-funding-3FSubscribe to the podcast on the ALIVE Podcast Network: https://alivepodcastnetwork.com/wtf/ to get access to bonus content.Keep tuning in on your favorite podcast streaming platforms like Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Spotify, and more and follow or subscribe to the show to get notified when new episodes drop.To be a guest or sponsor the podcast, email whereisthefunding@gmail.com.Follow the podcast on Instagram at whereisthefunding_podcast and on LinkedIn at WHERE'S THE FUNDING? PODCAST.Follow me, your host Michelle J. McKenzie on LinkedIn.Join me next Friday for another episode.

What I Love About Revenue-Based Financing with Melissa Widner S.5 Ep.2                                                                                                                                                                                                                                     Melissa Widner is an entrepreneur, investor, and CEO of Lighter Capital, the pioneer and leader in revenue-based financing for tech startups, founders, and companies. She was the founder and CEO of 7Software, a Silicon Valley-based enterprise software company acquired by Concur. She was also the CEO of Northwest Industrial Supply and is the co-founder and Chairperson of Sydney-based Heads Over Heels an organization that supports women entrepreneurs running companies with high growth potential. Previously, Melissa was the Managing Director of NAB Ventures, the VC arm of the National Australia Bank, and a General Partner at Seattle-based Seapoint Ventures. In this episode we discussed:The benefits of revenue-based financingThe advantages and disadvantages of different types of capitalWhat is mean to bootstrap a business and why founders are doing so; andThe hallmarks of success for a bootstrapped businessTo my listeners, I hope you enjoyed this episode. If you liked it, leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts, or share this episode with other people who need to hear it.  Click here to review: https://kite.link/where-E2-80-99s-the-funding-3FSubscribe to the podcast on the ALIVE Podcast Network: https://alivepodcastnetwork.com/wtf/ to get access to bonus content. Keep tuning in on your favorite podcast streaming platforms like Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Spotify, and more and follow or subscribe to the show to get notified when new episodes drop.To be a guest or sponsor the podcast, email whereisthefunding@gmail.com. Follow the podcast on Instagram at whereisthefunding_podcast and on LinkedIn at WHERE'S THE FUNDING? PODCAST.Follow me, your host Michelle J. McKenzie on LinkedIn. Join me next Friday for another episode.

In this episode, Melissa talks about her experience with venture capital companies, important metrics for SaaS companies, unit economics, how remote culture differs from physical culture, how to advise founders to structure their raise, and how to level the playing field for female founders, and much more

Melissa Widner from Lighter Capital talks to us about the evolution of the Venture capital space for Women Entrepreneurs.  Melissa Widner Melissa Widner is the CEO of Lighter Capital, the pioneer and leader in revenue-based financing for tech startups, founders, and companies. Previously, Melissa was the Managing Director of NAB Ventures, the VC arm of the National Australia Bank, and a General Partner at Seattle based SeaPoint Ventures. She is the co-founder and Chairperson of Sydney-based Heads Over Heels, an organization that supports women entrepreneurs running companies with high growth potential.

Are you confused about funding options for your tech company? On this episode of Tech Leader Talk, I am talking with Melissa Widner.  She is the CEO of Lighter Capital, which is a leader in revenue-based financing. Melissa has experience as a founder with multiple exits, an angel investor, and a VC investor.  This gives her an interesting perspective on how to fund startups. On this episode, Melissa and I discuss different types of funding options for tech startups – and the advantages & disadvantages of each option. We also talk about revenue-based financing and when that's a good option to consider. And, Melissa shares her thoughts on when founders should consider bootstrapping their business. “Startup entrepreneurs are the most fascinating people on the planet.” – Melissa Widner Today on the Tech Leader Talk podcast: - Different funding options for tech startups – and how to choose the best option - Raising capital without giving up equity or control - How to raise capital in today's business environment - When should you consider revenue-based financing - Bootstrapping your tech startup   Connect with Melissa Widner: LinkedIn:  https://www.linkedin.com/in/melissawidner/ Website:  https://www.lightercapital.com/ Thanks for listening! Be sure to get your free copy of Steve's latest book, Cracking the Patent Code, and discover his proven system for identifying and protecting your most valuable inventions. Get the book at https://stevesponseller.com/book.

Guest summary (10-second version): Guest: Melissa Widner (@melissawidner) Company: Lighter Capital Role: CEO Background: Lighter Capital is a revenue-based financing fund that helps SaaS companies raise capital without giving up ownership. Talking points (five-second version): Revenue-based financing dynamics Ownership preferences of founders How downturns affect capital markets

Melissa: CEO of Lighter Capital, a pioneering firm in revenue-based financing Previously a VC Partner for 17 years Ex-CEO of 7Software which was acquired by Concur Founder of Heads over Heels, a strategic networking group to help female leaders in high-growth companies Check out the episode for our discussion on revenue based financing as an alternative to traditional VC and how founders can prepare for the upcoming economic conditions. Links: Lighter Capital: https://www.lightercapital.com/ Heads Over Heels: https://www.headsoverheels.com.au/ Y Combinator Letter: Business Insider Article

Brandon Krongold and Matt Dowling are Investment Co-ordinators at Lighter Capital — a zero dilution, revenue-based debt capital provider for growing tech and healthtech businesses. In this episode, Brandon and Matt share their story and how Lighter Capital has invested hundreds of millions of dollars into growth companies. They also explain what terms like ‘zero dilution', ‘zero equity warrants', ‘zero personal guarantees' and ‘financial covenants' mean, before comparing and contrasting those terms with traditional debt or venture capital models.   Key takeaways: Lighter Capital, based in Australia and the U.S., is the pioneer and largest provider of non-dilutive debt capital to tech start-ups in Australia and the U.S. Every year, Lighter Capital works with hundreds of businesses to grow their companies. Lighter Capital's revenue-based financing model makes it easy to access up to $1M in growth capital with zero dilution and no equity/warrants, personal guarantees or financial covenants. There aren't that many reasons why a start-up might fail, and one of those is surely not having enough resources to continuously grow momentum. Therefore, every healthtech founder should be learning what options are available to them to be able to access cash and/or resources and when to engage with those options.   Resources and links: https://www.linkedin.com/company/lighter-capital/ https://lightercapital.com/ https://www.linkedin.com/in/brandon-krongold-a97824158/ https://www.linkedin.com/in/matthew-dowling-a75ba611/   Connect: Listen to other episodes of Reimagining Healthcare Connect with Yianni Serpanos on LinkedIn Follow HealthTechX on LinkedIn Follow HealthTechX on Instagram Follow HealthTechX on Meetup See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Melissa Widner is the CEO of Lighter Capital, an investment firm that is based in the US and launched in Australia in 2020. Their novel model involves lending to early stage startups and linking repayments to revenue, without requiring founders to relinquish equity. Melissa has a long history in the startup world, having been CEO or board member of many companies. In her conversation with Adam, she discusses Lighter Capital's new model, and the ways in which she believes the Australian startup ecosystem has made huge progress in the last 5 or so years. See full show notes https://w2d1.com/melissa-widner

Melissa Widner is the CEO of Lighter Capital, the pioneer and leader in revenue-based financing for tech startups and scales-ups. Prior to Lighter Capital, Melissa was the Managing Director of NAB Ventures, the VC arm of the National Australia Bank and a General Partner at Seattle based SeaPoint Ventures. She was also the founder and CEO of 7Software, and the CEO of Northwest Industrial Supply, where under her leadership, both companies generated over a 10X return to investors. Melissa is also the co-founder and Chairperson of Sydney based Heads Over Heels, an organization that supports women entrepreneurs running companies with high growth potential. She has served as a lecturer at the University of Washington's Graduate School of Business where she taught courses on venture capital and entrepreneurship. Melissa has also served on the boards of several venture backed technology companies in both the US and Australia. She holds a MA from Stanford University and a BA from the University of Washington. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

On this episode of the Jason Cavness Experience I talk to James Newell – Managing Director at Voyager Capital CavnesssHR Beta Testing Wait List Sign up Be sure to sign up for the Beta Testing of the CavnessHR platform. www.CavnessHR.co By signing up to our beta testing you will receive 3 months free and after that be locked into our beta pricing forever. REFERRAL BONUS - For each company you refer that signs up for the waitlist, you will receive one free month of HR in addition to the above. CavnessHR Social Media CavnessHR website: https://www.cavnessHR.com Jason's email: jasoncavness@cavnessHR.com @CavnessHR across social media @jasoncavnessHR across social media We talk about the following Name, Image and Likeness rule in College Sports VC Deal Funnel When should a founder stop What is the role of a VC on a board James' Bio James has been working with high growth technology companies as an adviser and investor since 2005 and focuses on early stage and seed investments in the Pacific Northwest. He currently serves on the boards of Voyager portfolio companies Kaskada, Lighter Capital and WellSaid Labs. He previously served as a board member or observer at Casper, DoubleVerify, General Assembly, Sauce Labs and Zerto, among others. Prior to joining Voyager, James worked for Institutional Venture Partners (IVP), a later stage VC based in Menlo Park. While with IVP, James worked on investments in AlienVault, Carbonite (NASDAQ: CARB), Casper (NYSE: CSPR), Checkr, DoubleVerify, General Assembly, Kayak (Acquired: PCLN), LegalZoom, Prosper, Sauce Labs, SoFi and Zerto. James earned a B.A. in Economics and a B.A. in Business Administration with a concentration in Finance from the University of Washington, where he was a first team Pac-10 All-Academic football player at free safety. He has also earned his M.B.A. from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania with a concentration in entrepreneurial management. James' Social Media James' LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jamesfnewell/ Company Website: https://www.voyagercapital.com/ Email: Newell@voyagercapital.com James' Twitter: @jamesfnewell Company YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCr52LdMY7h6eMNqnHn6BSaA Tony's email: info@tonytaylorinspires.com James' Advice In terms of in terms of advice. don't take any advice from what VCs are posting on Twitter or saying on a podcast or live stream. I think just because somebody is a good investor doesn't mean that they should be a guru and give life advice, as well. Develop real authentic relationships with people outside of social media. Most of what's available on there is just marketing anyway. Once the world kind of opens up and everybody's getting together in person. Get back out there, meet lots of people, develop lots of authentic relationships.

