TechCrunch Early Stage 2022
April 14, 2022 — San Francisco
Speakers
Obi Akpuda
Startup Advocate Microsoft for Startups
Shely Aronov
Co-founder & CEO InnerPlant
AJ Asver
Director, Product Management Brex
Rajeev Batra
Partner Mayfield
Peter A Boyce ll
Founder & Managing Partner Stellation Capital
Dalton Caldwell
Managing Director & Group Partner Y Combinator
Navin Chaddha
Managing Partner Mayfield
Shankar Chandran
Partner Walden Catalyst Ventures
Janice Chen
Co-founder & CTO Mammoth Biosciences
Frederique Dame
General Partner GV (Google Ventures)
Glen Evans
Partner, Core Talent Greylock
Viviana Faga
General Partner Felicis
David Feinstein
Head of Partnerships SuperRare Labs
Cathy Gao
Partner Sapphire Ventures
Joséphine Kant
Program Manager & Coach Google for Startups
Antonio Key
Director of Venture Investments Samsung Next
Sahil Lavingia
Founder, SHL,Twitter; Founder & CEO Gumroad
Joe Lau
Co-founder & CTO Alchemy
Jess Lee
Partner Sequoia
Kelley Mak
Partner Work-Bench
Manny Medina
CEO & Co-Founder Outreach
Scott Moss
Principal Initialized Capital
Dami Osunsanya
Director, SB Opportunity Fund SoftBank Group
Ursheet Parikh
Partner Mayfield Fund
Niki Pezeshki
General Partner Felicis Ventures
Kyle Poyar
Operating Partner OpenView
Diego Rey
Co-Founder & CSO Endpoint Health
Brian Rothenberg
Partner defy.vc
Slava Rubin
Founder & Managing Partner, humbition Founder, Vincent
Carlotta (Lotti) Siniscalco
Partner Emergence Capital
Elliot Tomaeno
Founder & CEO ASTRSK
Anis Uzzaman
Founder & CEO Pegasus Tech Ventures
Omar Valle
Startup Business Development Amazon Web Services
Jennifer Vancini
Founding & General Partner Mighty Capital
Ryan Wexler
Investor Dell Technologies Capital
Hadley Wilkins
VP, Brand & Communications Atomic
Yana Welinder
Co-founder & CEO Kraftful
Tiffany Wong
Co-Founder and COO Pry Financials
Erik Zhou
Chief Accounting Officer Brex
Mary D'Onofrio
Vice President Bessemer Venture Partners
Lindsey Mignano
Founder Mignano Law Group
Born and raised Raleigh, NC in the heart of Research Triangle Park NC, his earliest tech memories can go as far back as designing MySpace pages for his classmates for $20 a design, he’s never been a stranger to letting his creativity and hustle take him to new heights. As a self-taught software developer, Obi has always been a life-long learner, but above all a life-long hustler and tinkerer. It was Obi’s passion for building from the ground up that led him to launching his first startup by the age of 20. Whether it’s ideating through a concept, sketching a design or testing out a product, Obi is excited about the opportunity to serve as not only a SME when it comes to rapid prototyping a product, but to also listen and empathize with founders as they look to navigate some of the uncertain waters that come with building a product from the ground up. He lives by the quote “Chances make champions” he has a dog named Drako Malfoy, and thinks Sopranos is the greatest show of all time.
Obi's Sessions
How to be a Player – Building a Winning MVP Roundtable
The goal of this roundtable is to discuss and learn how to utilize the Design Thinking methodology to create an experience that combines content, creativity and collaboration in building the first iteration of your product. In the end founders will be able to work through the common hurdles faced while transitioning from the idea to product phase
Shely Aronov is the CEO and co-founder of InnerPlant, an early-stage company pioneering the development of living plant sensors. She was born in Israel and graduated from Tel Aviv University before receiving an MBA from Standford. Shely is a repeat entrepreneur having founded a clean-label hummus brand and led a $320M World Bank-funded project to build a wastewater system in Cartegena, Colombia. She founded InnerPlant in 2018 to create crops that signal farmers with optical signals when they’re under stress from pathogens or a lack of water or nutrients.
Shely's Sessions
How to Tell Your Story
Shely Aronov is the CEO and co-founder of InnerPlant, an early-stage company pioneering the development of living plant sensors. She was born in Israel and graduated from Tel Aviv University before receiving an MBA from Standford. Shely is a repeat entrepreneur having founded a clean-label hummus brand and led a $320M World Bank-funded project to build a wastewater system in Cartegena, Colombia. Hear from Aronov on how to create a process around fundraising, how to make your pitch unique, and how to capture the attention of investors and others as you share your story.
AJ Asver works as a Product Management Director at Brex overseeing the development of our startup products. Prior to joining Brex, AJ worked at Coinbase on their data and payment products and was a serial founder selling his first business to Google in 2008 and then working in music production and co-founding Kado.
AJ's Sessions
Future-proof your FP&A
Believe it or not, the early choices you make building out your financial reporting process can have an outsized impact on your ability to scale your vision. Our panelists will share personal and practical advice every founder should know now for better decision-making later on
Rajeev Batra is an experienced investor and former enterprise software entrepreneur and executive. He helps lead Mayfield’s enterprise practice, focusing on Cloud and SaaS, and engages deeply with entrepreneurs on company building from the earliest stages. He has had a front-row seat to the trend of SaaS growing from systems of record to systems of engagement/action, by partnering with the founders of industry leading companies such as Marketo, Outreach, ServiceMax, SmartRecruiters, Crunchbase, Skilljar and WideOrbit. Rajeev holds an MBA from Harvard Business School, a Masters in Electrical Engineering from Cornell University, and a Bachelors in Electrical Engineering from the University of Maryland at College Park, where he serves on the Board of Visitors of the A. James Clark School of Engineering.
Rajeev's Sessions
Setting the Foundation for Built-to-Last Companies
When it comes to company building, some things can’t be retrofitted – they have to be set in place from day one. Join this session with Outreach Co-founder & CEO Manny Medina and Mayfield’s Rajeev Batra as they share insights from Outreach’s inception to iconic journey, including lessons learned on building an empathetic performance culture, embedding DEI into your DNA, the playbook for great category design and more.
