Bill Gates
10 statements across 9 episodes · 3 bullish · 1 bearish · 9 people on the record · first statement Nov 23, 2015 by Suranga Chandratilake · said 115 times in 61 episodes since 2015 · across every show →
Mentions by year
brought up most by Harry Stebbings (26), Quentin Clark (10), Suranga Chandratilake (9), Sahil Lavingia (4), Mike Hudack (4), Josh Wolfe (4), Hadi Partovi (4), Guillaume Pousaz (3)
tap a year for its mentions
2026 12 mentions in 11 episodes 1 per episode
- The SaaS Massacre: Public Market Collapse |Microsoft Lost $360B & NVIDIA’s $100B Dispute with OpenAI
- Labour, Engineering, Social Media, GrokBots, Cybercabs: 7 Predictions for How AI Changes the World
- Jensen Huang Declares AGI Has Arrived | Tesla Launches Cybercabs | Index Pulls Out of Town
- The AI Boom Will Create Enormous Roadkill: Who Wins & Loses? | David Frankel
- Should the US Ban Chinese Open-Source Models | OpenRouter's Chance To Sell | Stripe Buying PayPal
- Zuckerberg Back on X Challenging Codex & Claude Code | SK Hynix’s $26BN IPO · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
- Enterprises Fear Frontier Models | Sam Altman Offers Trump 5% of OpenAI | DeepSeek Builds Own Chips · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
- Cliff Weitzman: What I Learned from 100 of the World’s Top CEOs & Why Tokens Will Outspend Salaries · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
- 3 more episodes that year, every mention in 2026 →
2025 6 mentions in 5 episodes 1 per episode
- Duolingo Co-Founder, Severin Hacker: How AI Impacts the Future of Work and Education · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
- General Catalyst CEO, Hemant Taneja: Lessons Scaling GC to $40BN in AUM · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
- Niklas Östberg, Founder @ Delivery Hero: Competing with Uber and Doordash in a Capital Arms Race · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
- Hussein Kanji, Founder @Hoxton Ventures: Why AI Means London Can Compete with the US | E1248 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
- Shervin Pishevar: What Really Happened in the Firing of Travis Kalanick | E1245 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
- every mention in 2025, scene by scene →
2024 12 mentions in 9 episodes 1 per episode
- Mike Hudack: How Facebook, Monzo and Deliveroo Build Great Products | E1201 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
- Dan Fougere, CRO @Datadog: Why Discounting is Dangerous and Contract Sizes are Misleading | E1229 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
- Kevin Hartz: "How I Lost Airbnb at Seed Because of an Exploding Term Sheet" | E1180 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
- Pedro Franceschi: What Brex Needs to do to be a Public Company | E1178 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
- Andrew Bialecki: Is Klaviyo the Most Under-Priced Public Company? | E1170 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
- Michael Eisenberg: How China Could Overtake the US in the AI Race | E1167 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
- Dan Siroker: Second-Time Founders Are More Investable & Why Not To Hire People Out of College |E1153 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
- Chris Dixon: Who Will Win the Next Generation of Venture? | E1132 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
- 1 more episode that year, every mention in 2024 →
2023 9 mentions in 7 episodes 1 per episode
- Matthew Prince: The Two Biggest Mistakes Every Founder Makes | E1072 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
- Kevin Niparko: Big Mistakes Founders Make When Hiring Product Teams | E1066 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
- Miles Grimshaw: The 5 Pillars of Venture Capital & Why Co-Pilot is an Incumbent Strategy | E1061 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
- Vinod Khosla: How AI Impacts Healthcare, Energy, Geo-Politics, Media and Climate Change | E1045 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
- Larry Summers: How the Fed screwed up; What a Trump win would do to the economy | E1024 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
