Category Visionaries (Front Lines Media)

In today’s episode of Category Visionaries, we speak with Kelsey Bishop, Founder and CEO of Candor, a culture-building platform that's raised $5 Million in funding.

Topics discussed: 

• How her experience loving some teams she worked with, but not others, led Kelsey to start Candor
• Kelsey’s favorite founder, his success story, and why she admires him
• Building a platform that allows people to get to know colleagues on a personal level, and the one element that plays a big part in the success of Candor
• Using TikTok as a marketing tool, and why luck and timing play a big part in fundraising
• The importance of following your intuition rather than someone else’s advice

Favorite book:

The Alchemist: A Fable About Following Your Dream

In today’s episode of Category Visionaries, we speak to Zach Rash, CEO and Co-founder of Coco, a food delivery robot that's raised $60 Million in funding.

Topics discussed: 

• Zach’s background in mechanical engineering and wanting to build something for the physical world
• Why Sam Altman, Coco’s largest investor, is an inspiration for Zach
• Using tech and a remote work model to build a product that makes food delivery cheaper for merchants and buyers, and the ins and outs of Coco’s workings
• Regulatory headaches, why Coco doesn’t steal jobs from human food deliverers, and how it contributes to sustainability
• Dealing with competition, lessons learned from fundraising, and Zach’s view for the future of Coco

Favorite book:

Elon Musk: Tesla, SpaceX, and the Quest for a Fantastic Future

Welcome to another episode of Category Visionaries — the show that explores GTM stories from tech's most innovative B2B founders. In today's episode, we're speaking with David DeWolf, CEO & President of Knownwell, a commercial intelligence platform that's raised $2 Million in funding.

Here are the most interesting points from our conversation:

• Accidental Entrepreneur: David's journey began as a software engineer who accidentally transitioned into entrepreneurship, founding his first company, Three Pillar, which grew to 2,500 employees.
• Leadership Philosophy: David emphasizes the importance of genuinely caring for his team while making tough decisions, creating a balance that fosters loyalty and respect.
• Growth and Acquisition: David's approach to scaling Three Pillar involved six acquisitions, highlighting the strategic growth and integration of complementary businesses.
• AI and the Future: Fascinated by AI, David’s new venture, Knownwell, focuses on applying AI to improve business operations and commercial relationships, aiming to create an intelligent operating system for enterprises.
• Customer-Centric Development: David stresses the importance of genuine curiosity in customer conversations, using insights to guide product development and ensure alignment with market needs.
• Thought Leadership: Knownwell's launch included a podcast to establish thought leadership in enterprise AI adoption, emphasizing the importance of first-mover advantage in a new market category.

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Sponsors:

Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership.

www.FrontLines.io

The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe.

www.GlobalTalent.co

Welcome to another episode of Category Visionaries — the show that explores GTM stories from tech's most innovative B2B founders. In today's episode, we're speaking with David Campbell, CEO and Co-Founder of Tropic, a software procurement platform that's raised $68 Million in funding.

Here are the most interesting points from our conversation:

• Identifying a Market Need: David recognized a gap in the procurement space, where traditional methods were not designed for the rapidly growing software industry, leading to inefficiencies and high costs.
• War-Time CEO Mindset: Emphasizing the importance of quick decision-making and aggressive strategies in a competitive and challenging market environment.
• Avoiding Distractions: Maintaining focus on Tropic's product roadmap and vision, despite the influx of competitors and market noise.
• Branding Strategy: Intentionally creating a unique, consumer-friendly brand for an enterprise B2B product, breaking away from traditional, boring enterprise software branding.
• Open Source Marketplace: Creating a marketplace with zero commissions to build trust and align completely with buyer interests, even if it means forgoing potential revenue.
• Future Vision: Aiming to build an all-encompassing platform for unified spend management, leveraging a large first-party data asset to drive innovative products and deeper value for customers.

In today's episode of Category Visionaries, we speak with Ishita Arora, CEO and Founder Dayslice, a no-code storefront for services businesses that's raised $6 Million in funding.

Topics Discussed:

• Ishita’s education background in mathematics, but why she opted to join Dropbox instead of pursuing a PhD
• The benefits of Bay Area networking, but why you don’t have to be in silicon valley to build powerful connections
• Why service-centered businesses have specific needs in scheduling, marketing, and customer management insights
• The real-world pain points that prompted Ishita to launch DaySlice, from firms working with google sheets right up to 2020
• Comparing yourself with competitors, and how DaySlice’s bold statement strategy helps them build consumer confidence

Favorite book: 

Only the Paranoid Survive: How to Exploit the Crisis Points That Challenge

Welcome to another episode of Category Visionaries — the show that explores GTM stories from tech's most innovative B2B founders. In today's episode, we're speaking with John Li, CEO & Co-Founder at Vimcal, a calendar productivity tool that has raised $7 Million in funding.

Most interesting points from our conversation:

• Origins of Vimcal: Initially focused on augmented reality, John and his co-founder pivoted from their original concept to address the pressing needs they personally experienced with calendar management during fundraising periods.
• The Pivot to Calendar Productivity: The shift to developing Vimcal was sparked by the challenges of scheduling investor meetings efficiently without relying on impersonal booking links.
• Initial Product Traction: Despite its early bugs, Vimcal quickly gained traction within the founder community for its unique 'slots' feature, demonstrating the importance of solving a specific, relatable problem.
• Targeting Executive Assistants: Vimcal recognized executive assistants as a critical user base, leading to the development of specialized tools to streamline their heavy calendar management workload.
• Innovative Marketing Campaigns: The campaign featuring Sarah Rafferty from "Suits" illustrates Vimcal’s creative approach to engaging its target audience and increasing brand visibility.
• Future Goals: John envisions Vimcal becoming an essential tool within large organizations, leveraging its EA product to gain entry and expand throughout Fortune 500 companies.

Ledgebrook is transforming the commercial insurance industry with a technology-driven approach that prioritizes speed and service for wholesale brokers. With $50 million in funding, the company has rapidly scaled to a $100 million run rate in less than two years since writing its first policy. In this episode of Category Visionaries, I spoke with Gage Caligaris, CEO and Founder of Ledgebrook, about his journey from spending nearly a decade as an actuary at Liberty Mutual to launching an insurtech startup focused on making commercial insurance quoting faster and easier.

Topics Discussed:

• Ledgebrook's mission to bring faster quoting experiences to wholesale brokers
• The 14-month journey from founding to writing their first insurance policy
• Scaling from 30 to nearly 100 employees in just one year
• Reaching $100 million run rate within 19 months of their first policy
• The company's expansion strategy of rapidly launching new insurance products
• Building a distributed team culture that remains connected and engaged
• The E&S (Excess and Surplus) insurance market opportunity exceeding $100 billion

GTM Lessons For B2B Founders:

• Simplify your value proposition: Ledgebrook succeeded by focusing on two clear promises: being the fastest to quote and the easiest to do business with. Gage explained, "Fast and cheap is what they like. We'd prefer to be fast over cheap." B2B founders should identify the 1-2 most critical pain points in their industry and build their entire value proposition around solving them.
• Choose boots-on-ground engagement over flashy marketing: Despite their rapid growth, Ledgebrook has minimal formal marketing. Instead, their underwriters travel two weeks each month to visit brokers in person. "We're in our broker's offices... instead of a marketing campaign, it's a boots on the ground approach," Gage shared. For B2B startups, prioritizing direct customer engagement can be more effective than traditional marketing campaigns.
• Maintain consistent service delivery: Ledgebrook built their reputation by simply delivering on their promises consistently. "We kept showing up, right? We kept coming back with those fast quotes, we kept picking up the phone," noted Gage. B2B founders should recognize that reliability and consistency are powerful differentiators in markets where competitors often overpromise and underdeliver.
• Integrate customer-facing and technical teams: Ledgebrook has tech team members do regular "ride-alongs" with underwriters to see how their products are actually used. This collaboration ensures they build the right features and move faster. B2B founders should create structured opportunities for engineers and product teams to directly observe customer interactions.
• Leverage referral recruiting for growth: Ledgebrook has scaled their team primarily through employee referrals. Gage shared, "People are like, man, I'm having a blast here. Let me bring my friends." Creating a workplace where employees genuinely enjoy their work can transform your hiring process, especially when scaling rapidly.

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Sponsors:

Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership.

www.FrontLines.io

The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. 

www.GlobalTalent.co

Welcome to another episode of Category Visionaries — the show that explores GTM stories from tech's most innovative B2B founders. In today's episode, we're speaking with Rishabh Jain, CEO & Co-Founder of Fermàt, a content commerce platform that's raised over $12 Million in funding.

Here are the most interesting points from our conversation:

• From Ad Tech to Entrepreneurship: Rishabh shares his transition from being a VP of Innovation at Liveramp to founding Fermàt, driven by the changes in digital tracking announced by Apple.
• Innovative Product Offering: Fermàt allows commerce brands to create customizable stores for every piece of content they launch online, enhancing user experience and conversion rates.
• Target Customers: Fermàt primarily works with small to medium-sized D2C brands in categories like food and beverage, beauty, apparel, and home goods.
• Impressive Growth Metrics: Fermàt saw a significant inflection point in Q4 of last year, with a 125x growth in GMV in twelve weeks and rapid customer acquisition in subsequent quarters.
• Overcoming Market Challenges: Rishabh discusses the pressures faced by e-commerce brands today and his medium-term optimism driven by new AI tools.
• Exciting Future Developments: Rishabh teases new AI-powered features coming in May, allowing brands to create unique, engaging shopping experiences tailored to various themes and moods.

Silent Push is revolutionizing threat intelligence by tracking threat actors' infrastructure setup before attacks occur. After selling his first cybersecurity company to FireEye and serving as VP of Products there, Ken Bagnall launched Silent Push to address fundamental gaps in how organizations detect and prevent cyber threats. The company has achieved remarkable traction, securing 50% of global Fortune 50 companies as customers within 18 months of launch.

Topics Discussed:

• Evolution from traditional threat intelligence to proactive infrastructure monitoring
• Building a complex data collection and behavioral analytics platform
• Strategic focus on enterprise customers versus SMB market
• Leveraging research and expertise to drive brand awareness
• Balancing free community tools with enterprise sales motion
• Geographic expansion challenges and opportunities

GTM Lessons For B2B Founders: 

1. Focus on markets that appreciate technical depth: Ken's first company struggled selling sophisticated email security through MSPs to SMBs who couldn't appreciate the technical value. After being acquired by FireEye, they discovered enterprise customers who deeply understood and valued their capabilities. This taught them to focus Silent Push exclusively on enterprise customers who can recognize and properly value technical innovation.
2. "Shout loudly in a small room": Silent Push's early GTM strategy focused on penetrating tight-knit threat intelligence communities within industry verticals. By establishing themselves as experts in these concentrated groups and consistently sharing valuable insights, they built strong brand awareness among their exact target customers. The strategy proved highly effective, helping them land major enterprise accounts quickly.
3. Build the right kind of community product: While many security companies struggle with free products, Silent Push succeeded by requiring user authentication, monitoring usage patterns to identify sophisticated users, and actively nurturing promising accounts. Ken emphasized that it's not purely product-led growth, but a "weird hybrid" approach tailored to their market position.
4. Leverage research strategically: Rather than joining the "echo chamber" of threat research, Silent Push focuses on uncovering and publishing novel findings that demonstrate their unique capabilities. This approach not only builds credibility but creates content that can be monetized across multiple customer segments affected by the same threats.
5. Take the right path to the CISO: Instead of pitching CISOs directly, Silent Push targets threat intelligence teams who can validate their technology hands-on and become strong internal champions. This circumvents initial skepticism about threat intelligence products at the CISO level by letting the technology prove itself first.

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Sponsors:

Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership.

www.FrontLines.io

The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. 

www.GlobalTalent.co

Welcome to another episode of Category Visionaries — the show that delves into GTM stories from tech's most innovative B2B founders. In today's episode, we're speaking with Kevin Flyangolts, CEO & Founder of Aclid, a biosecurity platform that has raised over $4 Million in funding. 

Here are the most interesting points from our conversation:

• The Genesis of Aclid: Kevin's transition from the tech industry to the biotech sphere was driven by his fascination with synthetic biology — the ability to program biology much like computer software, but with life-altering implications.
• Aclid's Mission: Focused on DNA and RNA manufacturing, Aclid addresses the astonishing ease of accessing potentially dangerous biological materials online by automating the end-to-end biosecurity process for manufacturers, ensuring safety and compliance without the manual hassle.
• The Collaborative Foundation: Kevin's partnership with Professor Harris Wong, a notable figure in systems biology, blends deep scientific knowledge with operational expertise, highlighting the importance of complementary skill sets in founding a biotech startup.
• Explaining Synthetic Biology: Kevin demystifies synthetic biology by comparing it to programming, where instead of creating software, you're creating new forms of life with practical applications, from medicine to materials.
• The Early Days: Aclid's initial strategy involved extensive conversations with manufacturers to identify pain points in biosecurity, leading to the development of their first prototype aimed at automating and streamlining the compliance process.
• The Importance of Security in Synthetic Biology: With the landscape of synthetic biology expanding, Kevin emphasizes the need for a proactive approach to security, likening the future of biosecurity infrastructure to the financial industry's automated security measures.

In a recent episode of Category Visionaries, I sat down with Steffen Vollert, Co-Founder and Interim CEO of Volt, to explore their journey building a global real-time payment network. With over $87 Million in funding, Volt has evolved from a European open banking solution to a worldwide payment infrastructure platform, connecting major payment systems like Pix in Brazil and PayTo in Australia. Beyond his role at Volt, Steffen shared an unexpected side venture - a vintage tractor restoration business that provides a therapeutic counterbalance to the digital world of fintech.

Topics Discussed:

• Evolution from European open banking to global real-time payments
• The transition through different leadership roles (CTO, COO, CEO)
• Early product market fit challenges and iterations
• Strategic focus on PSPs and enterprise customers
• The impact of COVID on early company formation
• Building marketing and sales teams in fintech
• Fundraising journey through multiple rounds
• Organizational scaling beyond 150 employees

GTM Lessons For B2B Founders:

• Speed to MVP Beats Infrastructure: Volt launched their initial prototype in just six months, compared to the industry standard of 2-3 years. Steffen explained, "We really focused on what is the fastest path to deliver something that has enough value for a merchants who actually put us on their checkout as a payment option." B2B founders should prioritize delivering core value quickly over building perfect infrastructure.
• Vertical Focus Drives Team Success: The team discovered that sales and marketing professionals in payments are highly specialized by vertical. Steffen noted, "Many salespeople in the industry are so specialized, they really join companies with a focus for their vertical where they have their network." B2B founders should commit to specific verticals long-term to attract and retain top talent.
• Product Market Fit is Continuous: Rather than a single moment, Volt experienced multiple "false" product market fits before achieving true traction. Steffen shared, "Every product advantage nowadays is temporary. You always need to be fast, you always need to be scrappy, you always need to think ahead." B2B founders should view product market fit as an ongoing process rather than a destination.
• Strategic Channel Selection: Volt deliberately chose to focus on large PSPs as distribution partners rather than pursuing SMEs directly. Steffen explained, "We really want to focus our resources on where we can move the needle for our revenue impact." B2B founders should evaluate distribution channels based on internal efficiency and resource constraints.
• Investment Partner Alignment: During fundraising, Volt prioritized investors who deeply understood their space over pure capital. Steffen emphasized, "For us it was much more important than the money itself... having partners on the other side to understand what we build, why we build it, why it's tough, why it's not going to be a straight line." B2B founders should seek investors who truly understand their market dynamics and challenges.

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Sponsors:

Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership.

www.FrontLines.io

The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. 

www.GlobalTalent.co

Welcome to another episode of Category Visionaries — the show that explores GTM stories from the tech's most innovative B2B founders. In today's episode, we're speaking with Vinoth Chandar, founder of Onehouse, a cloud-native data Lakehouse solution that has raised $33 Million in funding.