In the last episode with Greg Poirier, we discussed his career journey and three traits of a strong leader. In today's episode, we're going to discuss what the enterprise sales model is and how our companies can switch over to this model.  According to Lighter Capital, “Enterprise sales, also known as complex sales, refers to the procurement of large contracts that typically involve long sales cycles, multiple decision-makers, and a higher level of risk than traditional sales.” Read at: https://monetizationnation.com/blog/how-to-shift-to-enterprise-sales/ 

Andy Sack has been a technology entrepreneur, angel investor and venture capitalist for 25 years — and is one of the godfathers of the Seattle startup community. He was managing director for Techstars Seattle, founder and executive chairman for Lighter Capital, and cofounder of seed stage fund Founder's Co-op. He participated in the first Techstars Boston Startup Weekend and was so moved by the experience that he decided to run a Techstars Startup Weekend in Seattle. As Andy says, “(I gave) a talk to the Techstars Boston class and it was supposed to be one hour. Three hours later after talking and answering questions, I left the building, and I was moved to tears.”He rallied the venture capital community in Seattle to support entrepreneurs through Techstars, creating a vibrant startup ecosystem that didn't previously exist. Three different unicorn startups (valued over a billion dollars) came out of Andy's 2011 Class of Techstars Seattle. Follow Andy on Twitter: @AndySackLearn more about his favorite charitable organizations:Two Screens for Teachers - Gives teachers a second computer screen so they can see their students while teaching remotely.Rainier Scholars - Creates pathways to college graduation for hard-working, low-income students and provides access to transformative educational opportunities.REST - Helps women on the street get out of troubled situations and abusive relationships and gives them a place to live.Techstars personnel and/or guests who speak in this podcast express their own opinions, and not the opinion of either Techstars or any company discussed in this podcast. This podcast is for informational purposes only, and should not be relied upon as legal, business, investment, or tax advice. You should consult your own advisers as to those matters. References to any securities are for illustrative and/or informational purposes only and do not constitute an investment recommendation or offer to provide investment advisory services. Furthermore, this content is not directed at nor intended for use by any investor or prospective investor, and may not under any circumstances be relied upon when making a decision to invest in any fund managed by Techstars. Certain of Techstars funds own (or may own in the future) securities in some of the companies discussed in this podcast. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Dexter Cousins is joined by Melissa Widner, CEO of Lighter Capital, the pioneer and leader in revenue based financing for tech start ups and scale ups. Seattle based Lighter Capital is backed by NAB and Silicon Valley Bank as well as US based VCs. Previously Melissa was the Managing Director of NAB Ventures, the VC arm of the National Australia Bank and a General Partner at Seattle based SeaPoint Ventures. She was the founder and CEO of 7Software, a Silicon Valley based enterprise software company acquired by Concur (Nasdaq: CNQR, acquired by SAP). She was also the CEO of Northwest Industrial Supply. Under her leadership, both companies generated over a 10X return to investors. Melissa is also the co-founder and Chairperson of Sydney based Heads Over Heels, an organisation that supports women entrepreneurs running companies with high growth potential. Melissa served as a lecturer at the University of Washington's Graduate School of Business where she taught courses on venture capital and entrepreneurship. She was previously on the board of the AIC (AVCAL) and has served on the boards of several venture backed technology companies in both the US and Australia. For more info go to https://www.lightercapital.com/Thanks To Our Partners FinTech Australia We share a mission to build a strong Fintech community, foster connections and support innovation.GM - Platforms & Lending Syd, $300k package - details, info@tieronepeople.comLaunch, Scale, Innovate Leaders in Fintech Executive Search and Recruitment

Lighter Capital's new interview series: "Happy Hour with a Founder", featuring Jody Page. It's a chance to hear directly from founders about their real-world experiences and get advice about building companies, scaling revenue, adapting to change, and more. Watch this conversation with Ari Palmer, Co-Founder & CEO of TaxTaker. Enjoy! Lighter Capital ➤ https://www.lightercapital.com/ Apply here ➤ https://www.lightercapital.com/apply/ Additional Resources: • Learn your Cost of Capital using our Cost of Capital Calculator ➤ https://cost.lightercapital.com/• Read our latest Startup Finance Playbook: Finding the Right Financing For Your Capital Needs ➤ https://www.lightercapital.com/the-start-up-finance-playbook/ • View our The Rise of Revenue-Based Financing Guide ➤ https://www.lightercapital.com/alternative-finance-options-for-tech-startups/ • Watch the Founders Series 2020 ➤ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L0k_2FnZ3T8&list=PLNFr1vxr7rJGgUzlwB7AnRm3xA20zo6xZ • Guides & eBooks ➤ https://www.lightercapital.com/guides-and-ebooks/ • Our Community ➤ https://www.lightercapital.com/clients/ • Contact Us ➤ https://www.lightercapital.com/contact/ About Lighter Capital Lighter Capital provides tech entrepreneurs with quick and easy access to non-dilutive financing to help grow their companies without giving up equity, board seats or personal guarantees. As the leader in Revenue-Based Financing, Lighter Capital has provided over $200 million in more than 700 rounds of financing to over 400 companies.

Today's guest is Melissa Widner, an experienced founder, CEO, investor and board member. She very recently left NAB Ventures to join Lighter Capital, one of NAB's portfolio companies, as CEO. Lighter Capital is the pioneer and leading provider of revenue based financing to SAAS companies. Prior to Lighter and NAB, she was the General Partner at SeaPoint Ventures, a US based venture capital firm and was CEO of 7Software and Northwest Supply where under her leadership, both companies generated over a 10X return to investors. In 2009, Melissa relocated to Sydney with her Australian husband. One year later, Melissa co-founded Heads Over Heels, an organisation that works with female entrepreneurs leading companies with high growth potential.In this conversation with Ian, Melissa discusses:• Why NAB is such a breeding ground for great VC talent • How starting a hair bow business in university led to landing a CEO role right out of college at an industrial supply company • Why 7Software's acquisition taught her the importance of timing • How Heads Over Heels accelerates the networks of female entrepreneurs • Why she left her Managing Partner role at NAB Ventures for CEO role at Lighter Capital• How Lighter is coping with COVID-19• Why she decided to join our Summit Club peer group for foundersRelevant linksMore about Lighter CapitalMelissa's LinkedInHeads Over HeelsRecommendationsBook: Mindset by Carol Dweck & Thinking in Bets by Annie DukePodcast: Squiz, Pivot, and Grammar GirlNews Source: New York Times App: SpotifyFavorite Tech CEO: Melanie Perkins, CanvaTV Show: The Late Show with Stephen ColbertTED Talk Topic: Why We Need More Women VCs

Lighter Capital's new interview series: "Happy Hour with a Founder", featuring Jody Page. It's a chance to hear directly from founders about their real-world experiences and get advice about building companies, scaling revenue, adapting to change, and more. Watch this conversation with JoAnna Abrams, CEO of MindClick. Enjoy! Lighter Capital ➤ https://www.lightercapital.com/ Apply here ➤ https://www.lightercapital.com/apply/ Additional Resources: • Learn your Cost of Capital using our Cost of Capital Calculator ➤ https://cost.lightercapital.com/• Read our latest Startup Finance Playbook: Finding the Right Financing For Your Capital Needs ➤ https://www.lightercapital.com/the-start-up-finance-playbook/ • View our The Rise of Revenue-Based Financing Guide ➤ https://www.lightercapital.com/alternative-finance-options-for-tech-startups/ • Watch the Founders Series 2020 ➤ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L0k_2FnZ3T8&list=PLNFr1vxr7rJGgUzlwB7AnRm3xA20zo6xZ • Guides & eBooks ➤ https://www.lightercapital.com/guides-and-ebooks/ • Our Community ➤ https://www.lightercapital.com/clients/ • Contact Us ➤ https://www.lightercapital.com/contact/ About Lighter Capital Lighter Capital provides tech entrepreneurs with quick and easy access to non-dilutive financing to help grow their companies without giving up equity, board seats or personal guarantees. As the leader in Revenue-Based Financing, Lighter Capital has provided over $200 million in more than 700 rounds of financing to over 400 companies.