- Tomer Cohen: Why LinkedIn Stories Failed; How LinkedIn's Feed Was Born; AI Startups | E1019 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
- Basecamp CEO Jason Fried: We Banned Talking Politics and 1/3 of our Team Quit | 20VC #963 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
- every mention in 2023, scene by scene →
2022 16 mentions in 5 episodes 3 per episode
- Hadi Partovi: How I Became an Advisor to Mark Zuckerberg; Lessons from Steve Ballmer | 20VC #961 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
- Martin Escobari: How to Invest During a Recession; Negotiation Tips; Developing Markets | 20VC #948 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
- HubSpot Founder Dharmesh Shah: The Ultimate Guide to Company Culture | E896 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
- How I Bought 12% of Google for $12M; How VC is Fixing Climate Change | John Doerr Full Interview · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
- 20VC: How I Lost a $125M Deal with Yahoo by Being Too Honest, The M&A Meeting with Steve Jobs That Did Not Go Well and How U2's Bono Saved The Day For One Tech Startup with Ali Partovi, CEO @ Neo
- every mention in 2022, scene by scene →
2021 7 mentions in 5 episodes 1 per episode
- 20VC: Checkout.com Founder Guillaume Pousaz on The Transition From Bootstrapped Founder to Raising $830M and a $15Bn Valuation, What It Means To Have "3 Roadmaps For Life" & How Becoming a Parent Changes the Type of Leader You Are
- 20VC's Therapist Thursday: We Are Not All Crushing It All The Time So Let's Stop Pretending, Working Through Challenges of Self-Worth and Self-Doubt & How To Find Joy in the Striving with Nick Mehta, CEO @ Gainsight
- 20VC: Scaling Zapier To $140M ARR and a $5Bn Valuation on $1.4M of Funding, What Founders Misunderstand About Fundraising & How Founders Should Think About Secondaries Today with Wade Foster, Founder & CEO @ Zapier
- 20VC: How To Deliver Feedback with Compassion and Clarity, WTF Are Values Really and How To Instill Them & Raising $50M+ From Index and Greylock but Remaining in Stealth for 12 Months with Linda Lian, Co-Founder & CEO @ CommonRoom
- 20VC: Hims Founder Andrew Dudum on Hims Going Public, The Reasoning and Benefits of SPACs, The Biggest Misconceptions of Successful Company Building & Wall St's Changing Perceptions Towards Growth and Profitability
- every mention in 2021, scene by scene →
2020 19 mentions in 5 episodes 4 per episode
- 20VC: Lessons From Working with Bill Gates, How To Lead Without Authority and The Difference Between Leadership and Management & How Fundraising Changes In A COVID World with Quentin Clark, Managing Director @ General Catalyst
- 20VC: Sahil Lavingia on Rolling Funds and Their Impact on The Future of Venture, How To Evaluate Market, Team and Product, The Value of Party Rounds & The Pros and Cons of Multi-Stage Funds Investing at Seed
- 20VC: Sarah Kunst on Why There Is Plenty Of Investor Money Still Available, The Megan Markle Effect and How It Impacts Hiring and Talent & Whether GP Commits Prevent Diversity and Inclusion
- 20VC: Steve Jurvetson on 20 Years of Friendship with Elon Musk, How To Analyse Market Timing, Why Venture Does Not Scale & Why He Has Never Sold A Share in Any Company He Holds
- 20VC: Airtable's Howie Liu on Potential Consolidation In The Collaboration Tools Market, The Transition From Peacetime To Wartime CEO & How To Make The Move To Remote Work Successful; The Process Beyond The Tools
- every mention in 2020, scene by scene →
2019 3 mentions in 3 episodes 1 per episode
- 20VC: Clearbanc's Michele Romanow on Why 40% of VC $ Raised Today Goes To Google and Facebook, How To Create A Financing Mechanism For The Repeatable Parts Of Your Business & Why We Need To Stop Celebrating Fundraises
- 20VC: Figma Founder Dylan Field on The Biggest Mistakes Young Founders Most Often Make, How To Go Slow To Go Fast With Venture Dollars & How The Design Process Will Fundamentally Change Over The Next 5-10 Years
- 20VC: Slow Ventures' Sam Lessin on How VC Forces Certain Companies To Exist and Makes It Difficult To Finance Others, Why Cities Won't Let Scooter Companies Be Profitable and Why Dapps Are A Concern and Where Emphasis Should Be Placed In Crypto