Here are the most interesting points from our conversation:

• Vinoth's Rich Background: Vinoth has a deep technical background in database and distributed systems engineering, with significant stints at Oracle, LinkedIn, Uber, and Confluent before founding Onehouse.
• Innovating at Uber: Vinoth was part of the team at Uber that built the world's first Data Lakehouse in 2016, a precursor to the modern data Lakehouse concept, showcasing his pioneering work in data management.
• Lessons from Uber's Turbulent Times: Vinoth's time at Uber during its most tumultuous periods taught him resilience and the importance of a positive product impact, underscoring the critical role of culture and team dynamics in navigating challenges.
• Admiration for Linus Torvalds: Vinoth admires Linus Torvalds for demonstrating how open-source software can create immense value over time, reflecting on the transformative power of collaborative software development.
• Influential Reads: Books like "The Journey is the Reward," a biography of Steve Jobs, and "Crossing the Chasm" have profoundly impacted Vinoth, offering insights into market innovation and the importance of category creation.
• Onehouse's Mission: Onehouse aims to revolutionize data management with its faster, better, and cheaper cloud data infrastructure, leveraging Apache Hoodie to enable efficient data processing and management.
• Navigating Product Market Fit: Identifying and refining Onehouse's customer profile and value proposition in a crowded and noisy market has been a significant challenge, with open-source community engagement playing a crucial role in building credibility and trust.
• Future Vision: Vinoth envisions Onehouse completing its product story to bring an interoperable cloud data plane to life, focusing on managing and transforming data effectively for businesses.

Vectara is pioneering the field of Retrieval Augmented Generation (RAG), addressing the critical challenge of hallucinations in AI systems. With over $53 million in funding, Vectara has positioned itself as the go-to platform for enterprises seeking to combat "RAG sprawl" while building AI assistants and agents that are accurate, secure, and explainable. In this episode of Category Visionaries, I sat down with Amr Awadallah, CEO and Founder of Vectara, to explore his journey from Egyptian immigrant to serial entrepreneur and his vision for creating AI systems that enterprises can truly trust.

Topics Discussed:

• Amr's journey from Egypt to Stanford in 1995 and how it transformed his career aspirations
• The entrepreneurial "infection" at Stanford that led Amr away from academia
• Founding and selling his first startup, Activia, to Yahoo in just one year
• The comparison of creating successful companies to the joy of having children
• How Vectara addresses the critical problem of hallucinations in large language models
• The concept of "RAG sprawl" and why enterprises need centralized governance
• Amr's framework for evaluating startup opportunities: technological inflection points, real problems, and great teams
• Why this AI revolution is a bigger technological inflection point than the internet or big data

GTM Lessons For B2B Founders:

• Focus on your unique value proposition: Amr emphasized the importance of standing out in a crowded market by focusing on what makes you unique. Vectara doubled down on accuracy and hallucination detection, becoming known as the company to combat AI hallucinations. B2B founders should identify what they can be known for that differentiates them from competitors.
• Choose your go-to-market strategy deliberately: When deciding between product-led growth or enterprise sales, commit fully to the approach that fits your business. For enterprise sales, implement account-based marketing focused on your ideal customer profile, host targeted field events, and use strategic dinners with compelling speakers to attract key prospects.
• Don't try to boil the ocean: The number one reason companies fail after team issues is lack of focus. Early-stage founders should maintain agility to test different approaches but quickly narrow focus based on where they're getting traction. Treat use cases as "two-way doors" - try them, keep what works, and move on from what doesn't.
• Build for the coming AI agent revolution: Amr predicts we'll move from the current "AI assistant phase" (requiring human oversight) to the "AI agent phase" (fully autonomous AI) within one year. B2B founders should position their products for this transition, particularly focusing on accuracy and trust as critical requirements for enterprise adoption.
• Leverage technological inflection points: Major technological shifts create gaps that allow startups to disrupt established players. Amr has built companies around three major inflection points: the internet (Activia), big data (Cloudera), and now large language models (Vectara). B2B founders should identify inflection points relevant to their industry and build solutions that capitalize on the new opportunities they create.

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Sponsors:

Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership.

www.FrontLines.io

The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. 

www.GlobalTalent.co

Welcome to another episode of Category Visionaries — the show that explores GTM stories from tech's most innovative B2B founders. In today’s episode, we’re speaking with Mark Lehmkuhle, CEO & Founder of Epitel, a brain health technology platform that has raised over $20 Million in funding.

Here are the most interesting points from our conversation:

• Simplifying EEG Monitoring: Epitel has developed a wearable EEG sensor that makes brainwave monitoring easier for patients. Unlike traditional EEGs, which require extensive equipment and specialist interpretation, Epitel’s sensor offers a streamlined approach to detecting central nervous system disorders, especially seizures.
• Seizures vs. Epilepsy: While seizures are common, with 1 in 10 people experiencing one in their lifetime, not all seizures indicate epilepsy. Epitel focuses on seizure detection, addressing a broader spectrum of neurological conditions, not just epilepsy.
• Bootstrapping and Perseverance: Mark shared how the company started in 2008 with a small team and minimal resources, operating out of an artist colony with limited heating and air conditioning. The journey took years of grant funding and regulatory hurdles before reaching commercialization.
• Regulatory Pathway: Despite being a medical device, Epitel’s technology sits on the lower end of the FDA's regulatory spectrum, allowing them to move relatively quickly compared to more complex devices. They achieved FDA clearance with non-dilutive funding, a strategic milestone that paved the way for institutional investment.
• Data Collection Challenges: To train their AI, Epitel had to develop their own clean EEG dataset because hospitals typically delete such data post-diagnosis. This created a significant technical hurdle but also underscored the uniqueness of their solution.
• Future Vision: Mark envisions Epitel expanding beyond seizure monitoring into broader brain health applications. Long-term goals include creating a system for continuous brain health tracking, similar to continuous glucose monitors, potentially detecting early signs of conditions like Alzheimer’s or even alerting to stroke risks.

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Sponsors:

Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership.

www.FrontLines.io

The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. 

www.GlobalTalent.co

In today's episode of Category Visionaries, we speak with David Berry, CEO and Founder of Valo, an AI for drug discovery and development company that's raised over $500 Million in funding.

Topics Discussed:

• David’s background in the healthcare space, and how getting bitten by the entrepreneurial bug led him away from a career in medicine
• Valo’s mission and their unique approach to developing new generations of drugs
• The immense cost and poor efficiency associated with the traditional approach to developing and discovering new medicine
• How data integration and AI technologies have supercharged the drug development process, and the prospects for innovation in the year to come
• Regulatory considerations and building a working relationship with the FDA
• Starting a unicorn company, and the challenges and responsibilities that come with it

Favorite book: 

• My Years with General Motors
• Leaders Eat Last

In today's episode of Category Visionaries, we speak with Philippe Petitpont, CEO and Co-Founder of NewsBridge, a cloud media hub platform that's raised €12.5 Million in funding.

Topics Discussed:

• Phillippe’s career background, and the unorthodox journey that took him from rocket engineering to management of media content
• An overview of NewsBridge’s cloud media hub platform, and its relevance for an industry already saturated with content
• Running a company across different continents and timezones, and how to make the new way of working work for you
• How NewsBridge overcame initial resistance from journalists to the introduction of AI technology in media
• A new media future of automatic video storytelling empowering creators across a whole range of platforms

Favorite book: 

Turn the Ship Around!: A True Story of Turning Followers into Leaders

In today's episode of Category Visionaries, we speak with Omer Glass, Co-Founder and CEO of GrowthSpace, a skill mastery platform that has raised $44 Million in funding.

Topics Discussed:

• Omer’s background in Behavioural Economics, his first (failed) startup and the lessons he learned about B2B and B2C
• What creating a “culture of excellence” in an enterprise means in practical terms
• How GrowthSpace contributes to human-to-human development within companies by using data to understand pain points
• What sets GrowthSpace apart from competitors
• The advice Omer would give his past self about fundraising

Favorite book: 

Free Prize Inside: How to Make a Purple Cow

Welcome to another episode of Category Visionaries — the show that explores GTM stories from tech's most innovative B2B founders. In today's episode, we're speaking with Senan Ebrahim, CEO & Founder of Delfina, an intelligent pregnancy care platform that's raised over $10 Million in funding.

Here are the most interesting points from our conversation:

• Inception of Delfina: Senan was inspired to create Delfina after witnessing a preventable stillbirth during his time as an MD PhD student at Harvard, leading to his focus on using AI to predict and prevent pregnancy complications.
• Personal Motivation: A personal emergency involving his wife’s pregnancy highlighted the inadequacies in maternal health care, driving Senan’s commitment to improving the system.
• Maternal Health Crisis: The US maternal health crisis is exacerbated by a reactive, profit-driven healthcare system, with particularly poor outcomes for marginalized groups such as Black and Native women.
• Predictive Technology: Delfina's AI-powered platform can predict complications as early as 12-14 weeks into pregnancy, providing crucial insights to OB-GYNs and midwives.
• Founding Journey: The first 90 days involved building the initial AI models and recruiting key team members, including his brother Ali as CTO and Priyanka Badia for product development.
• Early Adoption and Validation: Delfina spent two years clinically validating their models with partners like Mayo Clinic before securing early customers, highlighting the importance of scientific validation in healthcare.

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Sponsors:

Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership.

www.FrontLines.io

The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. 

www.GlobalTalent.co

Welcome to another episode of Category Visionaries — the show that explores GTM stories from tech's most innovative B2B founders. In today's episode, we're speaking with Dan Beck, CEO & Co-Founder of 401GO, a retirement benefits platform that's raised over $14 Million in funding.

Here are the most interesting points from our conversation:

• Diverse Entrepreneurial Background: Dan has a history of starting and exiting various businesses, ranging from consumer products to consultancy in China, and even a food truck.
• Motivation for 401GO: Inspired by a personal finance class in college, Dan's goal was to make retirement savings accessible and easy for small businesses after struggling to set up a 401K for his employees.
• Simplifying Complexity: 401GO focuses on reducing the complexity and cost traditionally associated with setting up 401Ks, allowing small businesses to set up a retirement plan in just 10-15 minutes.
• Advisor-Centric Platform: The decision to build a platform that integrates financial advisors was crucial, providing both high-tech and high-touch service to clients.
• Regulatory Tailwinds: State mandates requiring small businesses to offer retirement benefits have increased demand, positioning 401GO to capitalize on this growing market.
• Sustainable Growth: 401GO has experienced consistent month-over-month growth of 8-10%, with a strong focus on partnerships with financial advisors and payroll companies driving this success.

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Sponsors:

Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership.

www.FrontLines.io

The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe.

www.GlobalTalent.co

In today's episode of Category Visionaries, we speak with Beck Besecker, CEO and Founder of Marxent, a 3D product experience platform that's raised over $44 Million in funding.

Topics Discussed:

• Beck’s background in finance, tech and marketing, and being a lifelong entrepreneur alongside his brother Barry
• Why the entrepreneur who most inspires Beck is his own father, and the time Beck met Neil Armstrong without knowing who he was
• Why it’s hard for people to make the right choices when buying parts of their homes like a kitchen, bath or decking project
• How Marxent uses AI to allow people to create 3D models that help them choose the right configurable parts for their home
• Building the “3D commerce” category, and what Beck has learned from fundraising

Welcome to another episode of Category Visionaries — the show that explores GTM stories from tech's most innovative B2B founders. In today's episode, we're speaking with Ilya Preston, CEO & Co-Founder of Paxafe, a decision intelligence platform for temperature-controlled logistics that has raised $14 Million in funding.

Here are the most interesting points from our conversation:

• Founding Paxafe: Paxafe was founded in 2018 to address inefficiencies in temperature-controlled logistics. Initially, the company offered IoT devices for real-time location tracking, but they eventually pivoted to focus on decision intelligence, optimizing cold chain processes.
• From Sensors to Intelligence: While sensors and IoT devices have helped track goods, the real issue remains in converting that data into actionable insights. Paxafe’s platform helps companies reduce waste and improve decision-making by offering a more comprehensive approach to supply chain management.
• Market Evolution: Paxafe transitioned from being categorized as a risk management platform to focusing on decision intelligence. Unlike competitors optimizing for black swan events, Paxafe's value lies in improving day-to-day decision-making, such as routing optimization and carrier selection.
• Building the GTM Function: Paxafe didn't set up a formal marketing function until after closing their Series A. Since then, they have focused on standing up inbound and outbound processes, showing how GTM can rapidly accelerate growth when implemented strategically.
• Effective Marketing Strategies: Conferences have been a high ROI channel for Paxafe, allowing them to engage with cross-functional teams. Consistent and high-quality content creation has also proven to be a key driver for pipeline expansion.
• The Importance of Clear Fundraising Processes: Ilya emphasized the importance of running a tight fundraising process with clear communication, goals, and timelines. Early on, he learned the importance of being explicit about whether you’re fundraising during investor meetings to avoid confusion later.

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Sponsors:

Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership.

www.FrontLines.io

The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. 

www.GlobalTalent.co

Welcome to another episode of Category Visionaries — the show that explores GTM stories from tech's most innovative B2B founders. In today's episode, we're speaking with Siadhal Magos, CEO & Co-Founder of Metaview, an AI assistant for hiring that has raised over $14 Million in funding.

Here are the most interesting points from our conversation:

• Founding Insight: Siadhal and his co-founders recognized that crucial hiring data was locked in interview conversations, leading them to create Metaview to capture and analyze this data for better hiring decisions.
• Evolving the Solution: Although the problem has remained consistent since 2018, advances in AI and LLMs have significantly enhanced Metaview’s ability to provide actionable insights from interview data, making the product more valuable.
• Challenges in Adoption: While the product concept is widely accepted, adoption can be slowed by multi-stakeholder sales processes and competing internal priorities within target organizations.
• Bottoms-Up Go-To-Market Strategy: Metaview’s initial focus was on tech companies similar to those the founders had worked at. As the product evolved, the target market broadened, allowing for a bottoms-up approach that leverages direct end-user engagement.
• Founder-Led Marketing: Siadhal attributes the success of their marketing efforts, particularly on social media, to authentic and knowledgeable communication directly from the founder, focusing on topics where he holds true expertise.
• Creating a New Line Item: Metaview often requires customers to create a new software line item in their budgets, which is justified by the product’s significant ROI—saving recruiters six to ten hours per week.

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Sponsors:

Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership.

www.FrontLines.io

The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. 

www.GlobalTalent.co

Welcome to another episode of Category Visionaries — the show that explores GTM stories from tech's most innovative B2B founders. In today's episode, we're speaking with Mousa Yassin, CEO & Founder of Pixaera, an immersive learning platform that has raised $5.7 million in funding.

Here are the most interesting points from the conversation:

• Pixaera's Mission: Pixaera bridges the gap between gaming and enterprise learning, leveraging high-fidelity 3D gamified experiences to revolutionize traditional training methods.
• Value of Gaming in Learning: Mousa highlighted how his gaming experience, particularly in World of Warcraft, equipped him with leadership, critical thinking, and problem-solving skills applicable in the enterprise world.
• Safety Training Focus: Pixaera focuses on safety training due to its high stakes and regulatory importance, transforming traditional methods with immersive, engaging experiences that dramatically improve retention rates.
• State of VR and Adoption: While VR technology is still evolving, Pixaera's platform works across various devices, with the majority of users starting on computers. VR usage is growing, supported by affordable and advanced headsets like the Quest 2.
• Effective Learning Metrics: Pixaera measures success through engagement and retention rates, showing significantly higher results compared to traditional video-based training, proving the efficacy of their immersive approach.
• Market Penetration Strategy: By initially targeting large enterprises like BP and Shell, Pixaera established credibility and set a benchmark in the industry, facilitating wider market adoption.

Welcome to another episode of Category Visionaries — the show that explores GTM stories from tech's most innovative B2B founders. In today's episode, we're speaking with Zack Rosenberg, CEO & Founder at Qortex, an intelligent video analytics platform that has raised $11 Million in funding.

Here are the most interesting points from our conversation:

• Early Industry Insights: Zack reflects on his early career at BuzzFeed, where he was among the first employees. His experiences there provided him with a foundational understanding of content virality and digital marketing strategies that have influenced his entrepreneurial journey.
• Entrepreneurial Lineage: Zack credits his entrepreneurial spirit to his parents, both entrepreneurs themselves, emphasizing the profound impact of their resilience and work-life balance on his career and personal life.
• Product Development Journey: He discusses the evolution of Qortex, initially starting with different aims and gradually pivoting towards video analytics driven by market needs and opportunities, highlighting the importance of adaptability in startups.
• The Challenge of Positioning: Zack talks about the crucial role of positioning in the marketplace and how subtle tweaks in positioning can significantly impact customer perception and product uptake.
• Building a Culture of Curiosity: At Qortex, fostering a culture of curiosity is key. Zack details how the company encourages this through various initiatives like guest speakers, dream meetings, and a company-wide book club to stimulate creative thinking and problem-solving.
• Future Vision for Media: Looking forward, Zack envisions a transformation in how video content is consumed and monetized, predicting a shift towards more personalized and non-intrusive advertising experiences based on content relevance rather than traditional demographic targeting.