Peter A. Boyce II is the Founder & Managing Partner of Stellation Capital, an early stage venture capital firm headquartered in Brooklyn. Prior to this, Peter spent eight years as a Partner at General Catalyst, an $8B venture capital firm that invests in powerful, positive change that endures. In addition to his work at GC, he co-founded & advises Rough Draft Ventures: a funding platform to support technology entrepreneurship on university campuses. Peter is a graduate of Harvard University, earning a B.A. in Applied Mathematics and a Secondary in Computer Science. He grew up in New York City, where he graduated from Stuyvesant High School. He is proud to be a Ron Brown Scholar. Outside of his time investing, Peter serves as a non-profit board member to support communities he is passionate about: The Shed, The Studio Museum in Harlem, The New Museum, NEW INC, Code Nation, and the Harvard College Fund. He serves as a Rock Venture Capital Partner at Harvard Business School, Program Advisor for the HBS MS/MBA Program, and an MIT Sandbox Board Member.
Peter A's Sessions
Nailing Your Series A
The fundraising landscape is frothy. Startups, for the first time in a long time, have plenty of leverage going into their Series A raise. Hear from Peter Boyce II, founder of Stellation Capital (former Partner at General Catalyst) on how to get the best terms, with the best investors for your startup, and ultimately the best long-term success, during your Series A fundraise.
Nailing Your Series A Roundtable
The fundraising landscape is frothy. Startups, for the first time in a long time, have plenty of leverage going into their Series A raise. Chat with Peter Boyce II, founder of Stellation Capital (former Partner at General Catalyst) on how to get the best terms, with the best investors for your startup, and ultimately the best long-term success, during your Series A fundraise.
Dalton is Managing Director, Architect and Group Partner at YC. He was the co-founder and CEO of imeem (acquired by MySpace in 2009), and the co-founder and CEO of App.net. He has a BS in Symbolic Systems and a BA in Psychology from Stanford University.
Dalton's Sessions
How to Get into Y Combinator
Y Combinator is the most prestigious accelerator out there, with more successful alumni who started out at YC than we care to count. As far as startup launchpads go, it’s relatively unmatched. Hear from YC Managing Director and Group Partner Dalton Caldwell on how to increase your chances of getting accepted to YC and how to optimize your time there to set your company up for success.
How to Get Into Y Combinator Roundtable
Y Combinator is the most prestigious accelerator out there, with more successful alumni who started out at YC than we care to count. As far as startup launchpads go, it’s relatively unmatched. Hear from YC Partner and Head of Admissions Dalton Caldwell on how to increase your chances of getting accepted to YC and how to optimize your time there to set your company up for success.
Navin leads Mayfield as Managing Partner. Under his leadership, Mayfield has raised eight U.S. funds and guided over 80 companies to positive outcomes. He has been named a Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum and has ranked on the Forbes Midas List of Top 100 Tech Investors seventeen times, including being named in the Top Five in 2020, 2022, 2023, and 2024. Navin’s investments have created over $120 billion in equity value and over 40,000 jobs. During his venture capital career, Navin has invested in over 60 companies, of which 18 have gone public and 27 have been acquired. Navin was one of the earliest Silicon Valley investors to leverage the promise of tech in India. He is Vice Chair of the Stanford Engineering Venture Fund and advisor to Neythri.org. Navin is an active philanthropist dedicated to supporting education, expanding opportunities for underrepresented communities, and addressing food insecurity. As an entrepreneur, Navin has co-founded or led three startups including VXtreme: a streaming media platform, acquired by Microsoft to become Windows Media; Rivio/CPA.com: a SaaS provider for small businesses, and iBeam Broadcasting (NASDAQ:IBEM): a streaming media content delivery network. Navin holds an MS degree in electrical engineering from Stanford University and a B.Tech degree in electrical engineering from IIT Delhi, where he was honored with the distinguished IIT Alumni Award.
Navin's Sessions
Going from 0 to Leading Web3 Platform Company
How do you go from consumer social to one of the first $10B companies in blockchain? In this session, Alchemy cofounder and CTO Joe Lau joins Mayfield Managing Director Navin Chaddha to share learnings on the founder journey to building the leading blockchain developer platform. Learn about how to find product-market fit in an emerging market, how to build a Web3 platform company, principles for navigating the early stage founder journey, and much more.
Shankar Chandran is a partner at Walden Catalyst Ventures, an over $550M early-stage venture capital fund dedicated to deep-tech investments focused on data & AI across North America, Europe, and Israel. Shankar is driven to solving the world’s toughest technology and business problems. His broad investments span Data Infrastructure & Cloud, AI, robotics, digital health, Industry 4.0, and device-level solutions. His 19-year venture capital record includes serving alongside Francis Ho as Co-Head of Samsung Catalyst Fund. He was previously a partner at Panorama Capital and JP Morgan Partners and holds eight patents as the primary inventor. Early in his career, Shankar was an engineer at Applied Materials and attended Indian Institute of Technology, IT-BHU (B.Tech.), Arizona State University (M.S) and The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania (MBA).
Shankar's Sessions
How to Pitch Your Deeptech Business
Deeptech is often seen as risky because it requires considerably longer development times and higher R&D investments before solutions can be brought to market. Finding the right business framework often remains a major challenge. We will break down how to best pitch your deeptech business to investors, including how to tell a compelling story around your value proposition and build a better proof of concept.
Janice Chen is the co-founder/CTO of Mammoth Biosciences, a biotechnology company based in the San Francisco Bay Area that harnesses the diversity of nature to power the next generation of CRISPR products across diagnostics and therapeutics. Through its discovery of novel CRISPR systems, the company enables the potential of its platform to read and write the code of life. Janice received her PhD from the lab of Nobel Laureate Jennifer Doudna at University of California, Berkeley. She investigated mechanisms of CRISPR proteins and developed technologies leading to multiple papers and patents, and co-invented the programmable CRISPR-based detection technology called DETECTR®. Janice was selected as a Forbes 30 Under 30 in Healthcare, Business Insider’s 30 Under 40 in Healthcare, Endpoints Top 20 Women in Biopharma, MIT Technology Review 35 Innovators Under 35, EY Entrepreneur Of The Year, SF Business Times Most Influential Women, and delivered a TEDx talk on the potential for CRISPR to democratize diagnostics.