- every mention in 2019, scene by scene →
2018 4 mentions in 3 episodes 1 per episode
- 20VC: ClassPass CEO Fritz Lanman on Betting His Career Facebook Would Be A $10Bn Company, Lessons From Travis and Uber on Scaling A Global Marketplace & Whether Growth and Capital Efficiency Are Mutually Exclusive
- 20VC: Behind The Scenes of a $Bn IPO Process, What Startups Can Learn From Teddy Roosevelt's "Five Minute Meetings" and What John Lennon Teaches Founders About Storytelling with Howard Lerman, Founder & CEO @ Yext
- 20VC: Thumbtack's Marco Zappacosta on The 3 Core Elements To All Board Meetings, Raising $250m from Sequoia and Why You Have To Win Supply Side Acquisition First For Marketplace Success
- every mention in 2018, scene by scene →
2017 13 mentions in 2 episodes 7 per episode
- 20VC: The 3 Forms Of Edge A Founder Can Have, Lessons From Being on A Board With Bill Gates & Why There Are A Lot Of Tourist VCs Who Are Going To Lose A Lot Of Money, with Josh Wolfe, Co-Founder @ Lux Capital
- 20VC: Raising Over $700m From The World's Best Investors, How To Innovate In Highly Regulated Markets & The 3 Superpowers of Insurance Companies with Mario Schlosser, Founder & CEO @ Oscar
- every mention in 2017, scene by scene →
2016 3 mentions in 3 episodes 1 per episode
- 20VC: Social Capital's Mamoon Hamid on Disrupting The Venture Model & Advancing Humanity By Solving The World's Toughest Problems
- 20VC: Why You Don't Have To Have Operational Experience To Be A Good VC, Why There Is No Optimal Stage To Invest & Why VCs Should Focus on Reputation Ahead of Cash On Cash Returns with Lyon Wong, General Partner @ Spectrum 28
- 20VC: X.ai's Dennis Mortensen on Why There Is No Incumbency Advantage in Artificial Intelligence
- every mention in 2016, scene by scene →
2015 11 mentions in 3 episodes 4 per episode
Everything said about Bill Gates, oldest first
Nov 23, 2015
Great tech CEOs need visceral product understanding over data analysis
“Certainly in technology, if we just sort of focus in on that, one thing that's key is someone who is viscerally understands the product that they're building and the marketplace that product lives in. You know, if you look at someone like Steve Jobs, that's wh…”
May 10, 2017 positive
Wolfe: Bill Gates Focuses on the 10% of Subject Matter Worth 90%
“He would listen and sit And think, and then it would be the ninety-ten of it, meaning he would get to the 10% of the subject matter that had 90% of the value. He was exceptionally tuned in to supporting founder, CEO, very astute on the economics of product, of…”
May 10, 2017
Jul 20, 2018
Gates and Ballmer initially saw Linux as a bigger threat than Google
“We had done the early work that got Gates and Bomber focused on Google as a threat to the business, and at the time, back then, they were more focused on the enterprise side and on the threat that Linux kind of represented, and so we had gotten the company pre…”
May 10, 2019
Dec 28, 2020
Jan 21, 2022 positive
Partovi: VC strategy focuses on generational founders over business plan flaws
“Rather than trying to poke holes in their business idea, I'm trying to figure out, is this person the next Bill Gates, or the next Mark Zuckerberg, and if they are, let me just step out of the way and not mess it up, just try to support them to achieve their p…”
Dec 16, 2022 positive
Top Tech Founders Like Jobs and Musk Actively Micromanage Product Details
“If you think of Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg Elon Musk, none of these folks are just trust that the team will get it done. They're getting very involved in little details. And it's much harder to point to examples of incredible consumer technology s…”
Jan 13, 2025 negative
Mar 30, 2026
Andreessen: Some top founders are born driven, without childhood trauma
“Some of the best founders in history have no trace of trauma in their background that I can tell. And I'll just give you two examples. You know, Zuckerberg is one who, you know, grew up in a classic upper middle class, you know, New Jersey household, very, you…”