Definity is pioneering a new approach to data pipeline observability and optimization specifically designed for the Lakehouse and Spark ecosystem. With $4.5 million in funding, this startup aims to transform how enterprises manage their data pipelines by providing real-time observability from within the pipelines themselves. In a recent episode of Category Visionaries, I spoke with Roy Daniel, CEO and Co-Founder of Definity, about the company's journey from addressing his team's own data reliability challenges to creating a solution for enterprise teams managing mission-critical data pipelines at scale.

Topics Discussed:

• Definity's full-stack data observability solution designed specifically for the Lakehouse and Spark ecosystem
• How the product works inside data pipelines to provide real-time visibility on data quality, pipeline health, and performance
• The founding story rooted in the team's experience with data pipeline reliability challenges
• The gap in the market between application performance monitoring and data quality solutions
• Definity's "inside-out" approach versus traditional "outside-in" data monitoring
• How the company approaches marketing to enterprise customers while enabling engineers to experience the product
• Fundraising during the challenging market conditions of late 2023

GTM Lessons For B2B Founders:

• Build solutions for problems you've experienced firsthand: Roy and his co-founders created Definity to solve challenges they faced in their own careers. "We started by building the solution we always wanted to have," Roy explains. This authentic connection to the problem space enabled them to develop a product that resonates with users facing similar challenges.
• Position at the intersection of established categories: Definity identified that data engineering was about a decade behind software engineering in terms of observability tools. By taking elements from existing categories (data quality and application performance monitoring) but applying them with a completely new approach, they created a distinctive value proposition that stands out in a crowded market.
• Focus on high-value use cases and segments first: Rather than taking a broad approach, Definity targets "the tip of the sphere" - enterprise teams working with high-scale, mission-critical data pipelines. Roy notes, "We cater to teams that work at very high scale in terms of their data operation... feeding into ML models, feature stores, regulatory reporting, customer reporting."
• Deliver tangible value to cut through market noise: In a space filled with buzzwords, Definity focuses on demonstrating practical value. "To rise above it, you really need to deliver a unique approach," says Roy. The company launched a free assessment tool that helps teams evaluate the health and cost of their platforms, providing immediate value while showcasing their differentiated approach.
• Find investors who deeply understand your problem space: Roy emphasized that securing funding during the challenging 2023 market required connecting with investors who understood "the pain points of the customer with second and third degree and not just at the surface level." The right investors could appreciate the nuanced innovation they were bringing to market.

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Sponsors:

Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership.

www.FrontLines.io

The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. 

www.GlobalTalent.co

Landbase is pioneering a new approach to go-to-market automation, using agentic AI to help businesses generate leads that convert. With $12.5 million in seed funding, Landbase is automating the mundane aspects of sales and marketing while leveraging machine intelligence to recommend high-converting campaign strategies. 

In this episode of Category Visionaries, I spoke with Daniel Saks, CEO and Co-Founder of Landbase, about his journey from building the unicorn AppDirect to his latest venture. Daniel shared his vision for creating software that works for you, not the other way around, and how AI-powered tools can help reclaim your day by turning months-long campaign processes into minutes.

Topics Discussed:

• Landbase's mission to solve the challenge of generating leads that convert
• Using agentic AI to create go-to-market campaigns with high conversion potential
• The transition from months to minutes for launching marketing campaigns
• Daniel's journey building AppDirect into a unicorn and his decision to start Landbase
• The shifting landscape of B2B technology from on-prem to SaaS to AI
• Finding motivation beyond material success and focusing on mission-driven work
• Landbase's three core OKRs: faster, cheaper, better
• How AI can harness data to enhance human performance, not replace humans
• Building "GTM1 Omni," Landbase's domain-specific model for go-to-market insights
• The concept of "digital trust" and its importance in modern marketing efforts

GTM Lessons For B2B Founders:

• AI should augment humans, not replace them: Daniel emphasizes that AI's role is to "automate the mundane so humans can do more human things." The most effective AI implementation preserves human agency while enhancing performance through machine intelligence.
• Focus on micro-ICPs for higher conversion: Landbase's data shows that targeting micro-ICPs (Ideal Customer Profiles) or niche audiences with specific problems can yield dramatically higher engagement rates—sometimes up to 90% email open rates compared to 1% for broader approaches.
• Opportunity in underdigitized industries: Traditional businesses like tool and die manufacturing, landscaping, or mining represent untapped markets for digital solutions. Being the first to create content for these niches can give you a significant advantage.
• Digital trust is the new currency: Building trust through your digital presence is critical. This includes having relevant case studies (video performs better than text), third-party ratings and reviews, credible authorities discussing your brand, and strong domain authority through proper backlinks.
• The Y Combinator playbook is outdated: Daniel argues that the traditional lean startup methodology of building a point solution around a defined customer market doesn't work in today's AI landscape. Creating a sustainable moat requires thinking differently and taking greater risks.

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Sponsors:

Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership.

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The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. 

www.GlobalTalent.co

Welcome to another episode of Category Visionaries — the show that explores GTM stories from tech's most innovative B2B founders. In today's episode, we're speaking with Mukund Karanjikar, CEO at CleanJoule, a sustainable aviation fuel producer that has raised $55 Million in funding.

Here are the most interesting points from our conversation:

• $55 Million in Funding: CleanJoule has successfully raised $55 million, including a strategic investment from Asia, bolstering their efforts in sustainable aviation fuel development.
• Sustainable Aviation Focus: Mukund emphasizes the importance of sustainable aviation fuel as a critical component in reducing the carbon footprint of the aviation industry.
• Development and Production Capabilities: CleanJoule is not only focused on developing sustainable aviation fuels but also on producing them, positioning itself as a key player in this emerging market.
• Strategic Investor Relations: The late addition of a strategic investor highlights the ongoing interest and potential in the sustainable aviation sector, especially from international markets.
• Market Positioning: By branding themselves as both a developer and producer of sustainable aviation fuel, CleanJoule is differentiating itself from competitors who may only focus on one aspect of the supply chain.
• Importance of Every Dollar: Mukund underlines the significance of every dollar raised, reflecting the high stakes and capital intensity of scaling in the clean energy sector.

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Sponsors:

Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership.

www.FrontLines.io

The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. 

www.GlobalTalent.co

In today's episode of Category Visionaries, we speak with Ben Borodach, CEO and Co-Founder of April, an embedded tax solution that's raised $40 Million in funding.

Topics Discussed: 

• Ben’s background in fintech and cybersecurity, starting his first company when he was at NYU, and working at Deloitte
• Founders who inspire Ben
• How April offers taxpayers an embedded service that helps them leverage their taxes to have better financial outcomes
• The current state of the market April operates in, and Ben’s view for the future of the company
• Why the most important thing to do as an entrepreneur is surrounding yourself with the best people

In today's episode of Category Visionaries, we speak with Travis Howerton, Co-Founder and CTO of RegScale, a continuous compliance automation platform that's raised over $21 Million in funding.

Topics Discussed:

• Travis’s background, including his 20 years in compliance in the United States’ nuclear weapons program, and transitioning from the public to the private sector
• The number one misconception people have about nuclear reactors and weapons
• Why compliance is an enormous hindrance for companies, and how RegScale uses AI and automation to make it easier for them 
• Travis’s approach to content marketing, and how he got 300,000 thousand downloads of his software
• Why Travis would advise his past self to grow RegScale more slowly

Favorite book: 

Good to Great

In today's episode of Category Visionaries, we speak with Daniel Turner, CEO of TRAXyL, an optical fiber installation company that's raised over $5 Million in funding.

Topics Discussed:

• Daniel’s early background, his education in computer science, and his time working in the intelligence community
• How living in DC and witnessing 9/11 shifted Daniel’s professional focus from game development to the intelligence sector
• How his father’s challenges with high-speed internet installation drew attention to a need for innovation in the installation industry
• Why a ‘minimally disruptive installation’ method means TRAXyL brings connection to people and places typically too challenging for fiber installation
• Making the transition from bootstrapping funding to finding success in a capital seed round, raising millions for further development

Welcome to another episode of Category Visionaries — the show that explores GTM stories from tech's most innovative B2B founders. In today's episode, we're speaking with Anthony Jules, CEO & Co-Founder of Robust AI, a robotics company that has raised over $42 Million in funding.

Here are the most interesting points from our conversation:

• From MIT to Sapient: Anthony shares his journey from MIT grad school to co-founding Sapient Corporation, growing it from 3 to 4000 employees and taking it public.
• Early Tech Scene: He reminisces about the tech scene in the early '90s, the pre-Internet era, and the challenges of building tech companies without today's information flow.
• Vision of the Internet: Anthony discusses the early days of the Internet and how recognizing its potential for transactions was a pivotal moment for his career.
• Robotics and AI at Google: He recounts his time at Google, the excitement of working on cutting-edge projects, and his decision to leave due to the mismatch in scale and focus.
• Founding Robust AI: Anthony details the serendipitous meeting with co-founders Rodney Brooks and Henrik Christensen, leading to the creation of Robust AI.
• Navigating COVID: The early years of Robust AI were defined by the pandemic, pushing the team to innovate remotely and pivot their focus in response to evolving needs.

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Sponsors:

Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership.

www.FrontLines.io

The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. 

www.GlobalTalent.co

Welcome to another episode of Category Visionaries — the show that explores GTM stories from tech's most innovative B2B founders. In today's episode, we're speaking with Jeremy Almond, CEO & Founder of Paystand, a B2B payment network that has raised over $100 Million in funding.

Here are the most interesting points from our conversation:

• Venmo for Enterprise: Paystand is a next-gen B2B payment network that saves companies millions of dollars by providing radically better economics, processing over $10 billion in payments and supporting around a million businesses.
• Building Through Focus: Jeremy emphasized the importance of staying focused. Paystand's growth is attributed to a brick-by-brick approach, first targeting specific markets like Oracle and Microsoft ecosystems before expanding.
• Scaling Milestones: Key company milestones were centered around unlocking the next stage of growth—from securing initial customers to making sales repeatable, and then scaling the business through focused enterprise sales strategies.
• Blockchain Innovation: Paystand’s payment platform is powered by blockchain, offering instant, automatic payments at zero cost, without reliance on traditional systems like Visa or Mastercard.
• Real Business Value, Not Blockchain Hype: While Jeremy is a believer in blockchain, he insists Paystand sells based on real value to customers, such as instant payments and reducing costs, not blockchain hype.
• The Next 10 Years: Jeremy envisions a future where businesses use blockchain infrastructure, replacing legacy systems like Visa and Mastercard, ultimately creating more efficient, tax-free financial ecosystems for companies globally.

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Sponsors:

Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership.

www.FrontLines.io

The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. 

www.GlobalTalent.co

In today's episode of Category Visionaries, we speak with Thibault Castagne, CEO and Founder of Vianova, a mobility intelligence platform that's raised $8.8 Million in funding.

Topics Discussed: 

• Thibault’s studies and work in finance in France, the US, London and Switzerland 
• Thibault’s experience moving to the mobility industry and founding his first company
• Reasons why The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People is an important book for Thibault
• Why the transportation system is inherently broken, and how Vianova works with governments toward achieving carbon neutrality
• The challenges of selling to public entities, and how to make it easy for them to say yes

Favorite book: 

7 Habits of Highly Effective People

Welcome to another episode of Category Visionaries — the show that explores GTM stories from tech's most innovative B2B founders. In today's episode, we're speaking with Itzik Cohen, CEO & Co-Founder of PayZen, a healthcare affordability platform that's raised $240 Million in funding.

Here are the most interesting points from our conversation:

• Healthcare Affordability Focus: PayZen addresses the growing problem of healthcare affordability by offering solutions that help patients manage their out-of-pocket expenses and ensure healthcare providers get paid.
• Innovative Payment Solutions: The platform offers interest-free payment plans and pre-care access cards, simplifying the process for patients and providers, ensuring better financial health for both parties.
• Data-Driven Approach: PayZen's solutions are heavily data-driven, focusing on automating processes like charity care and Medicaid eligibility to help patients get the financial assistance they need.
• Early Customer Strategy: Itzik emphasized the importance of starting with pilot programs and success-based revenue models to build trust and credibility with early customers in the healthcare space.
• Complex Industry Simplification: Despite the complexity of healthcare payments, PayZen's technology integrates seamlessly with existing systems like Epic MyChart, making the process straightforward for users.
• Sustained Growth and Innovation: With a vision of becoming a trusted brand in healthcare payments, PayZen aims to expand its solution set, address more use cases, and maintain its innovative edge as it grows.

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Sponsors:

Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership.

www.FrontLines.io

The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe.

www.GlobalTalent.co

In today's episode of Category Visionaries, we speak with Alan Cowen, CEO and Founder of Hume AI, a research lab and technology startup that's raised Over $17 Million in funding, about how unchecked machine learning can lead very quickly to exploitation, and why we need to develop technology more in line with people’s mental health. With algorithms targeted specifically for more positive behavioral outcomes, positive emotions and desirable life outcomes, Hume AI is charting a new course in the development of human-AI interaction.

We speak with CEO and Founder Alan Cowen about his background education in psychology and being a pioneer in the field of data science and human emotion, his motivations for founding Hume AI and the risks of unchecked machine learning development for people’s mental wellbeing, and how he sees the current frenzy surrounding AI technology developing in the years to come.

Topics Discussed:

• Alan’s background education in psychology, and being one of the people who brought data science to the study of human emotion 
• Experiences at Google’s AI program and the decision for Alan to strike out on his own with a new company
• The potential risks of unchecked AI development and the risks of exploitation even when unintentional
• Why wellbeing-aware algorithms are an essential part of a healthy relationship with the technology we rely on every day
• The current media frenzy surrounding ChatGPT and similar language models, and what it means for AI in the future
• Where Alan believes AI should sit in our future society, and some practical suggestions for how we might get there.

Favorite book: 

Human Compatible: Artificial Intelligence and the Problem of Control

Welcome to another episode of Category Visionaries — the show that explores GTM stories from tech's most innovative B2B founders. In today's episode, we're speaking with Stacy Edgar, CEO & Co-Founder of Venteur, a health insurance platform that's raised $7.6 Million in funding.

Here are the most interesting points from our conversation:

• Venteur's Mission: Born out of personal experience with health insurance challenges, Venteur aims to solve health insurance affordability for all Americans. Stacy and her brother, drawing from their family's entrepreneurial journey and healthcare struggles, have built a platform that offers personalized health insurance plans, empowering individuals to make proactive health decisions.
• The Origin and Pivot: Founded in November 2020, Venteur initially focused on helping individuals and businesses navigate health insurance choices through AI-driven decision support technology. The company made a significant pivot during COVID-19, moving from a focus on professional sports to a broader healthcare market, acknowledging the changing needs and landscape.
• The Business and Customer Impact: Venteur's platform offers businesses a way to provide pre-tax health insurance stipends, shifting away from traditional group plans. This approach allows employees to select plans that best suit their needs and can lead to substantial cost savings for businesses, with one healthcare system saving $9 million and preserving 175 jobs by switching to Venteur.
• Market Education and Resistance: Educating the market on the benefits of individual coverage health reimbursement arrangements (ICHRA) is a core part of Venteur's strategy, leveraging social media to demystify health insurance jargon and encourage informed consumer choices. However, the established health insurance model, which significantly benefits from the status quo, presents resistance to change.
• Growth and Challenges: Venteur's journey has involved learning the complex dynamics of the health insurance industry, including the importance of choosing the right sales and commercial team members with deep industry knowledge. The company's growth reflects the market's readiness for a new approach to health insurance, despite the inherent challenges of changing long-standing industry practices.
• Future Vision: Looking ahead, Venteur aims to further personalize healthcare through its platform, offering individualized bundles of health services and insurance that cater to each person's unique needs, promoting preventative care and wellness alongside traditional health coverage.

In today's episode of Category Visionaries, we speak with Hersh Tapadia, CEO of Allstacks.

Topics Discussed:

• An intersectional career between engineering and biomedicine, how Hersh found a career between disciplines
• Stakeholder expectations, unexpected challenges and what ‘delivering’ really means
• Solving the surprise issue, and why everyone wants to plan for an anticipated outcome
• Harmony, building teams, and why individual accomplishment isn’t enough for success
• Why value stream intelligence gives employees the tools to create a more satisfying, meaningful workplace experience

Favorite book: 

The Boys in the Boat: Nine Americans and Their Epic Quest for Gold at the 1936 Berlin Olympics

Welcome to another episode of Category Visionaries — the show that explores GTM stories from tech's most innovative B2B founders. In today's episode, we're speaking with Colin Luce, CEO & Co-Founder at Basis Theory, a payments tokenization platform that has raised over $20 Million in funding.