Lighter Capital's new interview series: "Happy Hour with a Founder", featuring Jody Page. It's a chance to hear directly from founders about their real-world experiences and get advice about building companies, scaling revenue, adapting to change, and more. Watch this conversation with Conor Lee, Co-Founder & CEO of Personas. Enjoy! Lighter Capital ➤ https://www.lightercapital.com/ Apply here ➤ https://www.lightercapital.com/apply/ Additional Resources: • Learn your Cost of Capital using our Cost of Capital Calculator ➤ https://cost.lightercapital.com/• Read our latest Startup Finance Playbook: Finding the Right Financing For Your Capital Needs ➤ https://www.lightercapital.com/the-start-up-finance-playbook/ • View our The Rise of Revenue-Based Financing Guide ➤ https://www.lightercapital.com/alternative-finance-options-for-tech-startups/ • Watch the Founders Series 2020 ➤ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L0k_2FnZ3T8&list=PLNFr1vxr7rJGgUzlwB7AnRm3xA20zo6xZ • Guides & eBooks ➤ https://www.lightercapital.com/guides-and-ebooks/ • Our Community ➤ https://www.lightercapital.com/clients/ • Contact Us ➤ https://www.lightercapital.com/contact/ About Lighter Capital Lighter Capital provides tech entrepreneurs with quick and easy access to non-dilutive financing to help grow their companies without giving up equity, board seats or personal guarantees. As the leader in Revenue-Based Financing, Lighter Capital has provided over $200 million in more than 700 rounds of financing to over 400 companies.

Lighter Capital's new interview series: "Happy Hour with a Founder", featuring Jody Page. It's a chance to hear directly from founders about their real-world experiences and get advice about building companies, scaling revenue, adapting to change, and more. Watch this conversation with Conor Lee, Co-Founder & CEO of Personas. Enjoy! Lighter Capital ➤ https://www.lightercapital.com/ Apply here ➤ https://www.lightercapital.com/apply/ Additional Resources: • Learn your Cost of Capital using our Cost of Capital Calculator ➤ https://cost.lightercapital.com/• Read our latest Startup Finance Playbook: Finding the Right Financing For Your Capital Needs ➤ https://www.lightercapital.com/the-start-up-finance-playbook/ • View our The Rise of Revenue-Based Financing Guide ➤ https://www.lightercapital.com/alternative-finance-options-for-tech-startups/ • Watch the Founders Series 2020 ➤ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L0k_2FnZ3T8&list=PLNFr1vxr7rJGgUzlwB7AnRm3xA20zo6xZ • Guides & eBooks ➤ https://www.lightercapital.com/guides-and-ebooks/ • Our Community ➤ https://www.lightercapital.com/clients/ • Contact Us ➤ https://www.lightercapital.com/contact/ About Lighter Capital Lighter Capital provides tech entrepreneurs with quick and easy access to non-dilutive financing to help grow their companies without giving up equity, board seats or personal guarantees. As the leader in Revenue-Based Financing, Lighter Capital has provided over $200 million in more than 700 rounds of financing to over 400 companies.

Welcome to the Happy Hour With A Founder podcast. Hosted by Jody Page and brought to you by Lighter Capital (www.lightercapital.com).

Joe Silver, CFO at Lighter Capital, discusses his firm’s debt-financing model for startups.

Executive Director of Client Services at Corum Group, Joel Espelien hosts a discussion with some of the biggest investors today covering the topics on everyone's minds.     What does it really mean when investors say they are, "open for business?" What are they looking for with companies. And, what are they looking for in CEOs.  Panelists:  Vladimir Besprozvany, Greater Sum Ventures Gillian Muessig, Outlines Venture Group James Newell, Voyager Capital Tim Porter, Madrona Venture Group Vani Rao, Lighter Capital Stacy Tatem, Women in Cloud Check out other podcast episodes, webcasts, and videos at WFS.com. 

Lighter Capital (https://www.lightercapital.com) provides revenue-based loans to startups. Jon Prentice discusses how this funding strategy works, and how his firm is helping fund startups during the COVID crisis. Read all of Kruze Consulting’s COVID and PPP Loan-related content at https://kruzeconsulting.com/blog/post/cares-act-startups/

“If only we had money, we could…” It’s a story I’ve heard a thousand times. Startups heaving a sigh, wishing they had investors to fund the awkward early stages. Scraping to get your software in shape… Working 60+ hour weeks… Can’t afford to hire people so you’re wearing every hat for every department… But the dark side of receiving VC funding is that you lose a massive slice of your company. It can be VERY expensive. The equity you give away just for some upfront money could be worth millions in a few years time, but you’re too desperate to know that now. BJ Lackland has a different approach. He’s the CEO of Lighter Capital, a funding company that supports tech entrepreneurs without them giving up equity, board seats or personal guarantees. In the 7 years BJ spent at the helm, they funded 365 companies… with 630 rounds of financing… deploying a total of $168 million. So, if this guy is a master at spotting a startup worth investing in, don’t you want to hear what he has to say? You can.  For this week’s episode of Escape Velocity, I sat down with BJ and we talked all about funding, financing, and loans for startups. In our interview, BJ opens up about: - What revenue-based financing actually is - How Lighter Capital does the math on a loan - What’s changed in SaaS financing  - Why equity funding could be your biggest mistake - Light Capital’s software for processing deals - What red flags BJ always looks out for (

In this episode of the Future 1 web show & podcast, we meet Vani Rao. Vani is a Director at Lighter Capital. Lighter Capital provides non-dilutive growth capital to early-stage tech companies. In this episode, we talk about career pivots and making a career change to reach more fulfillment in a career. In addition, we talk about the different types of venture debt that are available and the growth opportunities that it provides. Finally, we learn why asking is for free and the importance of that. The material contained on this web series & podcast is for informational purposes only and should not be construed as an offer or a recommendation to buy or sell any security nor is it to be construed as investment advice. Music credits: Clouds by MBB | https://soundcloud.com/mbbofficial , Music promoted by https://www.free-stock-music.com , Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported, https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/deed.en_US IMPORTANT NOTICE: This web series and podcast is intended for informational purposes only. The views expressed are not, and should not be construed as investment advice or recommendations. Recipients of this should do their own due diligence, taking into account their specific financial circumstances, investment objectives and risk tolerance (which are not considered in this web series and podcast) before investing. None of this information communication is an offer, nor the solicitation of an offer, to buy or sell any of the assets mentioned herein. --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/joelpalathinkal/support

On this episode of the Startup of the Year Podcast, Rich Maloy the VP Engagement at Established talks with Thor Culverhouse, CEO of Lighter Capital, and John Willard the Managing director of Silicon Valley Bank, about revenue-based financing. They also discuss alternative capital opportunities and structures and ways to finance your startup that are not tradition venture capital methods, and more…

Our second #HYPEsession features BJ Lackland, CEO of Lighter Capital. Lighter Capital is the most active revenue-based financing provider in the United States. In this chat BJ shares:What exactly is revenue-based financing and when does it make sense versus traditional VC or angel money, or bootstrapping.A look into Lighter's existing portfolio and the amount of funding they typically provide.What type of companies make the most sense with Lighter Capital's model.#HYPEsessions are provided to you here in audio format through our podcast feed, but also simulcast with video on my personal Linkedin (linkedin.com/in/rajivnathan) and IGTV via the @startuphypeman account.If you're a partner of the startup ecosystem and want to be featured in a future #HYPEsession, email media@startuphypeman.com. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

In episode #1195, we share several alternative (yet effective!) ways of funding your business. We give you all the details on crowdfunding, revenue-based financing, and the more traditional routes involving bank loans. Tune in to hear what you need to do to attract investors!  TIME-STAMPED SHOW NOTES: [00:25] Today’s topic: Alternative Ways to Fund Your Business.  [00:37] Why people should consider funding and the problem with bootstrapping. [01:02] The need for funding even if you are Elon Musk or Jeff Bezos. [01:47] Thoughts on crowdfunding and the various platforms you can use.  [02:22] A list of the main crowdfunding platforms and how much you can raise per year.  [03:03] The importance of having traction before attempting to raise money.  [03:27] How you can raise money through revenue-based financing.  [04:15] The models that companies like Lighter Capital use.  [05:05] Getting a traditional bank or SBA loan in the US and their interest rates.  [05:22] What the credit card company Brex is offering in terms of credit.   [06:01] The importance of having a formula that is already working.  [06:24] That’s it for today! [07:02] To stay updated with events and learn more about our mastermind, go to the Marketing School site for more information. Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode: Jeff Bezos on Twitter Elon Musk on Twitter PayPal Tesla Kickstarter Indiegogo  CrowdEngine  StartEngine Republic  Wefunder MicroVentures Lighter Capital  SaaStr Clearbanc Brex  Activision  Disney  Leave Some Feedback:   What should we talk about next? Please let us know in the comments below Did you enjoy this episode? If so, please leave a short review.   Connect with Us:  Neilpatel.com Quick Sprout  Growth Everywhere Single Grain Twitter @neilpatel  Twitter @ericosiu

