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Jamie Siminoff

Founder & Chief Inventor, Ring · 1 appearance on the record, plus 1 compilation re-air.

computed by AI from the episodes · how this works → · full disclaimer →

founderexecutiveinvestorauthor@JamieSiminoff ↗ring.com ↗

Jamie Siminoff is the creator of the Wi-Fi video doorbell and founder of Ring. After Ring was acquired by Amazon for over $1 billion, he served as Chief Inventor and later returned as Vice President of Product.

20statements → 5claims → 1claims resolved → 4.24/5average certainty → 2.18/5average debate potential → ≈4.0/5argument clarity, estimated → 18said about them ↓

1 supported 0 partly supported 0 contradicted 1 not yet assessed 3 not checkable as stated how the 5 claims stand · each chip opens the sources

5 assertions · 3 opinions · 6 insights · 6 disclosures · every statement was checked. The predictions and assertions are the 5 claims: statements the public record can support or contradict. 1 is resolved, 1 is not yet assessed, and 3 name no date, number or outcome precise enough to check. Everything else (opinions, insights, what ifs, disclosures) can never be settled by the record, so it carries no assessment.

The record, in short

What the tape says about how Jamie argues and how the claims held up. Everything they said, and everything said about them, is in the tabs below.

Their most notable supported claim

Assertion Supported
Ring Broke QVC's Single-Day Sales Record With $22.6M in One Day
“We broke the record for QVC for the year for sales in a day 22.6 million dollars in a day.”
Jamie Siminoff Mar 3, 2023 ▶ 18:09 Ring CEO Jamie Siminoff: The $1BN Amazon Acquisition; How Richard Branson Invested | 20VC #984 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings

How they sound: speaking style how? →

298 words/min while actually speaking · 4.7 um and uh per 1k words · 19.9 false starts per 1k · 32.5% of pauses land inside a clause

No argument clarity score for Jamie Siminoff: no usable question→answer exchanges on raw tape (a fair score needs 8+). We do not score a sample that small. Roundtable and news formats yield far fewer direct exchanges than interviews. Their coarse estimate from 49 exchanges on the produced feed is ≈4.0/5, shown at half point precision because the sample is small and produced tape scores higher.

Measured by listening to 12,215 words across 1 episode, but every recording we have of Jamie Siminoff is the aired feed, and an editor cleaned that audio before release. Some of the hesitation was cut before we ever heard it, so read these as floors: the true rates are at least this high. These are measurements of speaking style, not scores. How it's measured →

How the interview went all their pushback → series average →

Across 2 rated episodes:

host pushback ▾ 2.5/10
pushed back at the host ▾ 2.5/10
setup questions received 77%

Everything Jamie Siminoff said on 20VC that made the record, most notable first. Filter by type, assessment or year in the ledger →