Here are the most interesting points from our conversation:

• Understanding Tokenization: Colin explains how Basis Theory is redefining tokenization for data security, focusing on developer-friendly tools that simplify complex compliance and security challenges.
• The Klarna Experience: Colin shares insights from his time at Klarna, highlighting lessons learned from scaling a European fintech giant in the U.S. market and the challenges of adapting to a different ecosystem.
• Founding Basis Theory: The "aha" moment for Basis Theory stemmed from the frustration Colin observed in merchants dealing with high payment processing costs and the lack of flexibility in existing systems.
• Vertical vs. Horizontal Focus: Colin discusses the strategic decision to initially focus on payments as a vertical before considering broader applications of their technology in other sectors like healthcare.
• Go-To-Market Strategy Evolution: Basis Theory shifted from a broad, horizontal approach to a more focused, vertical strategy, emphasizing the importance of a top-down sales motion in achieving early traction.
• Outbound Sales Success: Despite the rise of PLG (Product-Led Growth), Colin highlights the continued relevance and success of outbound sales for deep infrastructure products like Basis Theory.

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Sponsors:

Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership.

www.FrontLines.io

The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. 

www.GlobalTalent.co

In today's episode of Category Visionaries, we speak with Josh Merrill, CEO of Confirm, a data-driven performance management platform that's raised over $11 Million in funding.

Topics Discussed: 

• Josh’s background in other enterprises before Confirm, and the reason why he decided to join Carta
• Why Josh considers Carta's founder to be an inspirational figure
• Lessons Josh learned from being an angel investor
• Why performance review tools are outdated, and how Confirm is changing that
• Josh’s marketing strategy, how his messaging evolved, and his advice on building a good pitch deck for investors

Favorite book: 

Zero to One: Notes on Startups, or How to Build the Future

In today's episode of Category Visionaries, we speak with Ravi Sandepudi, Co-Founder and CEO of Effectiv, a fraud and risk management platform that's raised $9.6 Million in funding.

Topics Discussed:

• Ravi’s background, including his time at Google and his experience as an Indian immigrant in the United States
• Effectiv’s goal of democratizing fraud management
• What it’s like to continuously battle fraudsters, and why nowadays smaller organizations are under attack
• How Effectiv helps financial organizations benefit from the latest advances in tech to protect themselves from fraud without creating friction for their clients
• Ravi’s advice for founders and his vision for the future of Effectiv

In today's episode of Category Visionaries, we speak with Michael Konialian, Co-Founder and CEO of Modern Life, a tech-enabled insurance brokerage that’s raised over $15 Million in funding, about how a lack of clarity and access to information in the life insurance space can leave people at a loss, and how Modern Life is hoping to bring a better model of insurance brokerage to the sector. By partnering with leading carriers, putting advisors first, and deploying strategic data analytics to help guide clients to the right choices, Modern Life helps everyone make complex financial decisions with care.

We also speak about Michael’s background and journey to becoming a CEO and Co-Founder, the challenges of the insurance sector and the potential for technology to radically improve things, why advisors will always remain key to the business model, and how the COVID-19 pandemic has changed everyone’s attitude to integrating new technologies.

Topics Discussed:

• Michael’s career background in the brokerage and technology space, consulting, sales and startups
• The personal experience with life insurance that helped Michael identify the need for change in the sector
• The power of data in the insurance brokerage space, and why more information is helping us make better decisions than ever before
• How the pandemic drove the digital transformation of the insurance industry, and what it means for brokers and customers alike
• The regulatory challenges confronting startups across multiple sectors, and why getting ahead of the red tape really matters
• Why Modern Life envisions building a long-term community between the advisors at the center of the insurance industry

Favorite book: 

The Lean Startup

In today's episode of Category Visionaries, we speak with Phillip Liu, CEO of Trustero, an AI copilot for security and compliance that's raised $8 Million in funding.

Topics Discussed: 

• Phillip's background, including his time at Facebook and work with Ben Horowitz
• Living through the .com bubble and starting and selling a successful company
• The origin story of Trustero and how it helps compliance professionals
• The future of the compliance market
• Lessons Phillip has learned from fundraising

Favorite book: 

The Hard Thing About Hard Things: Building a Business When There Are No Easy Answers

In today's episode of Category Visionaries, we speak with Kirby Winfield, Founding GP at Ascend VC, about his love for angel investing and the passion he feels in providing founder-friendly venture capital with genuine value to add to their partners’ offerings. By leaning into projects they have a genuine love for and interest in, Ascend gives so much more than just capital, forging a unique identity among a crowded field of VC firms through real commitment and support to turn business aspirations into commercial reality.

We also speak about Kirby’s background in the startup space and taking his first company public in 1990s, how Ascend was founded and developed its investment strategy, the future of venture capital in a post-covid economy, and why, when trying to raise funds, building relationships is a never-ending process that takes dedication to get right.

Topics Discussed:

• Kirby’s career in the startup space, and taking his first company to market as far back as the late 90s
• The inspiration for founding Ascend and the unique approach to investment which places this generalist VC in a class of its own
• How Kirby learned to pursue his own path in the investment space, and stopped worrying about emulating others’ success
• Why, as a founder seeking funding, it’s important to stay committed to a consisted cycle of building investor relationships
• The vital role of personal fit in pursuing investments, and why everyone should play to their strengths
• Being a ‘recovering marketer,’ and setting out on a path towards more specialist skills and expertise

Welcome to another episode of Category Visionaries — the show that explores GTM stories from tech's most innovative B2B founders. In today's episode, we're speaking with Geert Van Kerckhoven, CEO & Co-Founder of Oper, a mortgage tech platform that's raised over $15 Million in funding.

Here are the most interesting points from our conversation:

• Oper’s Mission: Oper is revolutionizing the European mortgage process by digitizing the journey for both borrowers and lenders. The platform aims to improve the experience from initial contact to final contract, reducing paper-based processes and streamlining mortgage underwriting.
• Founding Story: Geert's 20 years of experience in fintech and banking, combined with frustration from a personal mortgage process, inspired the creation of Oper. He saw a clear gap in the market for a modern, scalable solution for mortgage lenders across Europe.
• First Customer Acquisition: Within three months of starting, Oper landed its first client who acted as a design partner, enabling the company to generate revenue from day one.
• Early Challenges: While securing a first client quickly, the challenge was to avoid building a proprietary solution for just one partner. The focus shifted to scaling the product and acquiring more clients to broaden its market presence.
• Go-to-Market Strategy: Oper focuses on enterprise sales with a team of experienced account executives managing relationships with banks. Additionally, they leverage partnerships with system integrators for larger, complex implementations, a key element of their growth strategy.
• Marketing Strategy: Geert emphasizes the importance of content marketing. Oper creates in-depth reports and thought leadership pieces that educate the market, helping them scale their knowledge beyond face-to-face meetings.

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Sponsors:

Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership.

www.FrontLines.io

The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. 

www.GlobalTalent.co

• Early Tech Aspirations: Stoyan's interest in technology began at a young age, with ambitions to build his own computer. His early career moves, including working for the biggest bank in Bulgaria, provided him with the insights and experiences that would later fuel his entrepreneurial journey.
• The Tech Scene in Bulgaria: From being perceived as a call center location to becoming an R&D hub for large tech companies, Bulgaria has experienced a significant transformation. This change reflects the country's growing startup ecosystem, fueled by an influx of capital and a wealth of educated talent.
• Addressing Cloud Complexity: Costimize tackles the complex, automated environment of cloud systems, aiming to simplify and optimize operations for businesses. Stoyan's vision is to provide a systematic approach to managing and reducing cloud expenses while organizing operational playbooks for sustainability.
• The Genesis of Costimize: The idea for Costimize was born out of Stoyan's experiences in managing IT operations and witnessing the manual efforts required to control cloud spending. This realization led to the development of a platform that could automate these processes, saving time and resources for businesses.
• Market Positioning and Growth Strategy: Initially focusing on Google Cloud as a niche market, Costimize is expanding its offerings to other cloud platforms. Stoyan's strategy involves leveraging marketplace opportunities and partnerships to drive growth, aiming for a tenfold increase in the coming year.
• FinOps and the Future of Cloud Management: Stoyan emphasizes the importance of FinOps (financial operations) in the evolving landscape of cloud management. He envisions Costimize as a central platform that connects various systems, aiding organizations in automating their cloud finances for enhanced profitability.

In today's episode of Category Visionaries, we speak with Greg Fallon, CEO of Geminus, an industrial AI optimization platform that's raised $12 Million in funding.

Topics Discussed:

• Greg’s background in mechanical engineering, being a lifelong nerd and having a passion for innovation
• Geminus’ goal of making machines more efficient 
• How increasing the efficiency of big plants and equipment can positively impact the environment
• Strategies Greg uses to cut through the noise in the AI industry
• 3 important lessons Greg learned from fundraising

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Sponsors:

Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership.

www.FrontLines.io

The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. 

www.GlobalTalent.co

Welcome to another episode of Category Visionaries — the show that explores GTM stories from tech's most innovative B2B founders. In today's episode, we're speaking with Lars Grønnegaard Hansen, CEO & Co-Founder at Dreamdata, a B2B revenue attribution platform that has raised over $12 Million in funding.

Here are the most interesting points from our conversation:

• Tech Scene Evolution in Copenhagen: Lars discusses the growth of the tech scene in Copenhagen, highlighting the emergence of successful companies like Vivino and Zendesk, which have paved the way for newer ventures like Dreamdata.
• Dreamdata’s Founding: Coming from a background in user experience and product development at Trustpilot, Lars and his co-founders launched Dreamdata to address the challenges B2B marketers face in linking marketing efforts directly to revenue generation.
• Focus on Data Integration: Dreamdata differentiates itself by integrating deeply with modern data stacks, allowing B2B marketers to perform sophisticated revenue attribution and optimize marketing spend based on data-driven insights.
• Changing the Attribution Conversation: Lars emphasizes the shift from using attribution merely as a tool for assigning credit to viewing it as essential for operational optimization and strategic planning in marketing.
• Automated Marketing Optimization: Dreamdata aims to automate B2B marketing processes, drawing parallels to advancements in B2C marketing automation that have transformed customer acquisition strategies.
• The Future Vision for Dreamdata: Looking ahead, Lars sees Dreamdata at the forefront of automating go-to-market strategies for B2B companies, enabling them to scale efficiently with technology-driven solutions.

Sponsors:

Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership. www.FrontLines.io

The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe.

www.GlobalTalent.co

Uptiv Health is revolutionizing the infusion care market by moving treatments from traditional hospital settings to technology-enabled retail locations. With $7.5M in funding, Uptiv has developed a hybrid model combining personalized in-person care with digital solutions, achieving 99+ NPS scores from patients and 87 NPS from referring providers. Their first center reached break-even within 14 months, validating their vision of scaling to 50-60 clinics nationwide while reducing healthcare costs through their innovative delivery model.

Topics Discussed:

• Transforming infusion care delivery through retail-based centers

• Building a technology stack that enables personalized patient experiences

• Implementing a human-centered design approach in healthcare

• Developing wraparound services for chronic condition management

• Balancing venture capital and private equity funding strategies

• Creating efficient operational models through technology

GTM Lessons For B2B Founders: 

• Early Payer Relationships Drive Market Entry: Uptiv secured insurance contracts 6-7 months before opening their first clinic. This strategic decision maximized their addressable market from day one, enabling them to accept all patients regardless of insurance provider. B2B founders should identify and establish critical partnerships well before launch to remove friction from early customer acquisition.
• Prove Value Through Micro-Commitments: Uptiv's sales strategy focuses on a simple ask to specialists: "Give us just one patient." This low-risk approach allows providers to validate Uptiv's service quality firsthand, leading to 150+ unique provider referrals within 12 months. B2B founders should design their initial customer engagement to minimize commitment while maximizing the opportunity to demonstrate value.
• Technology-Enabled Cost Optimization: Rather than adding cost through technology, Uptiv uses their app to eliminate traditional operational overhead. By shifting administrative tasks to patients pre-visit and centralizing phone operations, they maintain premium service while achieving faster break-even. B2B founders should leverage technology to simultaneously enhance user experience and improve unit economics.
• Human-Centered Design as Differentiation: Uptiv eliminated standard healthcare barriers like reception counters and clipboard paperwork, replacing them with personalized digital experiences. This approach delivers both operational efficiency and customer delight, driving their 99+ NPS. B2B founders should identify industry conventions that create friction and design solutions that benefit both users and business operations.
• Hybrid Service Model Evolution: Uptiv's vision combines physical locations with virtual care capabilities, creating a scalable model attractive to both venture capital and private equity. Their wraparound services for chronic care management expand their value proposition beyond core infusion services. B2B founders should design their service model to capture expansion opportunities while maintaining focus on their core offering.

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Sponsors:

Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership.

www.FrontLines.io

The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. 

www.GlobalTalent.co

Foundersuite has established itself as the leading platform for startups raising capital, with $13 million in funding and a comprehensive suite of tools designed to streamline the fundraising process. In this episode of Category Visionaries, I sat down with Nathan Beckord, CEO of Foundersuite, to explore how his extensive background in investment banking and startup advisory evolved into building a specialized platform that's revolutionizing how founders approach fundraising. Nathan shares his journey from consultant to entrepreneur, and how Foundersuite has grown from a simple CRM into a robust platform serving startups from seed stage through Series B and beyond.

Topics Discussed:

• The evolution from an investment banking career to founding a startup focused on fundraising tools
• How Foundersuite narrowed its focus from a broad suite of founder tools to specialized fundraising solutions
• The strategic decision to target the seed through Series B segment as their primary market
• Building a sustainable marketing strategy through events, podcasting, and innovative guerrilla tactics
• The launch of Funding Stack, a new platform designed for VCs and fundraising consultants
• How AI is being integrated throughout the fundraising process to enhance efficiency and outcomes

GTM Lessons For B2B Founders:

1. Start with your unique expertise: Nathan built Foundersuite based on his decade of fundraising experience, turning his specialized knowledge into product features. He explained, "I'm a one trick pony. The only thing I've done ever since college is raise capital for startups." B2B founders should leverage their deep industry expertise when defining their product category and value proposition.
2. Be willing to kill good products for great focus: Despite positive user feedback on several products in their initial suite, Foundersuite made the difficult decision to eliminate tools that weren't core to their primary value proposition. Nathan recalls, "It was hard to kill something that people did love... but they weren't really paying as much for that." B2B founders should continuously evaluate their product portfolio against market traction and be willing to make tough decisions for greater focus.
3. Define your "Goldilocks" customer segment: Foundersuite identified their ideal customer segment as seed through Series B companies—not too early (pre-seed) and not too mature (Series C+). Nathan explains, "Too early, you don't have any money, you can't pay us, you're not really fundable. Too late, you have a lot of other resources to help you raise capital." B2B founders should similarly identify where their product delivers maximum value and focus acquisition efforts accordingly.
4. Use content marketing as a learning opportunity: Foundersuite's "How I Raised It" podcast not only serves as a marketing channel but also provides valuable market intelligence. Nathan shared, "I thought I knew everything about raising capital. And here I am just drinking from a fire hose... I'm learning more than my first six months of doing a podcast than I have in the last five years of actually doing the work." B2B founders should view content marketing as both a growth channel and a customer research tool.
5. Implement annual marketing experiments: Foundersuite commits to trying one new marketing approach each year. Nathan explains, "One of the things I try and do every year... let's try a new, different marketing experiment." For 2025, they're implementing monthly webinars. B2B founders should similarly build experimentation into their marketing roadmap while maintaining their core channels.

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Sponsors:

Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership.

www.FrontLines.io

The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. 

www.GlobalTalent.co

In today's episode of Category Visionaries, we speak with Andrew Scheuermann, CEO of Arch Systems, a machine data and analytics company that's raised $25 Million in funding, about the struggles people all over the world face with accessing the tools and resources necessary to build truly smart solutions. Powered by rich machine data, the Arch Systems FX Platform has been developed to automatically surface actionable insights for manufacturing operations, driving better decisions at every level of an organization, whatever they’re trying to achieve.

We also talk about Andrew's background in engineering, machine building, and entrepreneurship, what it was like striking out on his own to found and lead a tech startup, what manufacturing optimization really means in practice, and how a late-stage pivot from horizontal developer to vertical analytics helped Arch Systems secure their elusive product-market fit.