In episode #1195, we share several alternative (yet effective!) ways of funding your business. We give you all the details on crowdfunding, revenue-based financing, and the more traditional routes involving bank loans. Tune in to hear what you need to do to attract investors!  TIME-STAMPED SHOW NOTES: [00:25] Today's topic: Alternative Ways to Fund Your Business.  [00:37] Why people should consider funding and the problem with bootstrapping. [01:02] The need for funding even if you are Elon Musk or Jeff Bezos. [01:47] Thoughts on crowdfunding and the various platforms you can use.  [02:22] A list of the main crowdfunding platforms and how much you can raise per year.  [03:03] The importance of having traction before attempting to raise money.  [03:27] How you can raise money through revenue-based financing.  [04:15] The models that companies like Lighter Capital use.  [05:05] Getting a traditional bank or SBA loan in the US and their interest rates.  [05:22] What the credit card company Brex is offering in terms of credit.   [06:01] The importance of having a formula that is already working.  [06:24] That's it for today! [07:02] To stay updated with events and learn more about our mastermind, go to the Marketing School site for more information. Links Mentioned in Today's Episode: Jeff Bezos on Twitter Elon Musk on Twitter PayPal Tesla Kickstarter Indiegogo  CrowdEngine  StartEngine Republic  Wefunder MicroVentures Lighter Capital  SaaStr Clearbanc Brex  Activision  Disney  Leave Some Feedback:   What should we talk about next? Please let us know in the comments below Did you enjoy this episode? If so, please leave a short review.   Connect with Us:  Neilpatel.com Quick Sprout  Growth Everywhere Single Grain Twitter @neilpatel  Twitter @ericosiu

Remember Enron? A company that went to the highest highs only to have a dizzying fall in 2007. One of the values that Enron had put on the wall was Integrity. In hindsight no one would associate Enron with anything remotely close to integrity. As you heard in the intro, how you reach your objective matters, the end doesn't justify the means and you have to be intentional about doing it the right way when it comes to people. As it turns out, putting values on the wall means nothing.This week on the SaaS Revolution Show we bring you a session from our recent SaaStock West Coast conference where a stellar panel discusses how to nail Company Culture & Mission and How to Build an Environment Fit for Scale. What this means is creating a sustainable company with healthy culture, good demeanor and authentic behaviours exuded by everyone. Moderated by Solu Nwanze, Director, Business Operations, Zendesk it features Sonja Gittens Ottley, Head, Diversity & Inclusion, Asana, Emma Eschweiler, VP, Silicon Valley bank, Steven Shapiro, VP Marketing (Americas), Clevertap and BJ Lackland, CEO, Lighter Capital.   They talk in detail how to prepare for a more dynamic workplace and build a more productive and engaged workforce and touch on important topics such as hiring, culture add, rather than culture fit, how to run a company and why you should act as a parent to your team. As we are just days away from our flagship conference in Dublin, we want to make sure you think about these softer topics as much as you do about product market fit, go to market and outbound sales strategy. Culture, inclusivity and equality matter far more than you think and if you don't spend time on them you could find yourself in Enron's shoes, with empty words hanging off your walls. If you still haven't, grab a last minute ticket for SaaStock19 where 230 speakers will bring useful and thought provoking content across seven stages.

BJ Lackland has spent nearly 20 years as an investor in and executive at startups, raising or investing over $200 million. As an investor, he’s been a VC, an angel, and is now the CEO of Lighter Capital, where he has overseen over 550 alternative investments in early-stage tech companies. As an executive, he’s been on the executive team of three companies, including as the CFO of a public energy tech company.Check out what BJ is up to at: https://www.lightercapital.com/

BJ Lackland is CEO of Lighter Capital, a Seattle based company that specializes in providing financial capital to early-stage SaaS companies. n this episode, we help you understand what exactly revenue-based financing is and why it's emerging as a leading alternative to equity financing for startups. The Show Notes Lighter Capital Techstars BJ on LinkedIn Omer on Twitter Enjoyed this episode? Subscribe to the podcast Leave a rating and review Follow Omer on Twitter Need help with your SaaS? Join SaaS Club Plus: our membership and community for new and early-stage SaaS founders. Join and get training & support. Join SaaS Club Launch: a 12-week group coaching program to help you get your SaaS from zero to your first $10K revenue. Apply for SaaS Club Accelerate: If you'd like to work directly with Omer 1:1, then request a free strategy session.

BJ Lackland is CEO of Lighter Capital, a Seattle based company that specializes in providing financial capital to early-stage SaaS companies. n this episode, we help you understand what exactly revenue-based financing is and why it's emerging as a leading alternative to equity financing for startups.The Show NotesLighter CapitalTechstarsBJ on LinkedInOmer on TwitterEnjoyed this episode?Subscribe to the podcastLeave a rating and reviewFollow Omer on TwitterNeed help with your SaaS?1. Join SaaS Club Plus: our membership and community for new and early-stage SaaS founders. Join and get training & support.2. Join SaaS Club Launch: a 12-week group coaching program to help you get your SaaS from zero to your first $10K revenue.3. Apply for SaaS Club Accelerate: If you'd like to work directly with Omer 1:1, then request a free strategy session.

This week’s startup scene was definitely in its top shape. We are talking about a total of 397 funding rounds that’s hundred more than last week, $31.2 billion total funding which is almost 5 times last week, 153 acquisitions recorded, and a transaction of a total acquisition amount of $9.3 billion. That being said, let’s dive right into the highlights. Feather, a New York-based company that offers contemporary, higher-end furniture on a subscription basis raised $12.5 million in a Series A round led by Spark Capital. Prior seed investors Fuel Capital, Bain Capital Ventures, PJC, Kleiner Perkins, and Y Combinator followed on in the round, according to Crunchbase. Algorithmia raised $25 million in Series B funding led by Norwest Venture Partners. Algorithmia, based in Seattle, is building infrastructure for the final step of the machine learning workflow: integrating a predictive model into a production code environment. Basically, what the company calls its “AI Layer” is a software environment that automatically produces a model-specific API the data scientist can call. DNA Script has raised $38.5 million in new financing to commercialize a process that it claims is the first big leap forward in manufacturing genetic material. DNA Script is focused on the manufacturing of synthetic DNA using a proprietary template-free enzymatic technology. The company aims at accelerating innovation in life science and technology through rapid, affordable and high quality DNA synthesis. The company said the money would be used to accelerate the development of its first products and establish a presence in the United States. Trendy luggage brand - Away, packs on $100 million funding and rolls past a valuation of $1.4 billion. The capital will be used to build additional brick-and-mortar stores, as well as add to Away’s portfolio of merchandise with an eye toward expanding into generic travel gear. To date, Away has sold more than 1 million suitcases. Moving on to acquisitions, HP enterprise announced it was buying Cray (a global supercomputer leader) for $1.3 billion, giving it access to the company’s high-performance computing portfolio, and perhaps a foothold into quantum computing in the future. VMware announced today that it’s acquiring Bitnami, the package application company that was a member of the Y Combinator Winter 2013 class. The companies didn’t share the purchase price. The company can now deliver more than 130 popular software packages in a variety of formats, such as Docker containers or virtual machine, an approach that should be attractive for VMware as it makes its transformation to be more of a cloud services company. Sisense announced today that it has acquired Periscope Data to create what it is calling a complete data science and analytics platform for customers. The companies did not disclose the purchase price. Sisense, which has raised $174 million, tends to serve business intelligence requirements either for internal use or externally with customers. Periscope, which has raised more than $34 million, looks at the data science end of the business. What else caught our eye last week? Fiverr files to go public, reports revenue of $75.5M and a net loss of $36.1M for 2018 Freelance marketplace Fiverr has filed to go public on the New York Stock Exchange. Their mission is to change how the world works together. They started with the simple idea that people should be able to buy and sell digital services in the same fashion as physical goods on an e-commerce platform. On that basis, they set out to design a digital marketplace that is built with a comprehensive services catalog and an efficient search, find and order process that mirrors a typical e-commerce transaction. Next, let’s take a peek at the Revenue based finance (RBF) model that’s on the rise. What exactly is RBF you ask? It’s a relatively new form of funding for tech companies that are posting monthly recurring revenue. Here’s how Lighter Capital, which completed 500 RBF deals in 2018, explains it: “It’s an alternative funding model that mixes some aspects of debt and equity. Most RBF is technically structured as a loan. However, RBF investors’ returns are tied directly to the startup’s performance, which is more like equity.”