Janice's Sessions
Evolving from Scientist to Founder
How do you go from PhD to startup founder and beyond? In this session, Mammoth Biosciences Co-founder & CTO Janice Chen and Endpoint Health Co-founder & CSO Diego Rey join Mayfield’s Ursheet Parikh to share learnings from their own scientist-to-founder growth journeys. Learn how to go from bench to bedside and leverage scientific breakthroughs to save lives, how startups can ink productive partnerships with industry behemoths, and more.
Frederique is general partner at GV specializing in disruptive technologies in the consumer space. She has spent 15 years building consumer and enterprise products for public companies and startups. Frederique helped start GV’s Women’s Health team and leads the cross-functional team of investors and advisors making investments in this space. Before joining GV, Frederique led product and engineering efforts at Uber, where in just four years, she helped scale the company from 80 employees to more than 7,000 and from 14 cities in four countries to 400+ in 68 countries. At Uber, she was also responsible for overseeing strategic programs focused on the global driver workforce and employee growth and productivity. Earlier, Frederique pioneered social at Yahoo!, building online communities and adding user-generated content to the company’s Search and Marketplace products. She also worked at online photo-sharing services Photobucket and SmugMug, for which she built social gaming mechanics to engage audiences and drive revenues. Frederique holds a Master of Science in Spacecraft Technology and Satellite Communications from University College London and a Master of Science in Telecommunications Engineering from Télécom SudParis.
Frederique's Sessions
Finding Product Market Fit
Validating your idea, through customer love for your product, may be one of the most emotionally and intellectually taxing parts of being an early stage founder. GV’s Frederique Dame, former operator (Uber) turned VC, will lay out the fundamentals of finding product market fit, including processes, feedback loops, and adaptability.
At Greylock, Glen helps entrepreneurs build high caliber teams, and prioritize recruiting as a core, strategic function of their business. Under his leadership, the core talent team at Greylock supports portfolio companies in recruiting and talent acquisition strategies. They guide entrepreneurs in sourcing as well as the tools and systems available to aid the recruitment, interview and hiring process. An experienced recruiting professional, Glen joined Greylock in 2018 following more than a dozen years overseeing recruiting and team-building at fast-growing tech companies including Slack, Facebook and Google. At Slack, Glen was the company’s first recruitment director and was responsible for designing talent acquisition strategy during a period of rapid growth, helping the company successfully hire across all functions on a global scale. At Facebook, he was instrumental in building the company’s engineering teams and processes in the early days as they began to scale rapidly. He also onboarded Oculus into Facebook’s operations post acquisition while also building their recruiting team to support aggressive growth plans.
Glen's Sessions
How to Hire Top Talent in Today's Hyper Competitive Market
Coming off of a record year for startups combined with the Great Resignation, nearly every startup is facing a shortage of talent. Hear from Greylock’s Glen Evans (former Slack, Facebook and Google) on how to optimize the recruiting and hiring process, how to find and develop talent, and the best practices for closing candidates.
Viviana is a General Partner at Felicis, bringing over 20 years of experience designing and building brand categories for successful cloud/SaaS and enterprise social companies. Her expertise includes scaling go-to-market SaaS teams, messaging and positioning, category creation, freemium product strategy, and sales enablement. An experienced angel investor, Viviana previously served as an operating partner and advisor at Emergence Capital. She held leadership positions in marketing at Yammer, Salesforce, Platfora, and Zenefits. After Yammer’s $1.2B acquisition by Microsoft, she became its head of marketing for enterprise social, which included Office 365, Skype, and Lync. She has a BS in Operations Management & Information Systems from Santa Clara University and enjoys spending time with her family and traveling internationally.
Viviana's Sessions
Going from Wedge to TAM
Investors love unrealistic goals based on pragmatic strategies. Felicis Ventures’ Viviana Faga and Niki Pezeshki will explain how to think about your early customers, the path to expanding that pool, and how to balance the possible plan with the impossible dream.
David leads partnerships at SuperRare Labs and works with marquee brands, top galleries, and agencies to amplify the SuperRare artist + Collector network. SuperRare is the premier digital NFT art marketplace with over $250M in sales in 2021 and is often compared to the Sothebys + Christies of the NFT art market.
David's Sessions
Beyond the Round: Making the most of your investor relationships
Today, many VCs offer founders more than just capital: They can provide useful counsel, open doors to the right partners, and help provide operational services that get your company off the ground and scale. Hear from Samsung Next alongside YC alumnus Kraftful and leading NFT marketplace SuperRare, as they share how the right investors on their cap table helped them supercharge their launch and growth efforts.
Cathy Gao is a Partner at Sapphire Ventures, where she invests in B2B AI and software, backing founders building AI-native companies that become core to how work gets done. She is particularly interested in companies that deliver measurable customer outcomes, build durable distribution, and compound into broader workflow ownership over time. Cathy serves on the boards of EliseAI, Blue J, Jeeva AI, Sword Health, and Medable. Before joining Sapphire, Cathy invested at AXA Venture Partners and began her career at TA Associates and Blackstone. She also spent time as an operator at Gusto, joining at the Series B, an experience that continues to shape how she partners with founders navigating rapid growth and strategic inflection points. Cathy studied economics and history at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, graduating summa cum laude. Her perspectives on enterprise AI and software have been featured in Bloomberg, CNBC, and The Wall Street Journal.
Cathy's Sessions
How Early Stage Founders Can Future Proof Against Market Volatility Roundtable
Quickly and unexpectedly, we’re seeing the market turn extremely volatile. Almost overnight, the economy has experienced increased inflation, hikes in interest rates and instability resulting from global political tensions between Ukraine and Russia. Now, investors are looking to public market volatility to anticipate how unstable global markets will affect their investments. As market conditions change, early-stage founders need to be ready for unexpected market swings.While founders do not have a crystal ball to see what market conditions will look like 12 or 24 months from now, early-stage startup founders can work to future-proof themselves now. Cathy, an investor who backs companies from Series A to pre-IPO, can provide a few key strategies
How Early Stage Founders Can Future-Proof Against Market Volatility
Quickly and unexpectedly, we’re seeing the market turn extremely volatile. Almost overnight, the economy has experienced increased inflation, hikes in interest rates and instability resulting from global political tensions between Ukraine and Russia. Now, investors are looking to public market volatility to anticipate how unstable global markets will affect their investments. As market conditions change, early-stage founders need to be ready for unexpected market swings. While founders do not have a crystal ball to see what market conditions will look like 12 or 24 months from now, early-stage startup founders can work to future-proof themselves now. Cathy Gao, a partner at Sapphire Ventures, backs companies from Series A to pre-IPO, and will provide a number of key strategies.