Topics Discussed:

• Andrew's background in engineering, machine building, and entrepreneurship, and what it means for his current business
• Making the transition to being a founder and CEO, and the business leaders which inspired his journey
• What manufacturing optimization and machine data analytics means for those pursuing innovative solutions all over the world
• Why Arch Systems initially struggled to secure a product-market fit, and the strategic pivot which turned everything around for them
• The future of where Andrew sees the company, from new materials to expanding into new markets

Favorite book: 

Built to Last: Successful Habits of Visionary Companies

Welcome to another episode of Category Visionaries — the show that explores GTM stories from the tech's most innovative B2B founders. In today's episode, we're speaking with Austin McChord, CEO of Casana, an in-home health monitoring platform that's raised over $46 Million in funding.

Here are the most interesting points from our conversation:

• Unconventional Transition: Austin's journey from cybersecurity with Datto to the medtech space with Casana highlights a unique path of leveraging operational skills across distinct industries.
• Product Philosophy: Both Datto and Casana share a design philosophy where products work best when unnoticed by users, emphasizing seamless integration into daily life for reliability and efficacy.
• FDA Regulatory Journey: The exhaustive and detailed process of gaining FDA clearance for medical devices, including biocompatibility testing and the rigorous documentation required for every aspect of product development and testing.
• Healthcare Innovation through Humor: Casana's marketing approach uniquely balances humor with serious science, using the novelty and inherent humor of a health monitoring toilet seat to engage audiences before delving into the product's significant medical benefits.
• The Future of Home Health Monitoring: The COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated acceptance and demand for in-home health monitoring, opening the market for Casana's innovative solutions and setting the stage for broader adoption and integration into healthcare practices.
• Fundraising in Medtech: Austin's insights into the medtech fundraising landscape, highlighting the unique challenges and milestones compared to more conventional tech startups, with a focus on developing products that can save lives before generating revenue.

In today's episode of Category Visionaries, we speak with Andreas Cleve, CEO and Co-Founder of Corti, a patient consultations platform that's raised $32 Million in funding, about why so much important information from patient consultations is underutilized and ultimately wasted, and how Corti plans to change all that. By activating the data produced by every patient-provider interaction via a bleeding-edge ai platform, Corti’s mission is to give healthcare professionals a set of supportive tools that transcend today's time-consuming technologies.

We also speak about the personal experiences which helped draw Andreas into the healthcare space, transitioning from the technology sector, his first forays with AI and chatbot technologies, and how being an industry thought-leader means dealing with regulation as you move to build a new market modality.

Topics Discussed:

• Andreas’ very personal experience which led him to take an interest in healthcare, and why he believes many people have similar stories
• Transitioning from the technology sector to establish himself as a healthcare entrepreneur, and how it feels to be a founder
• Andreas’ first forays into the AI space with Obvio, a chatbot for healthcare facilities
• Why timing is critical to startup success, and how it influences market alignment for new businesses
• The reality of working with regulators as a thought leader in any industry, and the differences between the European and US market

Welcome to another episode of Category Visionaries — the show that explores GTM stories from tech's most innovative B2B founders. In today's episode, we're speaking with Barb Hyman, CEO & Founder of Sapia AI, a recruiting technology platform that's raised over $21 Million in funding.

Here are the most interesting points from our conversation:

• Revolutionizing Hiring: Sapia AI leverages natural language processing (NLP) to create an engaging, efficient, and bias-free hiring process, replacing traditional resumes with AI-driven candidate assessments.
• Impact of AI Adoption: The rise of AI, particularly after November 2022, has significantly accelerated interest in Sapia’s technology, although the company has been pioneering AI-driven hiring since 2018.
• Navigating Category Creation: Sapia AI is a new category called "Smart Interviewer," but the challenge has been in positioning it within existing HR tech categories. The focus is now on customer storytelling to convey its unique value.
• Empathy in Enterprise Sales: Barb emphasizes the importance of "enterprise empathy" when selling AI into HR, recognizing the significant change management required and celebrating success only when the customer does.
• Candidate Experience as a Marketing Tool: The virality of Sapia AI’s candidate experience has led to organic growth, with candidates often referring the product to key decision-makers within organizations.
• Global Expansion Strategy: Sapia AI has strategically focused on the EMEA market due to its sophisticated approach to AI regulation and the high demand for inclusive, bias-free hiring processes.

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Sponsors:

Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership.

www.FrontLines.io

The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. 

www.GlobalTalent.co

Welcome to another episode of Category Visionaries — the show that explores GTM stories from tech's most innovative B2B founders. In today's episode, we're speaking with Ian Amit, CEO & Founder at Gomboc, a cloud security remediation platform that has raised over $5 Million in funding.

Here are the most interesting points from our conversation:

• Origins of Gomboc Name: Ian shared the geeky and meaningful origin of the company name, Gomboc, inspired by a monostatic shape devised by a Hungarian mathematician, symbolizing the company's mission to self-right security issues automatically.
• Leadership Lessons from IDF: Despite not following the typical cybersecurity pathway through the IDF’s elite units, Ian's military service profoundly shaped his leadership style, emphasizing quick decision-making and handling responsibility across diverse teams.
• Career Evolution: Ian's career journey from a hacker tinkering with computers to various roles in cybersecurity, including red teaming and leading security research, culminating as a CISO at major corporations, provides a rich backdrop to his startup's mission.
• Transition to Entrepreneurship: Ian discussed his transition from security executive roles to founding Gomboc, driven by his desire to address systemic issues in cloud security he encountered firsthand, emphasizing the need for effective remediation over mere detection.
• Gomboc’s Solution to Cloud Security: The platform focuses on automating the remediation of security misconfigurations in cloud environments, providing code-level solutions that integrate seamlessly with existing DevOps workflows, significantly reducing the manual labor typically involved in securing cloud deployments.
• Market Education and Category Creation: Ian highlighted the challenge and importance of educating the market about the need for automated security remediation solutions in cloud computing, which is not yet widely recognized as a distinct category by analysts but is critical for reducing widespread vulnerabilities.

Soluna is pioneering a new category of renewable computing, building data centers co-located with renewable energy power plants to monetize stranded or wasted energy while providing sustainable compute power for AI workloads. With over $180 million in funding, Soluna is constructing a distributed network of facilities around the country that enables massive AI compute capabilities while driving demand and resiliency in the renewable energy sector. In this episode of Category Visionaries, John Belizaire shares Soluna's journey from addressing a stranded wind power project in Northern Africa to becoming a leader in sustainable computing infrastructure.

Topics Discussed:

• The evolution of Soluna's business model from blockchain computing to AI workloads

• How renewable energy curtailment creates opportunities for data center innovation

• The landscape of renewable power plant ownership and development

• Building relationships with major power producers and investment funds

• The technical challenges of creating flexible, distributed computing facilities

• Content marketing strategies for category creation and demand generation

GTM Lessons For B2B Founders:

• Master the missionary sell: John emphasized the importance of education and de-risking in the early stages of category creation. When introducing a novel solution, focus on addressing customer concerns systematically and finding early adopters willing to validate your approach. The first six months were spent convincing power plant owners that computing facilities could work effectively with their operations.

• Leverage content marketing for scalable education: Initially relying on outbound calls, Soluna transformed their pipeline by investing heavily in content marketing through podcasts, newsletters, articles, and social media. This education-first approach led to 80% of their pipeline becoming inbound leads. B2B founders should view content as a scalable way to address common customer questions and concerns before the first meeting.

• Build an integrated content engine: Rather than viewing content creation as an overwhelming task, start with recorded conversations that can be repurposed across multiple formats. One conversation can become a blog post, podcast episode, video content, and email sequences. This approach creates a content library that continuously generates marketing assets while maintaining consistent messaging.

• Target the convergence of major trends: Soluna positioned itself at the intersection of renewable energy, cryptocurrency, and AI computing. While some of this alignment was fortunate timing, the company's planned evolution from cryptocurrency to broader computing applications allowed them to capitalize on the AI boom. B2B founders should look for similar convergence opportunities in their markets.

• Focus on systemic industry problems: Soluna identified that renewable energy curtailment was a widespread issue affecting plant profitability. By understanding the "McDonald's and Burger King problem" of optimal resource locations creating grid congestion, they developed a solution that addressed a fundamental industry challenge rather than a point problem.

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Sponsors:

Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership.

www.FrontLines.io

The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. 

www.GlobalTalent.co

Welcome to another episode of Category Visionaries — the show that explores GTM stories from tech's most innovative B2B founders. In today's episode, we're speaking with Claudius Jehle, CEO & Co-Founder of Volytica Diagnostics, a battery diagnostics platform that has raised over $9 Million in funding.

Here are the most interesting points from our conversation:

• Pioneering Battery Diagnostics: Claudius transitioned from mechanical engineering to e-mobility, focusing on the degradation and quality assessment of electric bus batteries, leading to the foundation of Volytica Diagnostics.
• Innovative Technology Development: Initially working with telematic IoT devices, Claudius developed algorithms to analyze field data from batteries in real-time, which became the core IP of Volytica Diagnostics.
• Navigating Early Challenges: The company faced significant challenges during its early days, especially amid COVID-19, including securing funding and negotiating licensing agreements with academic institutions.
• Strategic Early Adopters: Claudius emphasized the importance of speaking at industry events and leveraging his network to attract early adopters, though he noted the need for a more scalable approach like webinars and online marketing.
• Global Monitoring: Volytica Diagnostics now monitors over a gigawatt hour of batteries across various applications worldwide, including utility-scale systems and public transport, showcasing their expansive growth and traction.
• Critical Go-to-Market Decisions: The decision to focus on API-based integrations and partnering with established companies in the logistics and utility sectors was pivotal, allowing for scalable and widespread adoption of their technology.

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Sponsors:

Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership.

www.FrontLines.io

The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. 

www.GlobalTalent.co

Ravin AI is revolutionizing vehicle damage assessment through AI-powered remote inspection technology. With $35 million in funding, Ravin AI has evolved from a Shell innovation project to a leading provider of AI-powered vehicle inspection solutions for insurance companies and fleets. In this episode of Category Visionaries, we spoke with Eliron Ekstein, CEO & Co-Founder of Ravin AI about the company's journey from experimental technology to enterprise-grade solution, including their strategic pivots during COVID and their approach to building critical partnerships in the insurtech space.

Topics Discussed:

• Evolution from experimental technology to enterprise solution
• Strategic market pivots from car rental to insurance
• Enterprise partnership strategy and execution
• Product development in deep tech environments
• Go-to-market approach in relationship-driven industries
• Future of vehicle damage assessment and repair

GTM Lessons For B2B Founders:

• Validate technology before market fit: In deep tech, Eliron focused first on validating that the core technology worked before seeking product-market fit. He emphasized a two-step validation process: "The first question we answered was, does it work? Then the second question is, does it matter to somebody?" This approach helped them avoid investing resources in market development before having a viable technical solution.

• Use anchor customers strategically: Ravin secured Avis Budget as their first POC customer, demonstrating the power of landing a recognized brand early. However, Eliron notes that the value goes beyond the logo: "They first need to believe in you as a person... they know that you don't really have a fully working product and it doesn't have validation elsewhere. So they just need to believe that this is going to work."

• Approach partnerships with clear deployment criteria: Eliron shared a critical framework for evaluating partnerships: "Will they deploy your product at scale, yes or no?" He advises founders to be willing to make painful concessions on exclusivity and pricing if the partner will drive real deployment, while avoiding partners who might engage simply to block competition.

• Navigate market transitions through product flexibility: When COVID impacted their car rental market, Ravin pivoted to used car assessments and eventually insurance. Eliron emphasizes the importance of maintaining product flexibility: "Product decisions are pretty hard because you have such limited resource and you cannot afford to make too many mistakes."

• Build market presence through strategic geographical expansion: Their entry into the Australian market through IAG partnership demonstrates how to build presence in new territories: "Getting that first partner in the market... opened the door for us because suddenly you go into conferences and you speak to people everybody knows the name."

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Sponsors:

Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership.

www.FrontLines.io

The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. 

www.GlobalTalent.co

Welcome to another episode of Category Visionaries — the show that explores GTM stories from tech's most innovative B2B founders. In today's episode, we're speaking with Nick Soman, CEO & Founder of Decent, a healthcare technology company that has raised $43 Million in funding.

Here are the most interesting points from our conversation:

• Risk and Motivation: Nick secured the domain "Decent" by spending $60,000 from his home equity line, pushing himself to succeed with the venture by leveraging personal risk.
• Broken Healthcare System: Healthcare is fundamentally flawed because incentives are built around raising costs rather than reducing them, with insurance companies benefiting from inefficiencies in the system.
• Level Funded Health Plans: Decent offers an innovative solution by combining level-funded health plans and direct primary care, allowing even small businesses to self-insure and save up to 40% compared to traditional market rates.
• Direct Primary Care Movement: Decent is riding the wave of the growing direct primary care movement, which allows doctors to focus on personalized care for fewer patients while reducing overall healthcare costs.
• GTM Strategy Evolution: Initially, Decent struggled with messaging. They shifted from promoting direct primary care upfront to leading with cost savings, which significantly improved their sales success.
• Scaling Through Brokers: Instead of bypassing brokers, Decent embraced them, building tech tools to empower them, which proved crucial for scaling and reaching more small businesses.

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Sponsors:

Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership.

www.FrontLines.io

The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. 

www.GlobalTalent.co

Welcome to another episode of Category Visionaries — the show that explores GTM stories from tech's most innovative B2B founders. In today's episode, we're speaking with Mike Conover, CEO and Co-Founder of Brightwave, an AI-powered investment research platform that has raised $6 Million in funding.

Here are the most interesting points from our conversation:

• Brightwave’s Core Mission: Mike explained how Brightwave leverages AI to expand human cognitive potential. The platform enhances investment research by helping asset managers identify mispriced assets through AI that can analyze far more data than a human can.
• AI’s Role in Investment Research: Brightwave’s AI focuses on organizing relevant content like SEC filings, news, and transcripts, helping analysts to synthesize large volumes of information and make informed decisions faster.
• The Evolution of AI: Mike’s journey, from building Databricks' first language model, to co-founding Brightwave, highlights how AI’s rapid progress has revolutionized industries, especially with large language models unlocking new capabilities in research and reasoning.
• AI in Financial Services: Mike noted that financial firms are rapidly adopting AI, with active asset managers embracing its potential despite limitations. The urgency of staying competitive is pushing firms to adopt AI early, despite its imperfections.
• Standing Out in a Crowded AI Market: To differentiate Brightwave, Mike emphasized the importance of product quality over AI hype. By building a tool that works and focusing on high-value synthesis and reasoning, Brightwave sets itself apart from competitors.
• The Future of AI Research Assistants: Brightwave’s long-term vision is to build a system that understands and reasons about the structure of the global economy, transforming the speed and accuracy of financial analysis for asset managers.

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Sponsors:

Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership.

www.FrontLines.io

The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. 

www.GlobalTalent.co

In today's episode of Category Visionaries, we speak with Sabrina Paseman and Simon Lancaster, General Partners at Omni Venture Labs, about the future of deeptech investment and globally-important innovation. 

Topics Discussed:

• The path both Sabrina and Simon took into the venture capital world, and why they both feel they’ve found their place
• The rise of the deeptech economy, and why Omni Venture Labs focuses on its application in the industrial manufacturing space
• Omni Venture Lab’s love of finding new founders and supporting their business growth from the bottom up
• Advice for innovative founders about prioritizing patents versus establishing a moat through ongoing product development
• Why contemporary companies need to priorities a clear path to profitability to gain attention from potential investors

Akston Biosciences is revolutionizing pet healthcare through innovative protein engineering and biotechnology solutions. After selling his first company Smart Cells to Merck for over $500M, Todd Zion founded Akston Biosciences in 2011 to apply advanced biotech expertise to the growing pet health market. With over $50M in funding, Akston is developing breakthrough treatments including once-weekly insulin, cancer therapies, and other protein-based medicines for pets, while maintaining cost effectiveness for pet owners.