Ron Huddleston, Chief Partner Officer at Twilio, joins the AppChat Podcast to discuss the importance of building out ecosystems and the differences he has seen building multiple ecosystems for various companies. Other subjects include breaking down various ecosystem models, how Huddleston's previous experience prepared him for working at Twilio, and the importance of trust and credibility in the industry. Here are the key topics, with timestamps, as well as the full interview transcript: Key Topics 00:00-01:58 Introducing the AppChat and our guest, Twilio's Chief Partner Officer Ron Huddleston 1:59-3:28 The challenges of indirect software sales 3:29-8:43 The importance of software companies building out an ISV and/or SI ecosystem 8:44-12:34 The differences in building out an ecosystem for Salesforce and Microsoft 12:35-17:10 The differences between a pure, cloud-based ecosystem, and a hybrid model including cloud and on-premise 17:11-20:02 How much Huddleston uses his previous experiences building ecosystems for Twilio, and how much he has to continue to discover and invent 20:03-25:54 The importance of trust and credibility when building out ecosystems 25:55-29:06 Building an app and sticking to the commitment you made to your ecosystem 29:07-30:22 Closing out and how to get in touch Full Transcript Intro: 00:01 You're listening to the AppChat, a podcast focused on SaaS growth strategies, plus successes in the Salesforce ecosystem, and beyond. Here's your host, CodeScience CEO, Brian Walsh. Brian Walsh: 00:14 All right. We're back on the AppChat Podcast. And today, I'm joined by Ron Huddleston, who, Ron, you have an incredible background when it comes to building out ISV ecosystems. Let me get this right. So you're currently the Chief Partner Officer at Twilio. Ron Huddleston: 00:31 Yeah. Brian Walsh: 00:32 Before that, CVP, One Commercial Partner organization at Microsoft. Ron Huddleston: 00:35 Yeah. Brian Walsh: 00:36 SVP of the AppExchange at Salesforce. Ron Huddleston: 00:38 Yep. Brian Walsh: 00:39 And started the OEM, ISV program at Oracle, where you were vice president. Ron Huddleston: 00:44 Yes. Brian Walsh: 00:45 Are there any bigger partner programs in the world to run than that? Ron Huddleston: 00:51 Amazon, maybe, now? Brian Walsh: 00:53 Maybe now, yeah. Ron Huddleston: 00:54 Yeah. Yeah, they're breaking new ground. But the Microsoft thing was definitely a big one. They've all been really fun. I do think that the folks at companies that get to build ecosystems, ISV, or SI, or any type of partner ecosystem, I think that it's probably the most fun job you can have at a bigger technology company, because you get exposed. It's not the same thing over and over. You get to really understand how to work with other folks and understand what's important to them. And so I stuck with it -- it was probably my 20th job at Oracle -- and when I found it and started building it, I just realized it was the most fun, like exciting, interesting, technically satisfying, from a business perspective, satisfying thing you could really do. So just from a personal perspective, I think it's probably the most fun you can have in cloud technology for a job. Unless you're like the CEO of a startup, or doing what you're doing, like building things. But if you're going to work for somebody else, I think it's a great job. Brian Walsh: 01:59 But I mean, I find that sometimes indirect sales, especially indirect software sales, can be extremely challenging. Like you're not actually doing that final license sale. You're lining up the partners and enabling them. I mean, is there something wrong in your head? Ron Huddleston: 02:14 No, there's not. It does carry its own set of complexities. But the strange thing is, whether it was on-premise or the cloud, those complexities repeat each other over, and over, and over again. So there really, after 20-odd years of doing this, there's not much you haven't seen, because where things get complicated is around human behavior, not necessarily around bringing really great solutions, and great partners, and technology together to solve problems. That's kind of the easy part, just to like address customer problems. Where things get a little crunchy is how human start, where things can get complicated, is when you're aligning different people, different organizations, different teams. That's where things get a little more complicated. I think everything up to that is not as complicated. But again, it's a pattern. And the patterns tend to repeat themselves. So you can sort of see around corners, the longer you do these kind of things, which makes it easier every time. This is, what, my third, fourth- Brian Walsh: 03:18 Fourth one. Ron Huddleston: 03:19 It kind of makes it a little easier every time you do it because you know, I probably made 10,000 mistakes. And you only make the same mistake three or four times. Brian Walsh: 03:29 Eventually, you get it right. So why an ecosystem? I mean, there's a huge amount of effort and investment. Why is it important for a software company to actually build out an ISV and/or SI ecosystem? Ron Huddleston: 03:44 Yeah. There's a lot of reasons. It depends on, are we talking about the technology company themselves that want to build an ecosystem? Brian Walsh: 03:51 Yeah. Ron Huddleston: 03:52 So you have to be a bigger company in order to do that, obviously. It's really hard to do it, otherwise. You can certainly build a small, little portfolio of folks that you work with if you're a smaller company. But there's nothing better than a broad ecosystem because it does a couple things. First things first is, if there's any way, shape, and form you're trying to prove out the sort of platform nature of the technology that you're trying to provide, the long road to get to that level of credibility is trying to do it yourself; trying to hire all the people in the world with the right expertise to sit down with a customer and explain to them, "No, bet on us. We're future-proofed. And you can do all of these things with us. We're a platform," it is really hard. The easier way to do it is to work with an ecosystem of technology, or IP, ISVs, and SIs; and the ones that are trusted in the space, that are maybe already trusted by the customers that you want to serve, and work with them to have them understand how your platform can help. And then build what's essentially, if those are the ingredients, then you know, the recipe book is how all those ingredients come together to help essentially cook a meal, like serve a beautiful meal for the customer, right? And so that's why it's a cool job. You get to be the chef, kind of. That's a good analogy, I'm going to use that analogy -- 20 years, I just discovered a new analogy. But you know, if you think about it that way, as ecosystems, as, you know, sure, you can call it one broad ecosystem, but really, it's a bunch of small solution maps, or what I was just calling recipes. It's a group of technologies, partners, companies, expertise, that solve particular problems. And no one company can really solve anything complicated on their own, really. Like it is just hard to do that over, and over, and over, and over again. You know, if you want to be broad-based, it makes it ... If you want to be a broad solution, like a platform, it makes it really hard to also solve problems, complicated problems, by yourself, right? If you want to stay really narrow and be like a really verticalized application or SI- Brian Walsh: 06:12 You can go super deep. Ron Huddleston: 06:13 You can go super deep. You can solve things on your own. But if you want to be big and broad, it's just the permutations of options are almost impossible. That's why ecosystems are so important. They drive credibility, but they also are the only way to solve really hard, complicated problems if you're trying to solve a lot of them. Those are the two reasons that it's great for the partner, or the platform, but it's great for all these companies that are sort of looking. It's great for cutting-edge companies. Like in the cloud, it was a wonderful thing. People actually all start relational databases. Like there were a lot of companies that were building up relational database practices back in the day. And there were these little, small startups that were building relational databases, or were driving Java for, like J2EE or something. Brian Walsh: 07:05 Yep. Ron Huddleston: 07:05 And I know this is going to sound really old. Brian Walsh: 07:07 We, you and I sound ancient right now. But keep going. It's great. We're reminiscing. Ron Huddleston: 07:10 Yeah. But the point was these companies, these smaller companies that would never have -- it was going to be a long time until they were big enough to where people really get exposed to them. Having an ecosystem, being part of a partner's ecosystem, of a vendor, a big platform's ecosystem, helped the companies that were the best, the most innovative, had the best technologies, sort of punch above their weight class, and could help change the market really quickly. So it's this symbiotic relationship between these platform players that need partners for the two, you know, for lots of reasons, but the two reasons I highlighted; but it's also great for partners, for ISVs and SIs, because it helps the best rise to the top. It helps the best innovate. And you know, it also, if you are the type of SIs or ISVs that are specialized in a particular place or industry, it helps you get access to customers where you might not get access before. So it's a real symbiotic thing when it's working really well, and nothing stands in the way, and there's no friction. And it's really just about sort of, you know, matchmaking. Like, you know, you're a cook. All your ingredients are great. You cook the best stuff. Everything, your oven works. Your waiters are awesome. I guess waiters would be sales in this analogy, right? Brian Walsh: 08:31 Yeah. Ron Huddleston: 08:32 Yeah. The waiters understand stuff. Brian Walsh: 08:35 Sales ops are your line chefs, right? Ron Huddleston: 08:37 Right, there you go. I'll work this analogy out at some point. I think it has legs. I'm thinking about it. Brian Walsh: 08:44 There's always an interesting thing, like if I compare where Microsoft has embraced their ecosystem, and I look at where Salesforce has, around capital efficiency, right? Because in the Salesforce world, there was almost no investment, outside of VC investment, almost no investment of, "Hey, let's invest in you to bring this product to market." Whereas we've seen, even on the Oracle and Microsoft side, lots of investment into ISVs to help them get started with an ecosystem. Ron Huddleston: 09:09 Yeah. I think Salesforce would argue, particularly back in the day when they were building it up, when we were building it up, where we didn't really have as much market presence. There are two things that companies can do to invest in you. They can certainly invest time or technology, but they can also -- I'm sorry, they can certainly invest money or technology, but they can also invest time and access. And at Salesforce, the way I pulled the AppExchange together was, you know, there were limitations around technology, and dollars, and investment dollars, which eventually got solved in one way, or shape, or form. But there was really very little limitation to time and access that could be provided. And so the big strength that Salesforce had at the time was, they were leading in the cloud. So they had, they were innovators, had access and had a sales organization. So a lot of the beginnings of that ecosystem were built around people receiving essentially go-to-market support, help, and guidance from Salesforce, in return for their technical investment in building something with Salesforce. And that was the trade-off that they made. Microsoft is a different beast, and they grew up through partners, and they always had partners. But they'd gotten to such a point where they were so dominant in the marketplace that they'd essentially become demand fulfillment. The partner channel was super optimized for really educated customers to come in and want to buy something. And they would go to very specific partners that would then fulfill that. And it was very educated demand fulfillment to a very educated market, which is entirely different than what we were setting up the One Commercial Partner team to do, which was to create demand. So, instead of having 1,000 points of connection with super-specialized partners, have partners that could show up in front of customers and say, "What problem do you have? What question do you have for my answers?" And then they could represent the full cadre of everything that Microsoft could do. You know, it's a huge technology portfolio. So they were just really limited historically because partners had to sort of pick their lane and stick with it. And so one of the things that's a great thing we did there, was break that down and only create very few lanes. So partners were expected to really lead the way and create demand. But in order to do that, we also had to change the finances. We had to change economics. We had to create a lot of incentives for the direct sales organization to work with them, which is a big part of it, too, because selling stuff, versus taking orders, is expensive. And so we had to make sure the partners could make money doing it. And so in that particular case, you know, the trade-off was, being able to represent Microsoft across the board is a tough thing to do, but if they'd invest their time, and energy, and attention, in learning how to sell and create demand, we made the economics work so that they could get a payback, which is a little different. It's almost the opposite of what Salesforce was doing. And so they're just very different situations. Brian Walsh: 12:29 Got it. Ron Huddleston: 12:30 But like I said, you know, you do this long enough, you've seen almost everything. Brian Walsh: 12:35 Well, let's actually study one more difference within that, which is you had a pure, cloud-based model. And then within Microsoft, you actually had this hybrid. You had cloud, right, like this emerging cloud ecosystem with Office 365 and Dynamics. You also had this gigantic on-prem, you know, basis of licenses. Is there a huge difference between those two types of ecosystems? Or are they basically the same? Ron Huddleston: 12:59 No. There really isn't. I mean, the economic models are different. But enough folks, I would say 8 years ago, 10 years ago -- God, 10 years ago, 15? I don't know ... Like 2008, 10 years ago, 2007, 2006, '07, '08, that's when the financial model differences, forget the technical differences, the relationship differences, the functional selling -- Brian Walsh: 13:24 Customer success, all that stuff. Ron Huddleston: 13:25 All that stuff, the actual financial models of how people expected to generate revenue and make a living, being a technology company or a consulting company, they were so different between cloud and on-prem that moving financial models was the primary thing holding people back from taking the step to the cloud. People liked the technology, but they couldn't take the jump. Like a lot of companies failed because they tried to put a foot in both camps, and you just couldn't. There's one financial model, on-prem, it's very short-term focused; one financial model, cloud, is very longterm focused. And if you're trying to serve both masters, you'll make bad, suboptimal decisions. And so I had a bunch of rules about the cloud. One of them was, you have to pick one or the other. You have to like, divest to one or the other. I think those days have changed, where even if people are doing a lot of on-prem stuff, like there's even the Microsoft SIs, or resellers, they've worked it out in such a way, through financing, through managed services, through something that they're emulating software as a service, financially. And so the technological flip is just a matter of time and opportunity. It wasn't a matter of this big burden, I'm sorry, barrier, an obstacle which is changing their whole financial model, which is really hard. I mean, I literally had sought out, the same way you guys were product development outsourcers, I'd sought out financial development outsourcers, as well, that helped to finance companies through the gap, like the two or three-year revenue gap when they make the transition, because the financial model transition was a lot harder than the technical transition, back in the day. Now, I don't think it's as hard. At Microsoft, it's, you know, some of the companies are so big, I think that the inertia is probably harder than the finances, you know? Just the daily grind, inertia of