Joséphine Kant is a Global Program Manager at Google for Startups, a certified leadership coach with her own practice, and co-founder of the non-profit Impact Gym focused on social entrepreneurship. As Global Program Manager for Google for Startups, Joséphine works on Google’s acceleration program that annually helps thousands of entrepreneurs get access to mentoring, technology, and connections. Prior to that, she worked in People Operations and advised Google’s leadership on location strategy and the talent workforce, designing hiring assessment tools to encourage unbiased and more equitable decision making. Joséphine is a certified and ICF-accredited leadership coach with the Co-Active Training Institute, the largest leadership development organization in the world, and runs a private coaching practice for entrepreneurs. She also sits on the Forbes Coaching Council, an invitation-only organisation for leading business and career coaches. She specialises in coaching startup founders on leadership, building culture, team development, and hiring and retaining talent. As an advocate for social entrepreneurship, Joséphine co-founded Impact Gym. Impact Gym is a non-profit focused on developing founders from underrepresented communities by connecting them to capital and connections. Her passion is to help social impact entrepreneurs leave their mark on the world.
Antonio serves as a Director of Venture Investments at Samsung Next. In this role, he works to identify software and services startups that could enable new revenue streams, facilitate entry into new markets and enhance Samsung’s technology capabilities and product offerings. He targets investments in early stage startups in the following focus areas: • Metaverse (Immersive Experiences, Creator Economy, AR/VR, Decentralization) • Blockchain (Dev/Builder Tools, Ownership, Community, UX) • Connected Health & Wellness • Fintech Prior to Samsung Next, Antonio worked on Wall Street as a bulge bracket investment banker, providing M&A advisory to private equity firms and F500 companies. His additional professional experiences include being a 2x bootstrapped founder and a strategy management consultant.
Antonio's Sessions
Beyond the Round: Making the most of your investor relationships
Today, many VCs offer founders more than just capital: They can provide useful counsel, open doors to the right partners, and help provide operational services that get your company off the ground and scale. Hear from Samsung Next alongside YC alumnus Kraftful and leading NFT marketplace SuperRare, as they share how the right investors on their cap table helped them supercharge their launch and growth efforts.
Gumroad exists to help every creative earn a living selling the stuff they make directly to their audience. Previously, he was early at Pinterest — a service that lets users collect, organize, and share the things they are into — and worked on turntable’s mobile apps. He designs and builds products for fun and profit.
Sahil's Sessions
When it Makes Sense to Crowdfund Capital
A new SEC regulation allows startups to raise capital using crowdsourced fundraising. Gumroad founder and CEO, Sahil Lavingia will speak alongside Slava Rubin, the founder of Indiegogo and Vincent, and now the Managing Partner of humbition, an early-stage venture fund, about when it makes sense to crowdsource capital. During this session, they’ll explain the regulations and discuss the different offerings available for founders.
Joe Lau is the co-founder and CTO of Alchemy, the world’s leading blockchain developer platform. He was honored as Forbes 30 Under 30, received his BS & MS in Computer Science at Stanford, and was a former engineer at Pinterest, Google, and LinkedIn. A serial entrepreneur, he co-created the #1 social app in the world, Down To Lunch.
Joe's Sessions
Going from 0 to Leading Web3 Platform Company
How do you go from consumer social to one of the first $10B companies in blockchain? In this session, Alchemy cofounder and CTO Joe Lau joins Mayfield Managing Director Navin Chaddha to share learnings on the founder journey to building the leading blockchain developer platform. Learn about how to find product-market fit in an emerging market, how to build a Web3 platform company, principles for navigating the early stage founder journey, and much more.
Jess Lee is Partner at Sequoia Capital. She is a board director at Ironclad, Maven Clinic, Wonolo, Squint, and Flagship. In addition to investing, she is also Chief Product Officer and leads the engineering, product, design, and data science teams at Sequoia. Prior to Sequoia, she was Co-Founder & CEO of fashion app Polyvore (acquired by Yahoo in 2015) and a product manager for Google Maps. Jess is also a founding and board member of All Raise, a non-profit dedicated to improving diversity in the tech industry. Jess has a B.S. from Stanford in Computer Science and loves manga, drawing, and cosplay.
Jess's Sessions
How to Get Your First Yes
Once the first domino falls, the rest inevitably follow. But when it comes to early fundraising, it’s not as simple as a tap of the finger. Sequoia’s Jess Lee will talk you through how to get that first investor on board, which will more often than not get other investors excited about the prospect of working with you.
Kelley Mak is a principal at Work-Bench, where he focuses on early-stage enterprise technology investments in areas including security, cloud and developer tools.
Kelley's Sessions
Critical Security Considerations To Scale & Sell Roundtable
Many startups tend to put security on the back burner in their early days, not realizing the critical role it plays in building a stable foundation for growth and in actually helping close customers. Kelley Mak, Partner at Work-Bench, an early stage enterprise VC, will help facilitate a conversation on what steps to take for good security hygiene, how to evaluate security at different stages of the startup journey, and how to leverage your security program to win customers.
Manny co-founded Outreach in 2014 and now serves as CEO. Prior to Outreach, Manny was employee number three on Amazon’s AWS team and led the Microsoft mobile division from launch to $50M in annual revenue. He holds an MBA from Harvard and a Master of Computer Science from the University of Pennsylvania. Manny is a model of vulnerable and transparent leadership to his employees, from his heartfelt weekly email to the team, to the traditional Friday get-together where the whole company shares their highs and lows of the week. He is a proponent of saving the planet by consuming less and purchasing second-hand whenever possible (he might be the only CEO to take the stage at industry events in shirts purchased from Goodwill). Manny grew up in Ecuador and now lives with his wife and three children in Seattle.