Topics Discussed: 

• The transition from human health biotech to the pet health market 
• Streamlined clinical trial processes in pet health vs. human health 
• The evolution of the pet healthcare market and consumer willingness to pay 
• Balancing technical innovation with cost-effective development 
• The challenges of fundraising in an emerging biotech category 
• Pipeline development across multiple pet health conditions

GTM Lessons For B2B Founders: 

• Navigate pivots decisively: Todd emphasized that most founders wait too long to pivot. He advises that when you start seeing signs that the future isn't unfolding as planned, that's the time to begin considering a pivot - while you still have resources and before becoming too entrenched. Their pivot to focusing entirely on pet health required significant restructuring but ultimately created a clearer path forward.
• Find the regulatory sweet spot: Akston discovered that pet health offered a faster path to market validation compared to human health biotech. The ability to conduct field trials with just hundreds rather than thousands of subjects, combined with more streamlined regulatory requirements, allowed them to de-risk their assets more quickly and cost-effectively while still maintaining high standards.
• Build for the actual market conditions: Rather than assuming future market changes (like expanded pet insurance coverage), Akston designs their products around current market realities - namely that most pet medications are paid out-of-pocket. This forced them to innovate not just technically but in development and manufacturing to keep costs accessible to pet owners.
• Create new categories through technology translation: Instead of building an entirely new technology, Akston applied proven biotech approaches from human health to the pet market. This allowed them to leverage existing expertise while pioneering a new category, positioning themselves as "the Biogen for pets" rather than just another pet health company.
• Structure early testing for rapid validation: By utilizing the FDA's investigational new animal drug application process, Akston could begin testing in their target population much earlier in development. This enabled them to validate their concepts within a year rather than waiting through multiple phases of trials, allowing for more efficient resource allocation.

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Sponsors:

Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership.

www.FrontLines.io

The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. 

www.GlobalTalent.co

In today's episode of Category Visionaries, we speak with Kaycee Lai, CEO and Founder of Promethium, a data fabric platform that's raised $34.5 Million in funding.

Topics Discussed:

• Kaycee’s background, including his time as a Federal Reserve analyst
• Why Martha Stewart is the CEO Kaycee admires the most, and why his favorite book is a classic 19th-century French novel
• The difficulties companies have in leveraging data, what data fabric is, and how Promethium uses data fabric to help companies overcome those obstacles
• The data industry: its current state and trends, and its future
• Why marketing is less important than educating prospects and being transparent about your product, and why fundraising is not really a numbers’ game

Favorite book: 

The Count of Monte Cristo

Ducky AI operates as a pre-LLM compute layer, enabling businesses to make their proprietary data accessible to large language models without compromising security or privacy. In this episode of Category Visionaries, James O'Brien shares the journey of pivoting from a customer support solution to becoming a machine learning infrastructure tool that helps developers find and transform internal business data for optimal LLM consumption. With $2.7 million in funding, Ducky is positioning itself as the essential bridge between enterprise data and AI systems, making advanced AI capabilities accessible to technical teams without requiring extensive ML expertise.

Topics Discussed:

• Ducky's evolution from a customer support solution to a developer-focused ML infrastructure tool
• The validation process that led to identifying knowledge accessibility as a core market problem
• How and why the team executed their pivot in just three months
• The challenges of defining an ideal customer profile in the rapidly expanding AI space
• Building a go-to-market strategy in Nashville's emerging tech ecosystem
• Fundraising lessons learned during the SVB collapse

GTM Lessons For B2B Founders:

1. Listen when developers ask for your infrastructure: James discovered their true product-market fit when developers started requesting access to Ducky's knowledge retrieval infrastructure rather than their customer-facing application. "We had a revelatory moment where we realized that a bunch of developers had asked for access to our infrastructure, our knowledge retrieval infrastructure. And that's kind of what we're good at." This insight led to their pivot toward becoming an API-first tool that matched their technical strengths with the right audience.
2. Validation is a superpower: The Ducky team excels at gathering unbiased feedback from potential customers. When considering their pivot, they embraced this strength: "I think one of the things that we're best at as a team is validation. I think we're really good at drawing relatively unbiased... input and feedback from people that we're interviewing or talking to." For B2B founders, this emphasis on rigorous customer validation before building can be the difference between success and wasted engineering resources.
3. Make pivot decisions with data, not emotion: When considering a change in direction, Ducky time-boxed their exploration to three weeks, built multiple prototypes, and showed them to potential customers. "It was pretty clear after three weeks that one was not only a better use of our skills and time, but also a better market fit." B2B founders should approach pivots methodically, setting clear timelines and success criteria for validation.
4. Design pricing that aligns with value creation: James emphasizes usage-based pricing that fundamentally connects revenue to customer value: "If you use it and it works, you will use it more. And that means that we're doing our job. And that's awesome. That's all I ever want to do, quite frankly, is get paid for actually bringing value to people." This approach creates natural incentives for both the vendor and customer, unlike the multi-year contracts that often create misaligned incentives.
5. Look beyond AI hype to focus on business problems: James discovered that many companies have been tasked to "do something with AI" without clear objectives. "People are like, 'hey, we got to do something with AI,' but we don't know what that is. And then they think so deeply about, 'hey, how are we going to construct this?'" B2B founders should help customers cut through the hype by focusing on the underlying business value and specific problems to solve, rather than getting lost in technical details.

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Sponsors:

Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership.

www.FrontLines.io

The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. 

www.GlobalTalent.co

Welcome to another episode of Category Visionaries — the show that explores GTM stories from tech's most innovative B2B founders. In today's episode, we're speaking with Aasim, CEO and Founder of Amenities Health, a patient engagement platform that has raised $10 Million in funding.

Most interesting points from our conversation:

• Healthcare as a Foregone Conclusion: Aasim was virtually born into healthcare with two doctor parents but found his true passion at the intersection of healthcare, policy, and technology.
• A Unique Path to Tech: Unlike many in tech, Aasim’s journey included a detour through med school, a master’s in public administration, and a stint in public policy, highlighting a non-traditional path to becoming a tech CEO.
• Policy Meets Product: His work at Baylor, Scott & White Health as the lead of innovation rekindled his passion for making macro-level impacts through technology and product innovation within healthcare.
• The Problem with Healthcare Engagement: Aasim observed a significant gap in how health systems manage patient engagement, particularly in making healthcare experiences as customer-centric as businesses like Amazon have done with retail.
• Vision for Amenities Health: The aim is to transform patient engagement by treating every patient like a concierge client, significantly improving the healthcare experience.
• The Challenge of Building Loyalty in Healthcare: Aasim is tackling the lack of true patient loyalty in healthcare by introducing a membership model aimed at ensuring no surprise billing, satisfaction guarantees, and transparent pricing.

Metafuels is revolutionizing the aviation industry by developing synthetic sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) technology that combines renewable electricity, CO2, and water to produce jet fuel without petroleum feedstock. Having raised $22 million in funding, the company was born during the COVID-19 pandemic when its founders transformed their longtime vision into reality. In this episode of Category Visionaries, Saurabh Kapoor shares insights on commercializing deep tech, addressing market skepticism, and building a new category in sustainable aviation.

Topics Discussed:

• Technical approach to synthetic sustainable aviation fuel production
• Evolution from consultancy to deep tech startup during COVID-19
• Addressing critics and market skepticism in the SAF space
• B2B marketing strategy for industrial-scale technology
• Commercialization roadmap and scaling challenges
• Vision for transforming aviation fuel infrastructure

GTM Lessons for B2B Founders:

• Timing market entry with macro disruptions: Metafuels launched during COVID when traditional consulting work slowed, allowing the team to fully focus on their vision. The pandemic created space for deep work on complex technical and business challenges before going to market.
• Building credibility in skeptical markets: Rather than trying to counter every criticism, Kapoor focused on addressing legitimate concerns while demonstrating clear technological and cost advantages. For deep tech founders, this means acknowledging valid challenges while showing how your solution fundamentally changes the equation.
• B2B marketing for industrial tech: With large-scale industrial products, traditional B2B marketing tactics don't apply. Metafuels focuses on building awareness of cost leadership and fostering long-term ecosystem partnerships rather than traditional lead generation.
• Strategic scope limitation: The team made an early decision to avoid food/feed chain competition, demonstrating how technical founders can use clear scope boundaries to strengthen their market position and narrative.
• Infrastructure-scale go-to-market: Metafuels' approach shows how to sequence a major infrastructure play - starting with demonstration facilities, then moving to commercial projects by 2026, before full fuel production and sales in 2028. This creates clear proof points for stakeholders at each stage.

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Sponsors:

Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership.

www.FrontLines.io

The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. 

www.GlobalTalent.co

Welcome to another episode of Category Visionaries — the show that explores GTM stories from tech's most innovative B2B founders. In today's episode, we're speaking with Martha Dreiling, Co-Founder & COO of Reserv, an AI-powered insurtech company that has raised $28 Million in funding.

Here are the most interesting points from our conversation:

• AI-Driven Claims Processing: Reserv is the first AI-powered third-party administrator (TPA) focused on insurance claims, providing both claims handling and deep data insights for underwriters.
• Venture Incubation Start: Reserv was born from dissatisfaction with legacy claims processing systems, launching through a partnership between Bain Capital Ventures and Altai Ventures.
• Fast Growth and Impact: Founded in May 2022, Reserv processed its first claim just five months later, showcasing their ability to scale quickly while leveraging modern SaaS platforms and AI.
• Climate Change’s Impact on Insurance: The rising importance of claims handling due to climate change and a tightening insurance market has increased the demand for more seamless, data-driven processes.
• Empowering, Not Replacing, Adjusters: Reserv’s technology focuses on empowering claims adjusters with AI, automating mundane tasks while maintaining the essential human element of empathy in high-stakes claim situations.
• Go-To-Market Complexity: The go-to-market strategy includes handling a complex network of stakeholders—MGA’s, insurance carriers, and policyholders—ensuring that every part of the value chain is well-serviced.

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Sponsors:

Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership.

www.FrontLines.io

The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. 

www.GlobalTalent.co

In today's episode of Category Visionaries, we chat with Reed Switzer, CEO of Hopscotch, an all-in-one B2B payments platform. Reed talks about his unconventional start in the B2B payments space, and how Hopscotch enables customers to achieve a frictionless payment experience by streamlining invoicing, bill pay, and cash flow management.

Reed also shares his thoughts on the growth and traction the company has experienced since its launch and how they’ve been able to "rise above the noise" in a competitive market. Reed believes that building trust with customers is crucial for success. And having a high level of conviction in what you're building, and maintaining transparency are key to building a successful brand. Hopscotch achieves this through a strong brand identity, storytelling, and providing valuable content beyond their core offering.

Topics Discussed:

• How Reed came up with the idea for Hopscotch after seeing the challenges faced by most B2B companies using antiquated payments platforms and systems that came up short
• How Hopscotch works to eliminate friction in the payment process by automating invoicing, streamlining communication between clients and vendors, and making it easy to manage cash flow
• Reed’s experience in starting a business venture at a young age and how this helped him develop resilience and adaptability.
• Reed’s thoughts on maintaining a balance between vision and adaptability - the importance of staying true to your vision while being open to evolving and adapting to changes in the market.
• How Hopscotch aims to create its own market category by focusing on business profiles and innovative features that cater to the specific needs of their target audience.
• Reed’s vision for Hopscotch on becoming the control tower for small business finances, simplifying the entire finance stack, and fostering a strong community among its users.

Favorite book: 

Rise and Kill First: The Secret History of Israel's Targeted Assassinations

Welcome to another episode of Category Visionaries — the show that explores GTM stories from tech's most innovative B2B founders. In today's episode, we're speaking with Mars Geuze, CHO & Co-Founder of Hardt Hyperloop, a transportation system that's raised over €36 Million in funding.

Here are the most interesting points from our conversation:

• From Student Projects to Hyperloop: Mars and his co-founders transitioned from building electric race cars to pioneering Hyperloop technology, catalyzed by Elon Musk's Hyperloop competition.
• Open, Standardized Infrastructure: Hardt Hyperloop advocates for a network of standardized infrastructure owned by governments or private entities, enabling various operators to run their Hyperloop vehicles.
• Capacity and Feasibility: Addressing misconceptions, Mars emphasized that Hyperloop can transport up to 20,000 passengers per direction per hour, rivaling traditional rail capacity.
• Strategic Partnerships and Global Efforts: Countries like the Netherlands, Spain, India, and South Korea are actively investing in Hyperloop development, with significant public-private partnerships driving progress.
• Next Steps and Testing: Hardt is building a 420-meter test facility to demonstrate key functionalities, including lane switching, which is critical for creating an efficient and flexible transportation network.
• Long-term Vision: Mars highlighted a phased approach, with operational pilot routes expected by 2029 and widespread adoption and scaling of longer routes from 2030 onwards.

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Sponsors:

Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership.

www.FrontLines.io

The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe.

www.GlobalTalent.co

In today's episode of Category Visionaries, we speak with Nikhil Choudhary, General Partner at Nirman Ventures.

Topics Discussed:

• Nikhil’s background, from engineering to the startup economy and eventually becoming CEO
• Contemporary challenges arising from increasing complexity in the construction sector, and the need to industry insiders to drive change
• Why Nirman Ventures focuses on the construction sector, and what they look for in founders ready to make an impact
• How founders can prepare a perfect pitch for potential VC funders, and the key elements required to secure investment
• Why Nikhil is always open to founders reaching out directly, and the importance of bootstrapping your business to success

Favorite book: 

Secrets of Sand Hill Road: Venture Capital and How to Get It

Welcome to another episode of Category Visionaries — the show that explores GTM stories from tech's most innovative B2B founders. In today's episode, we're speaking with Stephany Lapierre, Founder & CEO of Tealbook, a supplier data platform that's raised over $72 Million in funding.

Here are the most interesting points from our conversation:

• Inspiration from Family Legacy: Stephany was inspired by her entrepreneurial family background, particularly her grandmother's successful management of a Pepsi bottling and distribution business.
• Origin of Tealbook: The idea for Tealbook was sparked by Stephany's experience in consulting, where she saw the inefficiencies in supplier data management at large companies like Johnson & Johnson.
• Competitive Differentiation: Tealbook stands out by using machine learning to automate the enrichment and distribution of supplier data, eliminating the need for manual data entry and portals.
• Creating a New Category: Tealbook coined the term "supplier data platform" to differentiate itself in the market and has worked with analysts and thought leaders to establish this new category.
• Raising Capital as a Female Founder: Stephany shared insights on the challenges female founders face in raising capital and the importance of building a complementary team and finding the right voice in investor meetings.
• Vision for the Future: Stephany envisions Tealbook becoming the gold standard for supplier data, integrated into every major procurement system, and expanding its data packs to unlock more use cases and deliver greater value to clients.

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Sponsors:

Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership.

www.FrontLines.io

The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. 

www.GlobalTalent.co

In today's episode of Category Visionaries we speak with John Jahnke, CEO and Co-Founder of Tackle.io, a cloud go-to market platform that's raised over $148 Million in funding.

Topics Discussed:

• John’s background as a kid who loved computers and wanted to be a CEO
• The two founders John would have liked to meet, and what his favorite books are
• Why software companies have difficulties selling their product through cloud providers, and how Tackle.io helps them do that easily
• Achieving and keeping product-market fit, and the process, obstacles and rewards of creating a new product category
• How fundraising gets easier after the initial stage, and why it’s important everyone in the company can tell the same story

Favorite book: 

The Book of Joy: Lasting Happiness in a Changing World

Tab Commerce is pioneering the first corporate card built specifically for restaurants, tackling the complex back-office operations of a traditionally low-margin industry. With $4 million in funding, Tab is creating a comprehensive spend management platform that addresses the unique challenges restaurant operators face. In this episode of Category Visionaries, I spoke with Ty Wilson, CEO and Co-Founder of Tab Commerce, to learn how his family restaurant background and pandemic-era insights led to building a fintech company that's transforming restaurant profitability through better spend management.