things makes things tough. Brian Walsh: 15:17 And I think some of your work in there really paid off; the Lighter Capital helping with MapAnything. Ron Huddleston: 15:22 Oh, yeah, I bet they made a crushing at that. Yeah. Brian Walsh: 15:26 Yeah. And now, I think Series D, and they're gigantic. Ron Huddleston: 15:29 Is Lighter Capital doing pretty well? I haven't talked to those guys in a while. Brian Walsh: 15:32 I think they're doing great. Ron Huddleston: 15:34 It's a great business model, I mean. Brian Walsh: 15:35 It is. Ron Huddleston: 15:35 Yeah. Brian Walsh: 15:36 It's interesting. They were so far ahead on that non-equity based funding for it. And now, I see Indie.vc. I see a lot of players coming in. Ron Huddleston: 15:44 Yeah. No, it's a good way to do it. Here at Twilio, there's so much. The funny thing is, it really feels a lot like the initial cloud, call it, revolution in 2007-08. Brian Walsh: 15:57 Yep. Ron Huddleston: 15:58 It's just in communications. And there's a lot of folks that are in the exact same spot; not that they're in financial, a big financial difference, model-wise. But telecommunications is like a different financial model, in a weird way. It's very like, usage oriented. It's got spikes. It's got a lot of weird things they're not used to, particularly if people are selling cloud seat kind of stuff. It's just a different sort of world for them. And a lot of folks don't have specialization in a lot of these things. And so, you know, building things like PDOs and financial development outsourcers are things that we're going to have to do here at Twilio as well, because there's thousands and thousands of ISVs and SIs that, whether they know it or not, are going to be using Twilio in the next couple years, because it just fits. Everybody who's moved to the cloud, there's probably an opportunity -- and touched a customer in some way, shape, or form -- there's an opportunity for them to work with Twilio. And you know, we've just got to make it easier. That was one of the things that, you were around at Salesforce when we did that, too. We just made it easier for people. Brian Walsh: 17:04 Totally. Well, let's jump into Twilio while we're here. You're assembling an amazing team. Ron Huddleston: 17:10 Yeah. They're good people. Brian Walsh: 17:11 It seems like you're applying all of your lessons from the past, you know, experiences building an ecosystem. How much do you have to continue to discover and invent? How much of this is just pulling out your playbook and running with it? Ron Huddleston: 17:24 You know, a lot of it is playbook stuff. I will say, the difference between communications technology, like it carries a lot of legacy with it. Like there is, you know, a whole lot of underlying technology that, if you're unfamiliar with it, which I am, you know, like the seven layers. That's just, there's a bunch of crazy stuff. Brian Walsh: 17:45 Yep. Ron Huddleston: 17:45 If you're unfamiliar with it, there's a lot going on there that has significant material impacts on business models that could work or couldn't work. So you bring the same playbook, and then you have this set of realities, constraints, and the technology as it exists, that then make things viable or not viable. And it is, you know, it's fundamentally a bit of a different thing, because it's a very API-forward company, which leads people down a lot of weird roads. Like what is an SI? What is an ISV? Which, by the way, we can get philosophical on this. Brian Walsh: 18:23 How do you differentiate? Ron Huddleston: 18:26 Like at Salesforce, people would just like get their heads wrapped around an axle, because you know, back in the day, when we were creating the partner program, I always tried to explain reselling, and OEMing, and trying to get like, I think, Veeva kept it on their first contract to sell Salesforce underneath their technology set. People were like, you know, "The technology is staying here. These are ours, it's in our -- this isn't the Salesforce," what do they call those things? I'm sorry. Do you remember those, at Salesforce, they have a name for the PODs that- Brian Walsh: 18:59 The ORGs? Ron Huddleston: 19:01 Not the ORGs, but whatever. It's Salesforce property. We're running it in our own data centers. Brian Walsh: 19:07 Right, in a POD. Ron Huddleston: 19:07 So how are you reselling anything? I'm like, "Well, it's, you know," even, and then licensing, which is just a human, you know, construct. It's not real. Like all these things, applying them to the cloud, it's semi-nonsensical, but it is a way to put these constructs together, and rules together, that help enable ecosystems to exist and thrive. There's something that they can sell, that they can put margin on, that they can build a business on. There's something that they can learn about, and then configure, and then leave with the customer. If you don't have the concepts of ownership, and passing ownership, and control, which don't make a lot of sense when you think about like a multi-tenant cloud, but if you don't have those things, you can't build businesses. And so, you know, a lot of it is building the faith that these human constructs exist, and that you can sell them, which for API companies, is a new thing. Like, I don't think AWS even does that yet. Brian Walsh: 19:59 No. But- Ron Huddleston: 20:00 It's weird, I know that I'm like waxing philosophical, but it is a- Brian Walsh: 20:03 But I mean, it all comes down to trust, right? Ron Huddleston: 20:06 Yeah. Brian Walsh: 20:07 You have to build trust with this partner that you will create these things, that you gave them your word, that they can actually invest millions of dollars to go forward with it. Ron Huddleston: 20:16 Yeah. Trust and credibility, in this space, is kind of what it's all about. And it's a thing about companies, too, is you know, they can, over time, their perspective on the importance of ecosystems and what the value is can change. But if you're leading up those ecosystem efforts, like you've got to try hard as hell to live up to the commitments, and consistencies, and visions that you put out there -- to the point where you're willing to sort of, you know, throw yourself in front of a train to make sure that like, you know, people don't change the philosophies you put in place, because people are betting their lives, their businesses, on what you're laying out as the vision and value of the partner program you're putting out there. And you're making these commitments, and anything that drives inconsistency, anything that's not committed, anything that violates trust in those things is a huge, huge problem. Like you know, you can spend years building up the trust that's required to build an ecosystem. And in one day, you can blow it. So that's, by far, the most important thing that you need people to understand who are setting up partner programs, or building teams, or you know, maybe looking to hire someone to build up their organization. Make sure that she or he, you know, the first thing out of their mouth needs to be like trust and consistency because without that, none of the rest of this really matters. Brian Walsh: 21:48 Yeah. And it's also, I think, the confidence that these larger organizations are actually going to stay in it, right? Ron Huddleston: 21:54 Yeah. Brian Walsh: 21:55 You know? This is not going to be a one-year test, then we're going away, because we're asking the likes of major companies to actually invest their future in this opportunity. Ron Huddleston: 22:04 Yeah. And you know, a lot of them don't take the jump and wait a year, wait two years, to see. I mean, the cloud took forever. It took four or five years for the bigger companies to jump. Brian Walsh: 22:15 Yep. Ron Huddleston: 22:15 But now, things are happening a lot faster. But there'll still be some companies that'll wait a year or two to jump. But you'll recall this, the ones that made it first in the cloud, the ones that were really successful were all the first ones, the people who moved fast. The consulting companies that moved fast, the ISVs that moved fast, the companies that jumped in there and took the risks were the ones that succeeded in the end. The ones that played on the sidelines, unless they were super dominant, they were playing catch-up, and still are. Brian Walsh: 22:44 And you watch the outcomes and success of those. ServiceMax, I mean, that was coming about when Service Cloud wasn't even fully baked, and almost a billion dollar exit. Veeva went public. DocuSign just went public. Ron Huddleston: 22:56 Yeah. Those were all the early ones, yeah. Brian Walsh: 22:58 Yep. They all came in. All right. So there is a PayPal Mafia: Peter Thiel, Elon Musk, Reid Hoffman. Ron Huddleston: 23:06 I don't know any of them very well. Brian Walsh: 23:08 Yeah, I know, but that's your social circle, I'm sure. You go surfing with them. I propose that there's actually an AppExchange Mafia as well now. We have you out there, Avanish at ServiceNow, Leyla took back over of the AppExchange, Todd Surdey is now at FinancialForce, Sean Hogan at Nintex, Brian Snyder at GE. That original crew, those people who were there on those early, Wild West days, are out there in the SaaS ecosystems. Ron Huddleston: 23:36 Yeah. Ross Eberhart's over here. Mike Rosenbaum's running product over there. Like, yeah, and a lot of trust amongst all those people. And we will, I'd love to work with any of those people. Avanish and I are always trying to figure out how we can do stuff. That's just a great group of people that, I think a lot of them learned a ton through that phase. There's even some folks that were from Oracle that are still in the Mafia, if you're going to call it that. Like, because Molly Bellero Fischer is still doing it. Ross is still doing it. Anders is still doing it. Ryan Begin's still doing it. Annie Heppberger, I think, runs partners now for Oracle. Brian Walsh: 24:23 Brent Floyd. Ron Huddleston: 24:24 Yeah. There's a lot going on; Kevin Walsh is still doing it. He's an Oracle person. Yeah. There are- Brian Walsh: 24:30 Joanne Pantuso is still doing it. Ron Huddleston: 24:32 That's right. Once you get a taste of working in ecosystems and partners, you don't really want to do other stuff, just because it's so fulfilling to help companies do something new, and grow, and to be part of their story. It's really fun. Like I said in the very beginning, in the opening when we were talking, if you could, you know, I had a lot of, I probably had 15 different jobs at Oracle. And this was by far the most fun. And I was a young man back then. And I had decided like, this is the thing I wanted to do. If I was going to work for somebody else, this is it, because there's no beating it. Like there's nothing, there's really not beating it once you get it going. That's why Twilio is so exciting, by the way. It's like the new Wild West. Brian Walsh: 25:13 Yep. Ron Huddleston: 25:13 It just reminds me of like the cloud. And a lot of those people are the same people, the Mafia you just mentioned, there's a lot of those same people that all recognize the same thing I do. Which means like, you're not running around saying, "Oh, trust me. This happened before." There's a bunch of people here that have lived it and are like, "Oh, my God. This is so interesting. It's exactly the same. And let's-" Brian Walsh: 25:34 We get to do it right the first time, this time. Ron Huddleston: 25:35 Yeah, yeah. Here's the thing -- we did it right before. I think I'd argue the Microsoft One Commercial Partner is set up the right way. We'll do it right here, it's just things are happening much faster. Instead of taking three or four years, it's happening in like 12 months. Brian Walsh: 25:52 Wow. Ron Huddleston: 25:53 It may be faster. It's crazy. Brian Walsh: 25:55 Well, and strategically, like technology-wise, adding in the whole serverless infrastructure, so you can host code now. You've got Flex, so you can start building out sort of UIs and the whole thing. Ron Huddleston: 26:05 Yeah, it has a face. Yep, that's a real thing. You'd be surprised how much having a face matters to LOB leaders, versus developers. Brian Walsh: 26:12 And I bet it also adds to some of the defensibility of it, right? Like, there's less attrition as you start adding even more and more layers, people can get deeper into your system, rather than just an API. Ron Huddleston: 26:23 Yeah. The thing about Flex, the most interesting part about Flex is the underlying technology. I don't want to give percentages, but I'd say a vast majority of the underlying technology has been around, you know, started 10 years ago, and it's been enhanced ever since. The moment that Flex came out, where it was a way to put a face, a UI, on what was possible in Twilio, the interest was a thousandfold, because it opened up people's minds to what Twilio was. Versus an API, which is a very difficult thing for non-developers to understand. You put a UI on it and explain what it is, you've just cracked open a huge market that should have been already there. It's just, people didn't understand what this, what Twilio could possibly do. And Flex wrapped that up nicely. Now the challenge is, when a platform, an API platform, which is a beautiful offering for SIs and ISVs, because it's like the cookbook that you need to do anything, which is just perfect for a partnering system. Brian Walsh: 27:21 And it's so damn easy to use at Twilio. Ron Huddleston: 27:23 Yeah. When you build an app, though, you, no matter what, unless you're picking exactly the right space, are probably going to bounce up into some elbows of people that have already built on your platform. And so, same problem at Salesforce, same problem at Microsoft, when you start expanding what you do and putting, you know, faces on things, and making new applications, like you mentioned Service Cloud and ServiceMax, that is a, you've got to tread very slowly, and know what you're doing, and make very considered decisions, because the chance that you are violating a commitment that you made to your ecosystem is probably very high. Now Twilio had never had a partner program, and really made a ton of commitments in that direction. But understanding the effects of things like this, and what's important, and what's not, is critical to our business going forward. And George and Jeff totally get it and understand. And so the idea of having governance, like a buy-build partner governance, and the impact that doing any of those actions, besides partner, if you buy or build, taking all that into consideration is one of the reasons why I feel really good about being here. Because they're super dead serious about it. And what they're focused on is, if they do buy or build, they're doing it underneath, like on the platform layer. Like even Flex, sure, it's a face. It's a UI. But if you really look at it, it's like an SDK for a UI. You know what I mean? It's not really a -- you could technically use it out of the box, but no one will. Brian Walsh: 29:02 Right. It's just the starting point. "Here, let me help you imagine this." Ron Huddleston: 29:06 Right, yeah. Brian Walsh: 29:08 That's fantastic. Well Ron, thank you very much for joining us. What's the best way, if somebody either wants to find a great job in an ecosystem, or they're looking to partner with Twilio, for them to get ahold of you and your team? Ron Huddleston: 29:20 If people want to do either of those things, the best way to get partnering going is to go online, and go to "become a partner," and go to the community. And then you'll get routed to like the person that you'll, you know, one of the 50-odd people that you'd be dealing with in to learn and become a partner. And there's people that are there just to quickly follow up and make sure you know how to do it and what's important. But if you're interested in getting a job, you can email me at rhuddleston@twilio.com, because we're hiring. We're going to hire another, you know -- lots. We're in super hiring phase right now. Brian Walsh: 29:59 Fantastic. Well, Ron, thank you very much for taking the time today, and glad we got this scheduled, and finally do it. Ron Huddleston: 30:04 Yeah, no. I'm very, very impressed by your fancy equipment and the level of professionalism in putting this podcast together. Brian Walsh: 30:11 Hey, look, I've grown up just as much as you have, okay? Ron Huddleston: 30:15 Yes, clearly you have. Brian Walsh: 30:18 All right, Ron. Thank you so much, everybody. Ron Huddleston: 30:20 All right. I'll see you around the water cooler. Bye. Outro: 30:22 Thanks for listening to this episode of the AppChat. Don't miss an episode. Visit AppChatPodcast.com, or subscribe on iTunes. Until next time, don't make success an accident.