Manny's Sessions
Setting the Foundation for Built-to-Last Companies
When it comes to company building, some things can’t be retrofitted – they have to be set in place from day one. Join this session with Outreach Co-founder & CEO Manny Medina and Mayfield’s Rajeev Batra as they share insights from Outreach’s inception to iconic journey, including lessons learned on building an empathetic performance culture, embedding DEI into your DNA, the playbook for great category design and more.
Scott is a product engineer, most recently a senior software engineer at Netflix before he joined Initialized as principal. He’s worked with companies such as Nike, IBM, and Bloomberg to assist them with engineering and training, and he’s contributed to some of the top open-source projects. He’s a Y Combinator alumni, a two-time founder of venture-backed companies, and he’s lived through many of the experiences and challenges our founders go through daily. He’s a mentor and shares real advice for founders and people trying to break into tech on his YouTube channel, where he also shares his own unconventional story.
Scott's Sessions
Technical Recruiting; What Early Founders and Entrepreneurs Should Be on the Lookout For Roundtable
Scott will lead a discussion around technical recruiting, the challenges of hiring in today’s hyper competitive market and what early stage founders can do to compete for great talent. As an engineer and former founder himself, Scott knows what it’s like to be on both sides of the negotiation table and will share practical advice founders can implement immediately: Becoming mission-driven vs profit-driven to inspire and attract the right people and compete with larger companies who can offer more perks, prioritizing the engineering traits important to you and investing in people’s potential rather than current skill level, and changing up your interview style. Employees have the leg up right now and it’s not a bad thing – but defining your company’s values is now a must do, not a nice-to-do anymore.
Dami leads Value Creation for SoftBank Group’s SB Opportunity Fund, where she’s charged with helping the portfolio companies grow and scale. At SoftBank, she’s led ecosystem partnerships and value creation work for companies in SB’s $100B Vision Fund including WeWork, Uber, Bytedance, amongst others. She also created and launched SB’s early-stage global accelerator, Emerge, where she led the sourcing, investing and support of companies across health tech, fintech, e-commerce, edtech, and software industries, and sat on the Investment Committee of. She’s invested in 12 companies from this inaugural cohort, which has now gone global. Prior to joining SoftBank, Dami helped lead Intel’s $75B Corporate Finance and Strategy team, and managed an extensive fulfillment operation with more than 100 employees, filling 15,000 orders a day at McMaster-Carr. She’s also led operations and finance teams at Sprint Corporation and Kraft Foods. Dami holds a Finance and Chinese degree from Emory University and an MBA from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business. She was named to Venture Capital Journal’s 40 Under 40 Rising Stars in 2022.
Dami's Sessions
Getting from Early to Growth Stage
For most investors, early-stage investments are largely about the founder and vision – but once you get to a growth stage investment, there are more factors at play. This session will cover the key differences between an early raise and a growth raise, what milestones investors look for – and how founders can prepare.
Ursheet is a Partner at Mayfield and invests in Human & Planetary Health and Infrastructure Software. His investments in human & planetary health include Mammoth Biosciences (CRISPR), Mission Bio (Single Cell Sequencing, Oncology), Qventus (Healthcare AI), Endpoint Health (Precision Immunology), Mirvie (predict and prevent pregnancy complications for moms and babies), GraphWear (Continuous Non-invasive Glucose Monitoring), Chemix (AI-powered next gen EV battery technologies) and Foodsmart (reverse metabolic disease). His investments in the enterprise sector include Versa Networks (Security and SD-WAN), Qwiet (Application Security), Rancher Labs (Cloud Computing platform acquired by SUSE), CloudGenix (SD-WAN platform acquired by Palo Alto Networks) and Netsil (Application Observability platform acquired by Nutanix). Prior to Mayfield, Ursheet had an operating career as a repeat entrepreneur and executive at Cisco and Microsoft. Ursheet was co-founder & CEO of StorSimple – the leading cloud-integrated storage company that was acquired by Microsoft in 2012. Ursheet holds an MBA from the Wharton School and a Bachelors in Computer Science from the Indian Institute of Technology in Mumbai, from which he received the Young Alumni Achiever award in 2015.
Ursheet's Sessions
Evolving from Scientist to Founder
How do you go from PhD to startup founder and beyond? In this session, Mammoth Biosciences Co-founder & CTO Janice Chen and Endpoint Health Co-founder & CSO Diego Rey join Mayfield’s Ursheet Parikh to share learnings from their own scientist-to-founder growth journeys. Learn how to go from bench to bedside and leverage scientific breakthroughs to save lives, how startups can ink productive partnerships with industry behemoths, and more.
Investors love unrealistic goals based on pragmatic strategies. Felicis Ventures’ Aydin Senkut and Viviana Faga will explain how to think about your early customers, the path to expanding that pool, and how to balance the possible plan with the impossible dream.
Niki's Sessions
Going from Wedge to TAM
Investors love unrealistic goals based on pragmatic strategies. Felicis Ventures’ Viviana Faga and Niki Pezeshki will explain how to think about your early customers, the path to expanding that pool, and how to balance the possible plan with the impossible dream.
Kyle leads OpenView’s Growth Team, responsible for advising portfolio executives on strategies to increase revenue growth and dominate their markets. He specializes in pricing & packaging strategy, which is the most effective yet overlooked growth lever at a SaaS company’s disposal. He’s an expert in product-led growth (PLG), go-to-market strategy, usage-based business models and SaaS benchmarks. Subscribe to his newsletter, Growth Unhinged, at kylepoyar.substack.com.
Kyle's Sessions
How to Scale with Usage-based Pricing
As more SaaS startups move toward usage-based pricing, the old playbook becomes less and less useful. OpenView’s Kyle Poyar can talk through how to grow your business without all the same benchmarks, milestones and strategies as the SaaS companies who’ve come before.
How to Scale with Usage-based Pricing Roundtable
As more SaaS startups move toward usage-based pricing, the old playbook becomes less and less useful. OpenView’s Kyle Poyar will chat with you about how to grow your business without all the same benchmarks, milestones and strategies as the SaaS companies who’ve come before.