Topics Discussed:

• Tab Commerce's evolution from supply chain solution to specialized corporate card for restaurants
• The complex, fragmented nature of restaurant back-office operations and purchasing
• How Tab is growing through strategic industry association partnerships
• The challenges of distribution and relationship-building in the restaurant technology space
• Tab's vision to become the standard commerce layer for the $1.5 trillion restaurant supply chain

GTM Lessons For B2B Founders:

• Study success relentlessly: Ty shared he constantly goes deep on companies he admires, calling it "one of the best uses of my time." He studies everything from their podcasts to press materials, which directly inspired Tab's corporate card product after researching Ramp. B2B founders should identify "company crushes" and systematically analyze their business models, marketing strategies, and product innovations for applicable insights.
• Vertically-focused products win over horizontal solutions: Tab recognized that generic spend management tools don't work for restaurants' unique workflows. "Every vertical will have their own spend management platform because every vertical has their own workflows and needs and go-to-market strategies," Ty explained. B2B founders should embrace deep vertical specialization rather than building generic solutions, as vertical focus builds immediate trust with customers who want industry-specific solutions.
• Strategic industry associations can solve distribution challenges: Unlike conventional digital marketing tactics which failed ("LinkedIn ads... doesn't work at all"), Tab found success by partnering with restaurant industry associations. Ty relocated his office to be five minutes from the Texas Restaurant Association and co-branded a card with them. For B2B founders targeting fragmented industries, leveraging established industry groups can provide credibility, access to engaged audiences, and cost-effective distribution channels.
• Relationship-based sales beats transactional approaches: In an era of increasingly transactional software sales, Tab deliberately built a relationship-focused sales organization. "Software sales has become super transactional. And I think that's hurt industries like restaurants and other brick and mortar businesses because they're very relationship based," Ty noted. B2B founders should consider whether their target market responds better to high-touch, relationship-driven sales approaches rather than modern, low-touch methods.
• Discover "landmines" through persistent market testing: Ty revealed it took over two and a half years to gain meaningful traction, during which they encountered numerous "landmines" – seemingly intuitive product ideas that actually failed in practice. For example, they initially tried to digitize chef-supplier ordering before realizing the existing phone/text workflow was actually more efficient. B2B founders should rigorously test assumptions and be prepared to pivot from apparently obvious solutions that the market rejects.

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Sponsors:

Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership.

www.FrontLines.io

The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. 

www.GlobalTalent.co

Welcome to another episode of Category Visionaries — the show that explores GTM stories from tech's most innovative B2B founders. In today's episode, we're speaking with Sergey Litvinenko, CEO & Co-Founder at Koop Insurance, an insurance technology company that has raised $7 Million in funding.

Here are the most interesting points from our conversation:

• Preventive Insurance Model: Koop Insurance distinguishes itself by offering a preventive insurance model tailored for the tech sector, where traditional insurance falls short due to a lack of historical data for new technologies.
• Founding Inspiration: The initial idea for Koop emerged from the challenges faced in the autonomous vehicle space, which led to the realization that these challenges were prevalent across the tech sector, prompting a pivot to insurance.
• Aha Moments: Sergey describes multiple "aha" moments in Koop’s journey, such as shifting from an API for autonomous vehicles to an insurance model when realizing the existing market’s inefficiencies.
• Growth and Scaling: Discussing the growth from a bootstrap startup in Pittsburgh to a pre-series A stage company in New York with nearly 20 full-time employees.
• Trust and Branding: Emphasizing the importance of trust in the insure-tech space, Koop focuses on building a brand that combines expertise, reliability, and partnership with giants like Munich Re and Lloyd’s of London.
• Market Strategy and Evolution: Koop’s strategy involves not selling insurance in the conventional sense but offering compliance and risk management as part of a comprehensive package to tech companies.

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Sponsors:

Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership.

www.FrontLines.io

The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. 

www.GlobalTalent.co

In today's episode of Category Visionaries, we speak with Swapnil Shinde, CEO and Co-Founder of Zeni, a finance operations platform that's raised over $47 Million in funding.

Topics Discussed:

• Swapnil’s background in computer science, and starting a service that was like Spotify for Indian music
• Working together with his identical twin brother
• Why startup bookkeeping is generally fragmented, complex, and lacking in insights, and how Zeni helps solve those problems
• Creating a new service category and disrupting a longstanding business
• Why fundraising becomes easier with every startup you found

Favorite book: 

Think Like a Monk: Train Your Mind for Peace and Purpose Every Day

Welcome to another episode of Category Visionaries — the show that explores GTM stories from tech's most innovative B2B founders. In today's episode, we're speaking with Ben Kliger, CEO and Co-Founder of Zenity, a security governance platform for no code and AI development that has raised $21.5 Million in funding.

Here are the most interesting points from our conversation:

• Unit 8200's Impact: Ben credits his transformative experience in Unit 8200, emphasizing the unit's culture of embracing challenges and enabling significant contributions to national security. This environment fostered his leadership skills and established a lifelong network of friends and colleagues.
• Entrepreneurial Roots and Vision: With a background influenced by entrepreneurial family values and participation in entrepreneur programs, Ben always aspired to create his own technology company. His journey through roles at Deloitte, Fortscale, and Microsoft further shaped his ambition to address meaningful business challenges with innovative solutions.
• Inspiration from Leaders: Identifying David Ben-Gurion and Satya Nadella as his inspirations, Ben admires their leadership qualities of empathy and customer obsession. These principles guide Zenity's mission to prioritize customer needs and drive meaningful impact.
• Zenity's Mission: Focused on security governance for no-code and AI development, Zenity aims to ensure that citizen-developed applications within enterprises are secure. By addressing the security aspects of no-code and AI tools, Zenity enables organizations to empower their non-technical staff without compromising on security.
• Ideal Customer Profile (ICP) Identification: Zenity targets large enterprises that heavily utilize major SaaS platforms for citizen development projects. The company focuses on security leaders within these organizations, offering solutions to manage the risks associated with no-code and AI development by non-technical employees.
• Marketing Philosophy and Growth Strategy: Emphasizing thought leadership and partnerships, Zenity engages with industry organizations and leverages direct sales to communicate its value proposition. The company's approach is not about inducing fear but about enabling organizations to harness the power of no-code and AI development securely.

In today's episode of Category Visionaries we speak with John Lunn, CEO and Founder of Gr4vy, a payment orchestration platform that's raised over $27 Million in funding.

Topics Discussed: 

• John’s background as a marine biologist who’s worked in payments for decades and helped start other companies, including PayPal
• John's most admired individuals, and sci-fi books that have influenced him
• Why payments are a problem area for online retailers, and how Gr4vy helps them manage payments with ease and flexibility
• The current payment landscape, and why trying to sell a payment system to a company’s payments team is the wrong move
• Why it’s important to pick VCs that you like as people, and why John would advise his past self to grow his company slower

Favorite book: 

The Culture (9 book series)

In today's edition of Funding the Future, we speak with Courtney Lipkin, partner at Susa Ventures, a seed fund based in San Francisco.

Topics Discussed:

• Courtney’s background growing in the Bay Area, studying international relations, and making her way into tech and venture capital 
• Why Courtney sees herself as better at venture than she would be at founding her own company
• Why Courtney loves working with founders and creative designers, and why her favorite book is a biography of Leonardo Da Vinci
• The history of Susa Ventures, and the characteristics that set it apart from other funds
• Why Courtney doesn’t think Silicon Valley is dying at all, and what a typical day is like for a venture capitalist

Favorite book: 

Leonardo da Vinci, by Walter Isaacson

In today's episode of Category Visionaries, we speak with Brandon Schulz, CEO and Co-Founder of Violet, an e-commerce technology company that's raised $14 Million in funding.

Topics Discussed:

• Brandon’s career background in social commerce and e-commerce businesses, and finding his calling in entrepreneurship
• Why so many social commerce team struggle to establish an integrated infrastructure for large numbers of companies selling on a single platform
• Violet’s vested interest in making their customers make more money, and how their pricing policy reflects this reality
• How overpromising often ends up compromising the category creation process in the minds of customers
• Finding product market fit, and the four-year slog towards finally making a commercial breakthrough

In today's episode of Category Visionaries, we speak with Peter Briffett, CEO and Co-Founder of Wagestream, a financial well-being platform that's raised $370 Million in funding.

Topics Discussed:

• Peter’s background in business, joining the early days of the dot-com era and scaling multiple high growth companies
• The importance of persistence and self-belief in pushing through the inevitable challenges that come with entrepreneurship
• Why Wagestream opted to partner with enterprise-scale businesses to provide financial services integrated within existing management systems
• Wagestream’s 3 main missions, and why they matter for the next generation of workers
• How Wagestream’s services help solve the issue of costly payday loans and overdraft fees while providing better financial independence

Favorite book: 

Crossing the Chasm, 3rd Edition: Marketing and Selling Disruptive Products to Mainstream Customers (Collins Business Essentials)

In today's episode of Category Visionaries, we speak with Eden Full Goh, Founder & CEO of Mobot, a mobile app testing platform that's raised over $17 Million in funding, about why realtime mobile testing is critical for the future of our app-driven lifestyles, and how Mobot positions itself as an indispensable tool in streamlining the process. 

We also speak about her journey as a young entrepreneur and how she developed her company into a successful venture. She discusses her passion for environmental sustainability and how it led to the creation of Mobot, the importance of having a strong team, seeking mentorship, and staying true to one's values while building a business.

Topics Discussed:

• How Eden took an early interest in entrepreneurship which has continued to shape her career
• The inspiration for Mobot and how Eden knew she was on to a winning idea by keeping things simple
• Why failure is a part of building a business that all entrepreneurs will have to confront at some point
• How mentorship plays a critical role in developing a person’s career
• Building a business while staying true to your principles in a highly competitive marketplace

Favorite book:

Atomic Habits

In today's episode of Category Visionaries, we speak with Anish Dhar and Ganesh Datta, Co-Founders of Cortex, an internal developer portal that's raised over $52 Million in funding.

Topics Discussed:

• Anish and Ganesh’s backgrounds as engineers working at different companies which had the same problem, and the origin story of Cortex
• Microservice going wrong, and how Cortex helps development companies keep track of who owns each service and whether they are following best practices
• Why Anish and Ganesh are certain that cold-calling is not dead, and how they learned to market their product
• How to ensure you keep domination within your category, and why it’s important to ensure you’re building the right thing at the right moment
• Why storytelling is crucial skill in fundraising, and how you can acquire over time

Welcome to another episode of Category Visionaries — the show that explores GTM stories from tech's most innovative B2B founders. In today's episode, we're speaking with Adam Silver, CEO & Co-Founder of Plural Energy, a clean energy investing platform that's raised $2.8 Million in funding.

Here are the most interesting points from our conversation:

• Making Clean Energy Investing Accessible: Plural Energy is focused on democratizing access to clean energy investments, whether you're an individual investor, a family office, or an institution.
• Strategic Decision to Rebrand: The company initially branded itself differently but decided to focus on a name that better represents its mission in the clean energy sector.
• Overcoming Regulatory Hurdles: Adam discussed the significant regulatory challenges they faced and how navigating these has become a core part of their strategy.
• Partnerships as a Growth Lever: Strategic partnerships are key to Plural Energy's go-to-market strategy, enabling them to scale more effectively.
• Targeting a Broad Market: The platform is designed to cater to a wide range of investors, from retail to institutional, making it versatile and scalable.
• Long-term Vision for Plural Energy: Adam shared insights into the long-term vision of the company, focusing on making a significant impact in the clean energy transition.

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Sponsors:

Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership.

www.FrontLines.io

The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. 

www.GlobalTalent.co

Welcome to another episode of Category Visionaries — the show that explores GTM stories from tech's most innovative B2B founders. In today's episode, we're speaking with Tiffany Ricks, CEO & Founder of HacWare, a security awareness platform that's raised $2.6 Million in funding.

Here are the most interesting points from our conversation:

• Transition to Product: Tiffany transitioned from running a consultancy to building HacWare after identifying phishing as a recurring vulnerability in her clients’ businesses.
• Phishing Impact: Phishing attacks lead to significant breaches, with 3.4 billion phishing emails sent daily and 71% of small businesses experiencing phishing attacks that lead to ransomware.
• Automated Solution: HacWare automates phishing simulations and security awareness training using AI, significantly reducing the labor hours required from 40 hours a week to just 1 hour a month.
• Educated Buyers: Small and mid-market businesses are becoming more knowledgeable about cybersecurity needs, understanding the importance of solutions like VPNs, password managers, and security awareness training.
• Continuous Improvement: HacWare releases software updates weekly, maintaining focus on customer pain points and continuously enhancing their platform’s capabilities.
• Future Vision: In five years, HacWare aims to provide comprehensive human risk assessments across various digital platforms, similar to credit scores, to identify and mitigate potential security risks.

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Sponsors:

Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership.

www.FrontLines.io

The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. 

www.GlobalTalent.co

In today's episode of Category Visionaries, we speak with Matt Butcher, CEO of Fermyon, a web assembly company that’s raised $26 Million in funding.

Topics Discussed:

• Matt’s background as a PhD in Philosophy, and the mistake that led him to learn coding in high school
• Working in HP and several other companies, including Microsoft
• Fermyon’s inception, and how it sells to developers as the easiest way to go from a blinking cursor to a deployed application in two minutes or less
• Matt's thoughts on the difference between a manager and a leader
• The advantages of starting a startup with a mature team, developing a pattern of boldness, and the importance of Matt’s mentor

Document Crunch is revolutionizing risk management in the $14 trillion global construction industry, addressing a critical challenge where 50% of projects finish over budget or behind schedule. In this episode of Category Visionaries, we sat down with Josh Levy, a former construction attorney turned tech founder who has raised $38 million to bring AI-powered contract intelligence to an industry plagued by legal complexity and financial risk. Document Crunch helps construction professionals understand and comply with complex contract terms, democratizing legal expertise that was previously available only to the largest firms with in-house counsel.

Topics Discussed:

• Document Crunch's mission to reduce the $43 million average construction lawsuit by improving contract administration
• How construction's thin margins make document compliance critical to profitability
• The company's evolution from a "Harvey for construction" to a field-ready construction AI platform
• Josh's journey from construction management major to attorney to tech founder
• The importance of authentic industry expertise in construction tech
• How the construction technology landscape has evolved over the past five years
• Document Crunch's partnership with Procore and vision for industry transformation

GTM Lessons For B2B Founders:

• Build solutions from lived experience: Josh's background as a construction attorney gave him deep industry knowledge that translated directly into product vision. He explains, "You can't fake what the experience brings to you...I close my eyes and think about interactions I've had with stakeholders that now are our user base in my former life." This authentic industry expertise has been critical to Document Crunch's success and ability to maintain a clear vision without pivoting.
• Focus on problems, not features: Josh learned early to emphasize the real-world problems Document Crunch solves rather than its AI capabilities. "We're not like an AI company. We're solving complex risks for our industry company," he notes. This problem-focused approach resonated more with construction professionals than technical features. Only recently has the company begun highlighting its AI capabilities, as the market has caught up with the technology.
• Marketing in verticals requires authentic brand building: In construction tech, Josh emphasizes that "brand reputation matters so much" and "that's not something you can fake your way to. That's earned on the conference floor. That's earned in the relationships." Document Crunch built trust by assembling a team of construction industry experts alongside their technical talent, creating credibility that has fueled adoption.
• Product-market fit comes from consistent industry focus: Document Crunch achieved success without pivoting because they remained focused on construction's specific challenges. Josh explains, "Zero freaking pivots, man. Zero. I always knew that we had a problem not just in the back office, but in the field." This clarity enabled them to refine their product methodically rather than chasing different markets.
• Find founder-market fit for vertical SaaS: For founders interested in construction tech, Josh advises, "My founder-market fit was a huge unlock at the onset of this venture." He recommends either having deep industry knowledge yourself or partnering with someone who does, as construction is "a unique industry" that requires specialized understanding. This principle applies broadly to any vertical-focused B2B solution.

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Sponsors:

Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership.

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The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. 

www.GlobalTalent.co

In today's episode of Category Visionaries, we speak with Patrick Woods, CEO and Co-Founder of Orbit, a community growth platform that's raised over $22 Million in funding, about why, in an economy where software is ‘adopted’ more than ‘sold,’ a sense of community can be a genuine driver of growth. Providing in-depth knowledge and powerful insights about sentiment, company size and almost everyone involved in your business, Orbit allows their clients to leverage an entire audience in pursuit of growth.

We also talk about Patrick’s background in marketing, brand strategy and customer success, why he eventually settled on a community-first approach to driving growth with Orbit, and why modern companies need to learn how to scale human-centric relationships.

Topics Discussed:

• Patrick’s background in marketing, brand strategy and customer success leadership, and the insights it gave him into how leading brands are built
• Ending up in San Francisco and how it felt to enter the startup economy for the first time
• Why modern businesses should allocate more focus to building communities, and the long-term benefits it can bring
• The radical change in how customers relate to their software, and the difference between being ‘bought’ and ‘adopted’
• Moving from business jargon to a more holistic understanding of how humans engage in their commercial journeys

Favorite book: 

• The Culture Map: Breaking Through the Invisible Boundaries of Global Business
• Good Strategy Bad Strategy: The Difference and Why It Matters

In today's episode of Category Visionaries, we speak with Brett Calhoun, Managing Director and General Partner at Scale VC, about why investing in extraordinary founders is front and center of their business model, and what they can bring to the table to give them a boost. With an industry-agnostic, idea-to-pre-seed stage funding focus, in everything across a broad spectrum of hardware and software innovations, Scale does what their name suggests, providing insights and guidance to get tomorrow’s business leaders where they need to be.