Jon Prentice joined Lighter Capital in August 2014, where he supports company-wide customer acquisition efforts and strategic growth plans for the San Francisco Bay Area Market. Jon helps source and assess early stage technology startups and educates them on Lighter Capital's revenue-based financing model compared to traditional equity or debt financing. Prior to joining Lighter Capital, Jon worked for two years in the San Francisco Bay Area at Siemens AG's venturing units, including Siemens Technology to Business and Siemens Venture Capital. Working in various analyst capacities with a particular focus on energy & cleantech, Jon sourced early stage startups for investment and partnership, conducted market analysis as well as due diligence, and made strategic recommendations to the company's C-level executives. A proud Washington State native, Jon graduated cum laude from the University of Puget Sound in 2012 with a BA in Business and German International Affairs and was also a member of the college’s honors business program

On this edition of The Predictable Revenue Podcast, hosts Collin Stewart and Aaron Ross welcome Allen Johnson, Senior Managing Director of Seattle's Lighter Capital, for another live edition of The Predictable Revenue Podcast. Allen is a longtime sales and finance executive, having led large scale sales teams, as well as financial services firms. Throughout the pod, Collin, Aaron and Allen discuss how to best structure a key piece of every well-functioning sales organization: the qualifications process. Highlights include: Lighter Capital's levels of selling (11:47), how Lighter Capital built its sales process (18:17), the art of guiding a conversation (21:33), how Allen provides advice to his team (23:11), and managing the handoff (30:50).  