Diego is a co-founder, board member, and Chief Scientific Officer of Endpoint Health, a precision immunology therapeutics company. Prior to co-founding Endpoint Health, Diego invented the core technology and led investigational efforts related to Roche’s antibiotic therapy guidance research and development program. Prior to Roche, Diego co-founded GeneWEAVE, a company that developed rapid tests to detect and guide therapy choice for serious infections, which was acquired by Roche in 2015. After Roche, Diego was a Visiting Partner at Y Combinator which has a portfolio of over 3,000 companies with a combined value of over $400B and includes over 300 life sciences and healthcare companies. Diego received a BS in Electrical Engineering from UC Santa Barbara and an MS and PhD in Biomedical Engineering from Cornell University.
Diego's Sessions
Evolving from Scientist to Founder
How do you go from PhD to startup founder and beyond? In this session, Mammoth Biosciences Co-founder & CTO Janice Chen and Endpoint Health Co-founder & CSO Diego Rey join Mayfield’s Ursheet Parikh to share learnings from their own scientist-to-founder growth journeys. Learn how to go from bench to bedside and leverage scientific breakthroughs to save lives, how startups can ink productive partnerships with industry behemoths, and more.
I’m an investment partner at defy. As a former founder, operator, and scaler from startup creation through IPO, I understand and deeply appreciate all of the ups and downs along the entrepreneurial journey. I thrive at the intersection of strategy, product, growth and analytics, with an emphasis on how we lead and empower our people to drive the best outcomes. I love working in support of the incredible entrepreneurs who make this happen, defying all reasonable expectations to create a new reality from unique insight and vision. Before joining defy, I spent more than 6 years scaling Eventbrite from a startup into the world’s largest event technology platform and marketplace for live experiences. As Eventbrite’s first VP of Growth, CMO and VP/GM of the company’s largest revenue segment, I helped to scale the business from a small startup to millions of users, $300M in revenue, and through our IPO (NYSE: EB) with a nearly $3B market cap. To stay close to the early-stage as Eventbrite outgrew its startup roots, I spent years advising and investing in dozens of startups independently and through First Round Capital’s Angel Track & Expert Network, Sequoia Capital’s Scout program, and YC’s Growth Council. Prior to Eventbrite I co-founded SkillSlate, a VC-backed local services marketplace, building the business through our acquisition by TaskRabbit (later acquired by IKEA). I joined Yahoo! in its first ten years, helping to build several of Yahoo!’s early businesses as the company’s youngest Product Manager. I started my first business from my USC dorm room—an early online ticket brokerage company called EventTicketsNow. At USC, I studied entrepreneurship and marketing and played for USC’s lacrosse team as two-time team captain and president, defensive MVP, and two-time recipient of the team’s “Trojan of the Year” award for leadership and positive impact on the overall program. I was also honored to play for Team USA West, representing our country in the 2004 International Games. Afterwards, I earned my MBA in finance and general management from NYU’s Stern School of Business. As a fourth-generation San Franciscan, I love building our life here with my wife Kelly, our children Chase, Charlie, Brooks and Taylor and our dog Rosie. On nights and weekends, you’ll find me coaching our kids’ sports, enjoying good food and red wine, snowboarding, playing guitar, or grinding through CrossFit workouts. One truism I’ve found holds over time: it’s all about the people. I’m truly honored to be part of this special defy team, and to be a coach, confidant, and partner to a phenomenal group of entrepreneurs.
Brian's Sessions
Growth Marketing for Startups
It takes money to make money, but smart spending on growth marketing can make a world of difference not only to your bottom line, but to your long-term viability. Hear from defy.vc’s Brian Rothenberg, who led marketing and growth for TaskRabbit and EventBrite, on how to make the most of your marketing dollars.
Slava Rubin is founder at Vincent, founder at Indiegogo and founder and general partner at humbition.
Slava's Sessions
When it Makes Sense to Crowdfund Capital
A new SEC regulation allows startups to raise capital using crowdsourced fundraising. Gumroad founder and CEO, Sahil Lavingia will speak alongside Slava Rubin, the founder of Indiegogo and Vincent, and now the Managing Partner of humbition, an early-stage venture fund, about when it makes sense to crowdsource capital. During this session, they’ll explain the regulations and discuss the different offerings available for founders.
When It Makes Sense to Crowdfund Capital Roundtable
A new SEC regulation allows startups to raise capital using crowdsourced fundraising. Indiegogo and Vincent founder and now GP of humbition, an early stage venture fund, Slava Rubin will chat with founders about when it makes sense to crowdsource capital.
Carlotta “Lotti” is a Partner at Emergence Capital. She joined the firm in 2018 as a Senior Associate and was named Principal in 2020. Less than a year later, Lotti was promoted to Partner as a result of the extraordinary impact she has had on the firm, the team, and the companies Emergence backs. Lotti’s strong investor acumen and long-term perspective are instrumental in uncovering compelling and unique investment opportunities, and in leading operational change. She has an outstanding ability to understand complex business structures and to apply that knowledge both in her diligence and at the board table. At Emergence, Lotti invests in early stage enterprise software companies. She serves on the Board of Directors of Whistic and of High Alpha, and is a Board Observer at Convex, Talent Hack, and Oyster. Being an immigrant herself (originally from Italy), she is passionate about helping immigrants and other underrepresented founders build iconic technology companies. She is also a fierce advocate for women in the Venture Capital industry. Lotti brings to Emergence a deep understanding of fintech, where she spent several years both as an operator and as an investor. For three years, she was an investor in financial services and financial technology companies at Advent International, a large global private equity fund, where she was also an observer on the Transunion board. She also spent time in the BizOps group at Nerdwallet and was an early stage investor at Ribbit Capital, a fintech-focused VC, where she led diligence on companies in the cyber insurance and 401K space. Lotti began her career as an investment banker at Goldman Sachs. She received a Bachelor of Science from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, where she graduated cum laude, and an MBA from the Stanford Graduate School of Business.
Carlotta (Lotti)'s Sessions
Pitch Deck Teardown
An enticing pitch is foundational to a startup’s chance of successful fundraising. Pair that with a well-constructed pitch deck and you’re off to the races. In this interactive session, Emergence Capital’s Lotti Siniscalco will look through real startup pitch decks submitted by the audience to share what sings, what doesn’t, and why.