We also speak about Brett’s background in finance, valuation and venture capital, and the vision which would ultimately see him join Scale VC, the growing tech ecosystem in the American MidWest, the firms that Scale have already helped guide towards growth and success, and the criteria they look for in the partnerships of tomorrow

Topics Discussed:

• Brett’s background across the world of finance, and the insights he brings to the table as the MD of Scale VC
• What fascinated Brett about the venture capital space, and the portfolios he’s managed over the years
• The importance of local partnerships and why Scale is building together with the University of Missouri
• The MidWest’s growing tech ecosystem, spearheaded by a few companies and with more to surely follow
• What Scale VC looks for in its ideal founder profile, and how to prepare a world-beating pitch

In today's episode of Category Visionaries, we speak with Martin Einemo, CEO and Co-Founder of Insurely, an open insurance platform that's raised €22 Million in funding, about why so many of us lack true understanding of how the insurance industry operates, and why that’s a problem for both providers and their customers. By empowering insurance customers to access their data from the companies who cover them, Insurely helps people find the policies which really work for them, and ultimately provide a win-win solution for everyone involved.

We also speak about Martin’s long career in the insurance industry, and how that made him aware of both technological shortcomings and customer frustration, what ‘open insurance’ really means, how angel investors provided the real impetus to find a marketable offering, and why, for Insurely, that ultimately turned out to be in the B2B space.

Topics Discussed:

• Martin’s long career in the insurance industry across multiple European markets, and the insights it gave him into how it could be improved
• Why the information gap between customers and their insurance providers is such a major problem for the sector, and what can be done about it
• ‘Open insurance’ as the defining concept for Insurely, and how they are empowering customers through access to data
• Rise and fall in the insuretech space, and how Insurely manages to rise above the background noise
•  How transitioning from a B2C app to a B2B platform helped Insurely overcome scalability and revenue generation challenges

Favorite book: 

The Lean Startup: How Today's Entrepreneurs Use Continuous Innovation to Create Radically Successful Businesse

Welcome to another episode of Category Visionaries — the show that explores GTM stories from tech's most innovative B2B founders. In today's episode, we're speaking with Matt Watson, CEO & Founder of Origin, a financial wellness platform for the modern workforce that has raised over $70 Million in funding.

Here are the most interesting points from our conversation:

• From Wall Street to Startup: Matt transitioned from a corporate role at Citigroup to becoming a successful tech founder, driven by a desire to bring professional money management to employees everywhere.
• Early Entrepreneurial Lessons: Starting with a snow shoveling business at age 12, Matt’s entrepreneurial journey was heavily influenced by his small business owner parents.
• Indio’s Success: Matt's first company, Indio, was a vertical SaaS company that provided workflow management for commercial insurance agents, achieving a significant exit and returning over 100 times initial capital to early investors.
• Financial Wellness Vision: Origin aims to offer the same level of financial advice and management to everyday employees that CEOs receive, addressing the widespread stress and complexity associated with money management.
• Conviction in Vision: Despite early rejections, Matt’s unwavering belief in the necessity of financial wellness benefits for employees helped secure initial customers and drive Origin’s growth.
• Market Adaptation: When faced with a downturn in benefits spend, Origin successfully pivoted to focus on core financial services, demonstrating resilience and adaptability.

In today's episode of Category Visionaries, we speak with Sohaib Zahid, CEO and Co-Founder of Railz, an accounting data platform that's raised over $15 Million in funding, about why the future of finance needs access to data, and how they make sense of it for their customers. By connecting to major accounting, banking, and eCommerce platforms to provide quick access to normalized and analyzed financial data on small and medium-sized customers, Railz helps their clients make the right business-focused decisions in real-time.

We also speak about Sohaib’s background in the medical field and how he made the transition to the tech economy through the world of hardware, new data tools transforming the financial sector, why analysis and not access has been holding it back for so long, and the vital importance of integrating trust at every level of business.

Topics Discussed:

• Sohaib’s background in med school and what career trajectories look like for your typical ‘Asian kid’
• How he worked his way through a range of businesses before landing as the founder of Railz
• The new data technology transforming the world of financial decision making
• Why analysis, not access, has been holding back the finance sector, and how Railz is bringing a new depth and scope of understanding to the industry
• How building trust into the way your business functions operates at multiple levels between team, product, and customer
• Why small business’ decisions should be based on comprehensive analysis of the entire growth cycle

Favorite book: 

The Alchemist

Welcome to another episode of Category Visionaries — the show that explores GTM stories from tech's most innovative B2B founders. In today's episode, we're speaking with Edward Wu, CEO & Founder of Dropzone AI, a next-generation cybersecurity platform that has raised over $20 Million in funding.

Here are the most interesting points from our conversation:

• AI-Powered Security Analysts: Dropzone AI is leveraging advancements in generative AI to replicate the decision-making processes of human cybersecurity analysts, enhancing the speed and accuracy of threat detection and response.
• Addressing the Talent Gap: Edward highlighted the significant talent shortage in cybersecurity, with a global deficit of 4 million professionals. Dropzone AI's technology aims to mitigate this by automating routine security tasks, freeing human analysts to focus on more complex and critical threats.
• Early Challenges and Opportunities: Starting in February 2023, Edward's prior experience in cybersecurity allowed him to identify the inefficiencies in security operations centers (SOCs) and inspired him to develop a solution that reduces the burden of voluminous security alerts on analysts.
• Customer Acquisition Strategy: Dropzone AI's approach to landing their first paying customers involved identifying early adopters within the cybersecurity community who shared a vision for the potential of AI-driven security.
• Marketing and Messaging: Without a formal background in marketing, Edward developed an effective communication strategy by immersing himself in industry expos and trade shows, learning to craft messages that accurately convey the capabilities and benefits of Dropzone AI's technology.
• Transparent and Accessible Product Demos: In an industry often shrouded in secrecy, Dropzone AI stands out by offering ungated, interactive demos on their website, fostering transparency and building trust with potential customers by allowing them to experience the technology firsthand.

Welcome to another episode of Category Visionaries — the show that explores GTM stories from tech's most innovative B2B founders. In today's episode, we're speaking with Armon Sharei, CEO & Founder of Portal, a cell engineering platform that has raised $5 Million in funding.

Here are the most interesting points from our conversation:

• Navigating the IPO Process: Armon shares the intense experience of taking a company public, emphasizing the numerous meetings with investors and the unique challenges posed by COVID-19, including navigating interactions over video calls with limited visibility.
• Dealing with Stock Price Fluctuations: He discusses how stock price volatility can impact focus and morale, offering insights into maintaining discipline and guiding a team to stay mission-focused despite the pressures of public market performance.
• Public vs. Private Company Dynamics: Armon explains the differences between running a public and private company, highlighting the increased transparency, regulatory burden, and efficiency of financial transactions as some of the factors that influenced his preference for public company leadership.
• The Role of Forced Transparency: He reveals how being public reduced the opportunity for "smoke and mirrors" tactics, providing a clearer view of peers and competitors and increasing the efficiency of financial dealings.
• Impact of Being Public: Armon appreciates the sharper, more informed nature of public investors and the accelerated pace of financial transactions, though he acknowledges the challenges and paperwork involved.
• Motivation for Building and Innovation: Reflecting on his personal drive, Armon attributes his commitment to improving the world to his experiences growing up in Iran and witnessing global disparities, which fuels his work in advancing cell therapies.

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Sponsors:

Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership.

www.FrontLines.io

The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. 

www.GlobalTalent.co

Welcome to another episode of Category Visionaries — the show that explores GTM stories from tech's most innovative B2B founders. In today's episode, we're speaking with Pukar Hamal, CEO & Founder of SecurityPal, a security reviews platform that's raised $21 Million in funding.

Here are the most interesting points from our conversation:

• Addressing a Critical Pain Point: SecurityPal was born out of Pukar's firsthand experience with the frustrations of completing extensive security questionnaires during crucial sales cycles, highlighting a significant barrier to closing deals.
• Complexity in Security Reviews: Security reviews are becoming more complicated, involving not just questionnaires but also interviews, evidence submissions, and policy reviews, reflecting the increasing demand for thorough security compliance.
• Category Creation - Customer Assurance: Pukar emphasizes that SecurityPal is defining a new category called "Customer Assurance," which focuses on providing continuous assurance to clients from the first contact to the end of the relationship.
• Motivation and Mission: Pukar's deep commitment to building SecurityPal over the next 30-40 years stems from his desire to bring Silicon Valley's innovations to Nepal and help establish "Silicon Peaks" in Kathmandu.
• Focus on Customers: Pukar believes that focusing relentlessly on customers is the key to success, enabling better fundraising, attracting top talent, and driving overall growth and satisfaction.
• Unique Market Positioning: Despite the noise in the security space, SecurityPal stands out by building a dedicated team in Nepal and focusing on thoughtful growth rather than relying on growth hacks or shortcuts.

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Sponsors:

Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership.

www.FrontLines.io

The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe.

www.GlobalTalent.co

In today's episode of Category Visionaries, we speak with Igor Jablokov, CEO of Pryon, an AI-powered enterprise knowledge management platform that's raised more than $50 Million in funding.

Topics Discussed:

• Igor’s background in the tech industry, working with Apple to create Siri, and the state of AI today
• A great Bill Gates quote about our biases when thinking about the short and the long term
• Why the man Igor most admires is Benjamin Franklin
• Facing disbelief when introducing innovative ideas, and why Igor doesn’t care about how other people define certain things
• Regulation in the AI industry and where AI is headed

Favorite book: 

The Complete Isaac Asimov's Foundation Series Books 1-7

Welcome to another episode of Category Visionaries — the show that explores GTM stories from tech's most innovative B2B founders. In today's episode, we're speaking with Eric Helitzer, CEO & Founder of SubBase, a construction materials management platform that has raised $5 Million in funding.

Here are the most interesting points from our conversation:

• Origins of SubBase: Eric's extensive background in construction management highlighted inefficiencies in material purchasing workflows, leading him to found SubBase in 2022.
• Early Challenges: The first six months involved balancing software development with running multiple construction jobs, all while iterating on a promising MVP.
• Initial Revenue Struggles: It took about a year to start generating revenue, with initial reluctance to charge for the software proving to be a significant learning experience.
• Go-to-Market Strategy: SubBase’s GTM approach includes leveraging word-of-mouth, outbound efforts, marketing, and educational events to drive adoption.
• Convincing the Industry: Eric discussed the challenges of persuading construction subcontractors to adopt new technology, emphasizing an approach that enhances existing workflows rather than disrupting them.
• Future Vision: SubBase aims to digitize more of the financial aspects of material procurement, deepen integrations, and create a seamless onboarding experience for users.

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Sponsors:

Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership.

www.FrontLines.io

The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe.

www.GlobalTalent.co

Welcome to another episode of Category Visionaries — the show that explores GTM stories from tech's most innovative B2B founders. In today's episode, we're speaking with Etrit Demaj, Co-Founder at KODE Labs, a real estate IoT platform that has raised $38 million.

Here are the most interesting points from our conversation:

• The Early Vision for KODE Labs: Etrit and his co-founders saw a gap in the real estate market for a scalable, cloud-based operating system for smart buildings, which led to the founding of KODE Labs in 2017.
• Bootstrapping and Belief: KODE Labs operated without outside capital until 2022, relying on the founders' belief in the transformative potential of cloud-based smart building platforms and their own financial resources.
• Landing the Empire State Building as a Client: In 2022, KODE Labs secured the Empire State Building as a client, showcasing their platform's ability to meet the high standards of iconic properties committed to ESG and smart building initiatives.
• Evolution of Go-to-Market Strategy: The company’s GTM approach evolved from a local focus to a regional and then national strategy, driven by initial success and feedback from their first 50 buildings.
• Pioneering the Smart Building Category: KODE Labs is redefining the smart building category by transitioning what was traditionally on-premises to the cloud, making large-scale deployments globally feasible and cost-effective.
• Building a Channel Partner Network: One of the most significant strategic decisions was creating a channel partner program, enabling global scalability through certified partners who can implement and build on the KODE Labs platform independently.

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Sponsors:

Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership.

www.FrontLines.io

The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. 

www.GlobalTalent.co

In today's episode of Category Visionaries, we speak with Andrew Wolfe, Co-CEO and Co-Founder of Bloomfilter, an AI-driven process mining platform that's raised $7 million in funding.

Topics Discussed:

• Andrew’s background as a teenage coder in the early days of the Internet
• Why the entrepreneur that most inspires Andrew is John D. Rockefeller
• How 78% of software products are late, over budget, or don't ship at all – and what Bloomfilter does to help developers identify issues in their processes
• Leaving a job with an 8-figure salary in order to pursue something that pays less – but is more rewarding
• Having your product placed by analysts in a different category than the one you see it in, and how to fight that

Favorite book: 

Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: An Inquiry into Values

In today's episode of Category Visionaries, we speak with Fabrice Deprez, CEO of Discai, a fintech platform providing anti-money laundering solutions that's raised $12 Million in funding, about how the twin burdens of regulatory tightening and the real savings business can make, is driving a surge in focus on preventing money laundering. With an AI-based solution taking over much of the manual work and ensuring the most stringent of high standards, Discai is promising a more effective, efficient solution to money laundering than ever before.

We also speak about Fabrice’s background from a family of entrepreneurs and his 20 years in consulting, how several of his unique ideas became in-demand services before ever going to market, building a company from the bottom up, and what it’s like to take AI international.

Topics Discussed:

• Fabrice’s early start in entrepreneurship, from a business-savvy family to building a business from the bottom up
• 20 years of work in the consulting industry and what it taught Fabrice about some strategic market opportunities
• The reputation risk for financial institutions of getting caught up in money laundering and other fraudulent behaviors
• Why current solutions to fight money laundering have failed to plug some priority holes in the financial system
• How Discai took their AI model international, and what it means to adapt existing solutions to new markets
• Discai’s ambitions to dominate the future of financial crime prevention

In today's episode of Category Visionaries, we speak with Yevgeny Pats, CEO and Founder of CloudQuery, which has raised $18.5 Million in funding.

Topics Discussed:

• Yevgeny’s background in cybersecurity intelligence and his misguided debut as an startup founder 
• What kind of person inspires Yevgenny as an entrepreneur and the real but limited inspiration he had from books 
• How the idea for CloudQuery originated and developed and how Yevgeny got his first paying customer
• What you must do to make your startup rise above the noise of competition 
• Limitations that Yevgeny sees in giving advice to others, and what advice he would give to himself

Favorite book: 

The Lean Startup: How Today's Entrepreneurs Use Continuous Innovation to Create Radically Successful Businesses

Welcome to another episode of Category Visionaries — the show that explores GTM stories from tech's most innovative B2B founders. In today's episode, we're speaking with Henry O'Connell, CEO & Founder of Canary Speech, a healthcare technology company that has raised $26 Million in funding.

Here are the most interesting points from our conversation:

• Origins at a Bagel Shop: Canary Speech started when Henry and Jeff Adams, the lead developer behind Amazon Echo, met and discussed the future of using voice to detect diseases. This meeting laid the foundation for Canary's vocal biomarker technology.
• Incredible Speed and Accuracy: The company's AI-driven platform analyzes 40 seconds of voice data, delivering results in milliseconds with 93-96% accuracy for diseases like Alzheimer’s, mild cognitive impairment, and Parkinson’s. It’s revolutionizing early diagnosis.
• Real-time Patient Insights: Canary Speech enables doctors to assess multiple conditions — from neurological diseases to anxiety and depression — during a live conversation. This allows for more comprehensive care without additional time-consuming tests.
• Global Reach and Language Capabilities: Canary Speech’s models are already being used in multiple countries and languages, including English, Japanese, and Spanish, extending healthcare accessibility to underserved regions.
• Strategic Partnerships with Microsoft: Microsoft’s investment and integration of Canary Speech into the Azure platform have expanded the company's reach globally. They’re now exploring partnerships that could further embed Canary’s solutions into healthcare systems.
• The Transition to SaaS: After two years of project-based revenue, Canary Speech transitioned into a SaaS model, allowing for recurring revenue streams and long-term scalability in healthcare and call centers.

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Sponsors:

Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership.

www.FrontLines.io

The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. 

www.GlobalTalent.co