Opinion
Siminoff: VC Overfunding Harmed Entrepreneurs by Pushing Them Toward Wrong Goals
“It over watered the grapes and that was an unfair thing to do to entrepreneurs. It actually hurt the entrepreneurs. It gave too much money to too many people too fast and the wrong goals. And it led people who are great people into the wrong places that it rea…”
Jamie Siminoff Mar 3, 2023 ▶ 1:09:58 Ring CEO Jamie Siminoff: The $1BN Amazon Acquisition; How Richard Branson Invested | 20VC #984 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Insight
Jamie Simenoff: Early founders must project extreme ambition over raw vulnerability
“I think that's part of entrepreneurship, is you just, you gotta make it up, because when you're in your garage building a doorbell, if you really told people what you really felt and where you were at, you probably would never make it, and so you have to say, …”
Jamie Siminoff Jun 9, 2023 ▶ 22:06 20VC: What are the World's Tech Leaders Running From? Fear? Insecurity? Poverty? What Drives the Best with Orlando Bravo, Bill Ackman, Dara Khosrowshahi, Parker Conrad, Tobi Luttke, Brian Armstrong and more..
Disclosure
Ring's $100M Funding Round Was Pulled Days Before Closing Over Lawsuit
“We have a round happening, and I get sued by someone who's very large in the business, They get an injunction against the product on me, which, you know, I will not comment on either way. We're, the investor decides, and you know, fair is fair, like a little t…”
Jamie Siminoff Mar 3, 2023 ▶ 15:32 Ring CEO Jamie Siminoff: The $1BN Amazon Acquisition; How Richard Branson Invested | 20VC #984 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Disclosure
Ring Hit -$70M Cash Shortfall by Withholding Payments to Factory Suppliers
“We probably went -50 to seventy million at one point. But that's just because we just didn't pay the factories.”
Jamie Siminoff Mar 3, 2023 ▶ 16:33 Ring CEO Jamie Siminoff: The $1BN Amazon Acquisition; How Richard Branson Invested | 20VC #984 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Siminoff: Printing My Personal Email on Ring Boxes Actually Scaled
“Putting the email in the box is the one thing that actually did scale at Ring.”
Jamie Siminoff Mar 3, 2023 ▶ 22:30 Ring CEO Jamie Siminoff: The $1BN Amazon Acquisition; How Richard Branson Invested | 20VC #984 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Disclosure
Siminoff Rejected a Prominent VC Firm for Ignoring Ring's Mission
“Very prominent VC. We sell comes to me and says like, when you pitched me, you totally screwed up. We never saw how good the business was. We totally would have invested. And I said, no, I was interviewing you. And you didn't pass the mission test.”
Jamie Siminoff Mar 3, 2023 ▶ 32:35 Ring CEO Jamie Siminoff: The $1BN Amazon Acquisition; How Richard Branson Invested | 20VC #984 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Disclosure
Siminoff Ordered $500M in Ring Inventory on Just $100M in Revenue
“Imagine like we went 3,000,030 1,000,001 70, To almost 500. So when we went from, like, one 70 to 500, I had to order, like, five hundred million dollars of inventory when we were, like, a hundred million dollar business.”
Jamie Siminoff Mar 3, 2023 ▶ 15:10 Ring CEO Jamie Siminoff: The $1BN Amazon Acquisition; How Richard Branson Invested | 20VC #984 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Assertion Not publicly verifiable
Ring Signed Amazon Acquisition Term Sheet on January 1, 2018
“That was going into the holidays of 2017. We signed the term sheet with Amazon on January first of 2018. So literally like, it was like a, from solving this to selling to Amazon was like 45 days.”
Jamie Siminoff Mar 3, 2023 ▶ 18:40 Ring CEO Jamie Siminoff: The $1BN Amazon Acquisition; How Richard Branson Invested | 20VC #984 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Opinion
Siminoff: Customer Surveys Are Useless Because They Hide Actionable Product Signals
“I hate surveys by the way, I like, literally, I, in my gut, I hate them. Is like, because they don't tell you anything, they tell like, 95% of people are happy.”
Jamie Siminoff Mar 3, 2023 ▶ 24:47 Ring CEO Jamie Siminoff: The $1BN Amazon Acquisition; How Richard Branson Invested | 20VC #984 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Disclosure
Siminoff: Selling to Amazon or IPO Were Ring's Only Acceptable Exits
“I told my investors, I told Amazon, I was either going to go public or sell to Amazon. Those are my two options. And it was because the only company that I felt would really take the mission Take it and allow us to keep executing on it and stay true to it was …”
Jamie Siminoff Mar 3, 2023 ▶ 39:25 Ring CEO Jamie Siminoff: The $1BN Amazon Acquisition; How Richard Branson Invested | 20VC #984 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Jeff Bezos Emailed Siminoff Post-Acquisition: "Don't Let Us Mess It Up"
“First email I got the day it closed, you know, came from Jeff and said, like, don't let us, you know, mess, mess it up. You know, you, like, you know, like you are in control.”
Jamie Siminoff Mar 3, 2023 ▶ 50:12 Ring CEO Jamie Siminoff: The $1BN Amazon Acquisition; How Richard Branson Invested | 20VC #984 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Opinion
Siminoff: Amazon Respects Its Acquisitions More Than Any Other Corporate Buyer
“Amazon's had a lot of acquisitions that have been successful, maybe more than anyone. And I think the one thing I would say is that they respect the companies they buy.”
Jamie Siminoff Mar 3, 2023 ▶ 50:33 Ring CEO Jamie Siminoff: The $1BN Amazon Acquisition; How Richard Branson Invested | 20VC #984 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Insight
Simenoff: Entrepreneurship requires believing in goals far beyond current reality
“A lot of entrepreneurship is like reality distortion. You have to believe in something that's much bigger and crazier than what can actually be accomplished.”
Jamie Siminoff Jun 9, 2023 ▶ 21:39 20VC: What are the World's Tech Leaders Running From? Fear? Insecurity? Poverty? What Drives the Best with Orlando Bravo, Bill Ackman, Dara Khosrowshahi, Parker Conrad, Tobi Luttke, Brian Armstrong and more..
Insight
Siminoff: Richard Branson's Investment Did Not Automatically Bring Ring Customers
“I think mostly people want to put a square peg in a round hole. So they want like Richard Branson invested and they like step back and like wait for the customers to come in. And like, that's not gonna happen. Richard Branson doing a blog post saying, I invest…”
Jamie Siminoff Mar 3, 2023 ▶ 9:02 Ring CEO Jamie Siminoff: The $1BN Amazon Acquisition; How Richard Branson Invested | 20VC #984 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Assertion Supported
Ring Broke QVC's Single-Day Sales Record With $22.6M in One Day
“We broke the record for QVC for the year for sales in a day 22.6 million dollars in a day.”
Jamie Siminoff Mar 3, 2023 ▶ 18:09 Ring CEO Jamie Siminoff: The $1BN Amazon Acquisition; How Richard Branson Invested | 20VC #984 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Insight
Siminoff: VC Safety Nets Disappear When Scaling Past 170 Employees
“One 70 to 500, like, they took away the, you know, you're on the tightrope, and all of a sudden you look down, and they're, like, pulling the mats away, like, the safety net is being pulled away, because, and when we did, like, when we had that issue come up, …”
Jamie Siminoff Mar 3, 2023 ▶ 19:56 Ring CEO Jamie Siminoff: The $1BN Amazon Acquisition; How Richard Branson Invested | 20VC #984 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Insight
Siminoff: Founders Should Risk Repeated Betrayal to Find Exceptional Talent
“I'd rather keep getting hurt and find a few great people than never be with great people.”
Jamie Siminoff Mar 3, 2023 ▶ 49:38 Ring CEO Jamie Siminoff: The $1BN Amazon Acquisition; How Richard Branson Invested | 20VC #984 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Insight
Simenoff: Trying to solve every problem for everyone prevents progress
“The hardest thing I had to learn was you can't solve every problem for everyone. Because then you do nothing.”
Jamie Siminoff Jun 9, 2023 ▶ 20:59 20VC: What are the World's Tech Leaders Running From? Fear? Insecurity? Poverty? What Drives the Best with Orlando Bravo, Bill Ackman, Dara Khosrowshahi, Parker Conrad, Tobi Luttke, Brian Armstrong and more..
Disclosure
Siminoff Receives Only 10 to 20 Customer Emails Daily Despite Box Placement
“Not that many, like probably 10 to 20 from neighbors.”
Jamie Siminoff Mar 3, 2023 ▶ 1:08:38 Ring CEO Jamie Siminoff: The $1BN Amazon Acquisition; How Richard Branson Invested | 20VC #984 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Jamie Siminoff Personally Flew to Install Ring Doorbells on Influencers' Homes
“I was trying to, like, get influencers on rings, so I was, like, literally, I was flying around and setting them up on people's homes”
Jamie Siminoff Mar 3, 2023 ▶ 0:04 Ring CEO Jamie Siminoff: The $1BN Amazon Acquisition; How Richard Branson Invested | 20VC #984 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings

The other half of the tape: Jamie Siminoff's own voice is left out of every number here. Other people bring the name up 16 times in 3 episodes on 20VC. 2 statements on the record name them. every mention, with the transcript →

Who brings them up most Adam D'Augelli 8Wesley Chan 6Mark Suster 1Harry Stebbings 1

Statements about Jamie Siminoff, by other people (2)

Prediction Didn’t hold up
Ring will generate hundreds of millions in revenue in 2016
“He's, you know, going to do, you know, hundreds of millions of dollars of revenue, if not more this year.”
Wesley Chan Jun 29, 2016 ▶ 24:11 20VC: Felicis' Wesley Chan on The Rise of IoT, Getting Recruited by Larry Page & Creating Google's Biggest Success Disaster
Insight
Exceptional founders focus on removing unnecessary features rather than adding them
“It takes a very, very rare, very smart, very, very sophisticated founder to really start thinking about what should I take out rather than what should I put in.”
Wesley Chan Jun 29, 2016 ▶ 24:52 20VC: Felicis' Wesley Chan on The Rise of IoT, Getting Recruited by Larry Page & Creating Google's Biggest Success Disaster

Every mention by year

tap a year for its mentions
0051101201620172018201920202021202220232024episodesmentions
011201620172018201920202021202220232024episodes it came up in
0050.5101201620172018201920202021202220232024episodesmentions per episode
2024 1 mention in 1 episode
2019 9 mentions in 1 episode
2016 6 mentions in 1 episode

Appearances (2)

EpisodeDateSpeaking time
20VC: What are the World's Tech Leaders Running From? Fear? Insecurity? Poverty? What Driv compilation Jun 9, 2023 1m
Ring CEO Jamie Siminoff: The $1BN Amazon Acquisition; How Richard Branson Invested | 20VC Mar 3, 2023 51m
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