How to Craft Your Pitchdeck Roundtable
An enticing pitch is foundational to a startup’s chance of successful fundraising. Pair that with a well-constructed pitch deck and you’re off to the races. At this roundtable, Emergence Capital’s Lotti Siniscalco will review your pitchdeck to share what sings, what doesn’t, and why.
Elliot founded ASTRSK in 2012 after spending 15 years working in agencies in SF, NYC, London and Paris. He has worked with companies such as Facebook, Eventbrite, Squarespace, Frank & Oak, Glu Mobile, ClassPass, Zola and more. Since launching in 2012, ASTRSK has helped launch more than 300 startups and tech products and has been part of 12 exits. Elliot is an investor in the Female Founders Fund and LP in Primary Ventures.
Elliot's Sessions
How to Get Earned Media
When wielded properly, press can be an invaluable weapon. ASTRSK founder Elliot Tomaeno has spent his life telling startup’s stories to the press. He’ll break down how journos think about news, how to get their attention, and how to own the relationship in the long-term.
How To Get Earned Media Roundtable
When wielded properly, press can be an invaluable weapon. ASTRSK founder Elliot Tomaeno has spent his life telling startup’s stories to the press. He’ll break down how journos think about news, how to get their attention, and how to own the relationship in the long-term.
Anis Uzzaman, Ph.D. is the Founder and CEO of Pegasus Tech Ventures. With over US$2 billion under Pegasus Tech Ventures’ management, Anis is responsible for overall global investments and operations of the firm. Anis also serves as the Chairman of Startup World Cup, a global platform that fosters innovation and entrepreneurship around the world. Anis has invested in over 220 startups globally. Some of Anis’s prominent startup investments are SpaceX, Airbnb, Doordash, 23andMe, Bird, Coinbase, Robinhood, SoFi, Calm, Color, Gojek, Bukalapak, Money Forward, etc. Anis currently serves and previously served as the board director in multiple global public and private companies including Lark, Asteria, Zuu, Tech in Asia, Affectiva, Jetlore, Blue Frog Robotics, Afero, Kii, Sano, I&C Cruise, Abivin and so on. Anis holds a Bachelor of Engineering degree from Tokyo Institute of Technology in Tokyo, Japan, a Master of Science in Engineering from Oklahoma State University in the USA, and a Ph.D. in Computer Engineering from Tokyo Metropolitan University in Tokyo, Japan. Anis is a Forbes Finance Council member and contributor at Forbes. Anis is also a contributing editor at Inc. Magazine, and an Entrepreneur Leadership Network Contributor at the Entrepreneur Magazine. Anis is an honored guest speaker in international conferences, workshops and seminars, has published more than 30 technical papers, and is the author of several books published globally.
Anis's Sessions
Why Raising Venture Capital Benefits Startups
Fundraising is a critical phase of any startup’s life, but it’s also a challenging task and hard to do successfully. The truth is, the amount of money that a startup raises – and how the startup does it – plays a major role in the company’s future trajectory. Given the many sources of capital available, it is smart to understand how corporate venture capital can be a successful model for startups and corporate investors.
Omar is a former founder with 20+ years of experience building teams and selling into the Enterprise and SMB markets. He has spent the last seven years on the AWS Startup team working with over 1,000 startups from accelerators like Y Combinator, Techstars, and StartX. He has mentored many of these startups from their pre-seed stage all the way to becoming successful unicorns. Omar is also a certified Optimize Coach and is committed to people’s full development and potential.
Omar's Sessions
Top 10 mistakes early founders make
What are the top mistakes early founders make while they are trying to reach Product/market fit and how do you avoid them? In this presentation, Omar will distill the lessons he has learned while working with over a thousand early stage startups from top accelerators like Y Combinator, Techstars, and StartX.
Jennifer Vancini is a Founding General Partner of Mighty Capital. Jennifer has been investing for 10+ years, and prior to Mighty Capital built Pointgrey Partners, a family investment office where she achieved a 15x cash-on-cash return. Before becoming a full-time investor, she held executive roles in corporate and strategic business development, especially in the high-growth security and mobile sectors with companies such as Telefonica, Symbian/Nokia, and Certicom, which she helped take public in Canada. Jennifer serves on private and non-profit boards and is currently the Vice-Chair of a Dean’s Advisory Council at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, where she completed her MBA.
Jennifer's Sessions
Why You Don't Need to Be a Unicorn Roundtable
Unicorns, not the mythical horse-like creatures from fantasy but private companies valued at $1 billion or more, seem to be popping up everywhere. Despite this, the reality is that although VC-funded companies need to grow big and fast, not every entrepreneur aims to be a unicorn – so how does one navigate the funding landscape without that goal in mind? The answer lies in a thorough exit strategy. With over 10 years of investment experience, Jennifer Vancini knows how to plan for an exit. At this roundtable, she will chat with you about best practices for preparing your company for exit and positioning yourself and your team for financial success. You will walk away understanding how the decisions you make today affect your exit options: which investors you choose, how you build your team, and more.
Ryan Wexler is an investor at Dell Technologies Capital, where he primarily focuses on data infrastructure and the developer landscape. Prior to joining DTC, Ryan worked in the technology investment banking division of Citigroup. He also spent time with the data management/analytics team at Magnetar Capital. Ryan holds a BA in Economics and Computer Science from Northwestern University and is based in Palo Alto, CA.
Ryan's Sessions
How to Talk Business When You’re a Technical Founder
When it comes to pitching early-stage enterprise startups, technical founders can sometimes neglect the business side of the conversation. To help build your confidence in “talking business,” DTC’s Ryan Wexler will cover the fundamentals of what investors want to hear about how you’ll transform your technology into a fundamentally important business.
Hadley has spent the past two decades in Silicon Valley building brands and helping founders tell their stories. She runs branding and communications at venture studio Atomic where she works side by side with founders at companies like Bungalow, Found, Hims & Hers, Homebound, OpenStore, and Replicant. She’s launched dozens of startups across multiple industries and worked with some of the world’s most iconic global brands and investment firms on marketing and communications. She most recently built and ran marketing at Redpoint Ventures, as well as helping fast-growing companies like Figma and Brandless. Hadley graduated from Boston University with a degree in Art History, a passion for design, and a specialty in explaining the irrational use of negative space.