On this edition of The Predictable Revenue Podcast, hosts Collin Stewart and Aaron Ross welcome Allen Johnson, Senior Managing Director of Seattle's Lighter Capital, for another live edition of The Predictable Revenue Podcast. Allen is a longtime sales and finance executive, having led large scale sales teams, as well as financial services firms. Throughout the pod, Collin, Aaron and Allen discuss how to best structure a key piece of every well-functioning sales organization: the qualifications process. Highlights include: Lighter Capital's levels of selling (11:47), how Lighter Capital built its sales process (18:17), the art of guiding a conversation (21:33), how Allen provides advice to his team (23:11), and managing the handoff (30:50).  

BJ Lackland. He has spent over 15 years as an investor in startups. As an investor, he’s been in VC and Angel and is now the CEO of Lighter Capital, where he oversees over 200 alternative investments in early stage tech companies. As an executive, he’s been on the executive team of 3 companies including CFO of a public tech company called Power Efficiency Corp. He’s raised and uploaded over $150M worth of capital. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Crossing the Chasm What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — Cirrus How many hours of sleep do you get? — 4-5 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Just keep seeking”   Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:20 – Nathan introduces BJ to the show 02:05 – BJ was at VC in the early 2000s for 5 years and focused on energy technology 02:58 – Lighter Capital is a fintech company that revolutionized as a startup finance 03:06 – They are using technology to improve entrepreneurs’ access to capital 03:14 – Lighter Capital’s model 03:23 – An entrepreneur spends 8-10 hours with them before they write a check 03:30 – The revenue-based financing tends to be the best aspect of equity 03:58 – On average, Lighter Capital provides companies $250K and can go up to $2M 04:28 – Pay multiple is 1.5 to 2 times and paid typically over a 3 to 5-year period 04:53 – If the company grows quickly, they can pay in a shorter time period 05:00 – “We have every incentive of trying to help them grow” 05:07 – Lighter Capital is really betting on the entrepreneurs 05:20 – Lighter Capital has raised a total of $120M 05:23 – The initial fund was $20M 05:45 – Lighter Capital is raising from traditional LPs 06:44 – Lighter Capital makes money like a bank does 07:35 – Most lenders are worried about payment defaults 07:44 – Lighter Capital focuses on helping companies grow long-term 08:40 – Lighter Capital has a minimum threshold of $15K a month 08:55 – Lighter Capital looks into 2 different audiences 08:58 – One is their customers 09:01 – The other one is their capital partner 09:14 – Lighter Capital is funding 10-12 companies a month 09:40 – Lighter Capital has a group of 9 developers and data scientists 09:49 – Lighter Capital has 90% accuracy for predicting revenue 10:45 – Lighter Capital still goes through several different factors for approving a company 11:56 – In Episode 421, Nathan had Ceterus who worked with Lighter Capital 12:17 – The payment can or cannot accelerate depending on the company 12:44 – Companies can pay lighter capital earlier with a lesser amount 13:56 – Lighter Capital funded companies that are just by themselves 15:00 – Lighter Capital is also funding similar companies 15:36 – In Episode 542, Nathan had HipLead and on Episode 560, Badger Maps, and they both worked with Lighter Capital 17:34 – Lighter Capital worked with 101 companies last year 17:54 – Lighter Capital closed a lot of deals last Christmas 19:20 – The Famous Five   3 Key Points: Thousands of new businesses are coming out every month; having easy access to capital is a huge advantage for them. Predicting one company’s future revenue is beneficial, both for the investor and the company. Keep seeking, stay curious, and always find new things to learn about.   Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives

Welcome to Episode 243 of the Success in Business Podcast. We are here for you every Monday to teach you about success in business and today is no different. Today Tom has invited two guests to join the show. We … Continue reading →

Welcome to Episode 243 of the Success in Business Podcast. We are here for you every Monday to teach you about success in business and today is no different. Today Tom has invited two guests to join the show. We … Continue reading →

Welcome to Episode 242 of the Success in Business Podcast. We are here for you every Monday to teach you about success in business and today is no different. Today Tom has invited two guests to join the show. We … Continue reading →

Welcome to Episode 242 of the Success in Business Podcast. We are here for you every Monday to teach you about success in business and today is no different. Today Tom has invited two guests to join the show. We … Continue reading →

Welcome to Episode 241 of the Success in Business Podcast. We are here for you every Monday to teach you about success in business and today is no different. Today Tom has invited two guests to join the show. We … Continue reading →

Welcome to Episode 241 of the Success in Business Podcast. We are here for you every Monday to teach you about success in business and today is no different. Today Tom has invited two guests to join the show. We … Continue reading →

Steven Benson. The founder and CEO of Badger Maps – the number one sales app in the Apple app store which helps salespeople become more successful. Badger shows salespeople their customers and leads on the map and connects them with their calendar to build a daily route. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Tools of Titans What CEO do you follow? –  N/A Favorite online tool? — Baremetrics Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Steven wished he had known that he’d learn more working for small companies than big companies   Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:27 – Nathan introduces Steven to the show 02:00 – Badger Maps helps salespeople with their jobs 02:37 -  Badger Maps is a SaaS model 02:50 – Average customer pay per month is $35 02:58 – Badger Maps was founded in 2012 03:24 – Badger Maps has 3 co-founders 03:50 – Steven and the other co-founders didn’t really split the equity 04:00 – When splitting the equity, everyone gets a fair deal 04:44 – Steven shares what to consider in splitting equity 05:58 – Badger Maps has an accelerator clause 06:44 – First year revenue is $70K 07:10 – Number of current customers is 4K 07:40 – Apple ranked Badger Maps as #1 08:50 – There are Fortune 500 companies who use Badger Maps 09:01 – The number of customers is both team and individual sales reps 09:16 – Gross monthly customer churn is 3.3% 09:37 – The customers are finding Badger Maps through word of mouth, SEO, and SMM 10:08 – The amount Badger Maps is willing to spend to acquire new customers 10:46 – Badger Maps spent $12K on paid marketing 11:00 – Average CAC 11:24 – Google is around $300 12:06 – In San Francisco, people are spending 100% of LTV on acquisition 12:53 – Badger Maps is bootstrapped 13:03 – Badger Maps had a loan from Lighter Capital 13:45 – Steven shares how Lighter Capital makes loans for SaaS companies 14:10 – Steven is paying 22-28% for the amount they have loaned and there’s no personal guarantee 15:06 – Total revenue in 2016 is around $1.2M 15:20 – Revenue goal in 2017 is $4.5M 17:05 – The Famous Five   3 Key Points: Be fair and make sure it is a great deal for everyone when splitting equity. Getting a loan can also be a good option for SaaS companies. In San Francisco, people are spending 100% of LTV on acquisition.   Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox  – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives

Conor Lee, founder and CEO of HipLead. The company helps leading B2B companies scale their outbound sales with high quality lead generation outbound campaigns. Before founding HipLead, Conor founded several other companies including TellFi which was in the Y Combinator, Winter 2011 batch. Prior to that, he worked as a lobbyist in statewide political campaigns. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard Things What CEO do you follow? –  Elon Musk Favorite online tool? – Zapier Do you get 8 hours of sleep? – No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Conor wished he had spent more time in tech than in politics   Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:30 – Nathan introduces Conor to the show 02:07 – Conor shares what happened to TellFi 02:58 – Conor had a co-founder who wanted to keep it going 03:19 – Conor shares how the exit happened 04:10 – HipLead helps companies scale their outbound sales 04:35 – HipLead’s pricing 04:55 – Current number of customers is 30 05:18 – HipLead was launched in 2013 05:30 – Conor is the solo founder, but he had a co-founder for awhile 06:25 – Conor has the majority of the shares of the company 07:35 – Conor and Nathan discuss cap tables 08:00 – Conor hired a lawyer for his legal documents 08:17 – Use the startup attorneys 08:31 – HipLead is bootstrapped 08:50 – HipLead’s loan 09:20 – Conor shares why he got the loan 10:00 – Conor shares how the loan works 11:30 – The type of loan is only for specific companies 12:00 – The company name that provides the loan is Lighter Capital and it is based in Seattle 12:21 – Annual customer churn: less than 15% 12:58 – CAC 13:09 – Customer’s LTV 14:15 – First year revenue 15:40 – 2015 revenue: $900,000 15:50 – Current ARR 15:59 – Conor is also looking into raising capital 16:10 – Team size of 16 16:29 – Team location is in San Francisco and other remote locations 18:35 – The Famous Five   3 Key Points: We need to be more open about exits—there are times where you just have to pull the plug. If you need funds and do not want to share equity, try a bank loan. Make sure your legal documents are in order, especially in the case of a split from your co-founder.   Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox  – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives

Jacob Colker of Lighter Capital (https://www.lightercapital.com) discusses startup funding and how to minimize dilution through Lighter Capital's startup loans. Lighter does not take equity like traditional venture lenders and has minimal covenants compared to traditional startup bank loans.

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