Hadley's Sessions
Playbook for Startup Brand Building
Building your brand at the early stages of company building is critical but often overlooked and misunderstood. A brand is more than a logo and a website; it’s the story that reflects your values and vision, guides every touchpoint and communication, and sparks connection and emotion. Brands are participatory, so you create your own brand story at launch, but others define it as you grow. Learn the building blocks of developing a compelling brand story that wins hearts and minds while supporting your company’s growth.
Playbook for Startup Brand Building Roundtable
Building your brand at the early stages of company building is critical but often overlooked and misunderstood. A brand is more than a logo and a website; it’s the story that reflects your values and vision, guides every touchpoint and communication, and sparks connection and emotion. Brands are participatory, so you create your own brand story at launch, but others define it as you grow. Chat with Hadley Wilkins to learn the building blocks of developing a compelling brand story that wins hearts and minds while supporting your company’s growth.
Yana is CEO and Founder of Kraftful – an AI assistant that helps product teams build better products by listening to users at scale. Before starting Kraftful, she led product teams at multiple tech companies and personally experienced the challenge of trying to involve millions of users in the product development process. At Kraftful, she built a team of Meta, Slack, and IFTTT alumni, backed by Y Combinator, Google, Samsung, and other exceptional investors and entrepreneurs. Yana is also a Stanford fellow and has been invited to give talks at the White House, the UN Internet Governance Forum, Yale, NYU, and many product events and podcasts over the years.
Yana's Sessions
Beyond the Round: Making the most of your investor relationships
Today, many VCs offer founders more than just capital: They can provide useful counsel, open doors to the right partners, and help provide operational services that get your company off the ground and scale. Hear from Samsung Next alongside YC alumnus Kraftful and leading NFT marketplace SuperRare, as they share how the right investors on their cap table helped them supercharge their launch and growth efforts.
Tiffany Wong is the Co-Founder and COO at Pry, a financial planning software company that helps companies manage their budgets, hiring plan, financial models, and cash runway. In her role, Tiffany has helped grow the company from 0 to 400+ customers within its first two years. Prior to her role at Pry, Tiffany supported CEOs at inDinero, a Y Combinator S10 company, and Replicon. Tiffany is also a Y Combinator alumni (W21), and a fellow of OnDeck Scale 2. Born & raised in San Francisco, Tiffany graduated early from UC Berkeley in 3 years with a B.A. in Economics and a minor in Ethnic Studies.
Tiffany's Sessions
Future-proof your FP&A
Believe it or not, the early choices you make building out your financial reporting process can have an outsized impact on your ability to scale your vision. Our panelists will share personal and practical advice every founder should know now for better decision-making later on
Erik Zhou is the Chief Accounting Officer of Brex. He has managed all aspects of financial operations and accounting, including regulatory reporting and tax compliance, in this role since 2018. He started his career in PwC’s Banking and Capital Markets practice and built over 11 years of experience working with banks, broker-dealers and large multinational financial institutions, with a focus on complex financial transactions, regulations, and day to day client operations.
Erik's Sessions
Future-proof your FP&A
Believe it or not, the early choices you make building out your financial reporting process can have an outsized impact on your ability to scale your vision. Our panelists will share personal and practical advice every founder should know now for better decision-making later on
Mary D’Onofrio is a partner and co-founder of the growth investment practice at Bessemer Venture Partners, where she primarily focuses on cloud software investments.
Mary's Sessions
Scaling from $1 to $10MM of ARR
When it comes to building and scaling a cloud business, leaders at all stages wonder what “typical” and “best-in-class” look like – and, while they’re some of the most helpful financial data points in the world, private market financial benchmarks remain some of the most elusive. To bridge this gap, join Bessemer Partner Mary D’Onofrio as she shares definitive benchmarking statistics and qualitative insights for companies looking to scale to new heights, focusing on growth from $1 to $10MM of ARR
Scaling from $1 to $10MM of ARR Roundtable
When it comes to building and scaling a cloud business, leaders at all stages wonder what “typical” and “best-in-class” look like – and, while they’re some of the most helpful financial data points in the world, private market financial benchmarks remain some of the most elusive. To bridge this gap, join Bessemer Partner Mary D’Onofrio as she chats with founders about benchmarking statistics and qualitative insights for companies looking to scale to new heights, focusing on growth from $1 to $10MM of ARR.
Lindsey S. Mignano represents emerging technology companies and industry-adjacent firms and SMEs as their outside general counsel. Her team’s practice includes SAFE note or priced round raises for early-stage (seed through Series B) startups, including bridge/extension rounds; buy-side or sell-side acquisitions, including asset sales plus acquihires or entity acquisitions, including due diligence and any novations of existing customer contracts; flips from abroad entity structures to a DE C Corp structure for the purposes of procuring American venture capital and the related priced round; corporate restructuring in order to achieve tax optimization for raises, sales, or co-founder exits/business divorces; corporate due diligence and cleanup in preparation for a raise or sale, including due diligence and cleanup related to stock grants, IP assignments, commercial contracts, etc.; IP spinouts, particularly transferring IP out of consulting businesses into a C Corp structure for QSBS or venture capital fundraising purposes; and outside general counsel services. Most of her clients are venture-capital funded at the seed ($1M to 5M+ range), Series A ($10M+ range), and Series B ($20M+ range). In terms of verticals, her most popular vertical includes enterprise SaaS/PaaS companies, many of which are AI technology companies. Her other clients include venture capital firms deploying capital to startups and other adjacent businesses that sell to or otherwise do business with technology companies.
Lindsey's Sessions
How to Grow and Scale your Startup: Top Tips on Seeking Venture Financing and Immigration
Early stage founders face a number of legal questions at the beginning of the startup journey. For example, how do foreign founders immigrate to the US to expand their businesses, how should founders approach incorporation and issuance of equity to the founding team and early stage hires or advisors, and how do founders approach angel or venture financing in the US? Startup law corporate attorney Lindsey S. Mignano of Smith Shapourian Mignano PC will discuss how early stage founders can incorporate their US entities, fundraise from angels and venture capital firms, and expand their footprint in the US.