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Nicolas Dessaigne

Group Partner, Y Combinator · 2 appearances on the record.

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

founderinvestorexecutiveoperator@dessaigne ↗algolia.com ↗

Nicolas Dessaigne co-founded the search API company Algolia in 2012, serving as its CEO through its Y Combinator batch and scaling the business before stepping down in 2020. In 2021, he joined Y Combinator as a Group Partner, where he coaches early-stage startup cohorts.

20statements → 7claims → 2claims resolved → 4.05/5average certainty → 1.9/5average debate potential → 4.3/5argument clarity · the sources → 17said about them ↓

1 supported 0 partly supported 1 contradicted 5 not checkable as stated how the 7 claims stand · each chip opens the sources

2 predictions · 5 assertions · 3 opinions · 7 insights · 3 disclosures · every statement was checked. The predictions and assertions are the 7 claims: statements the public record can support or contradict. 2 are resolved, and 5 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 Nicolas 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
Algolia Doubled Its Company Headcount in Six Months
“I sometimes would double the size of the company in six months.”
Nicolas Dessaigne Apr 22, 2016 ▶ 10:04 20VC: Fundraising Is Also Business Development with Nicolas Dessaigne, Co-Founder & CEO @ Algolia

Their most notable contradicted claim

Prediction Didn’t hold up
SaaS Search Will Overtake On-Premise Search by 2021
“Search Is moving from on-premise to SaaS, and it's going to accelerate in the next five years. And so I believe that in five years SaaS will be actually much stronger than on-premise.”
Nicolas Dessaigne Apr 22, 2016 ▶ 22:37 20VC: Fundraising Is Also Business Development with Nicolas Dessaigne, Co-Founder & CEO @ Algolia

Expressed certainty vs assessment result

none yet certainty 1
none yet certainty 2
none yet certainty 3
0% certainty 4
100% certainty 5

weighted support: a fully supported claim counts one, a partly supported claim counts half. Each filled bar is clickable and opens exactly those claims; "none yet" means nothing said at that certainty level has resolved yet

Argument clarity: do they answer the question? how? →

4.3 / 5 directness 4.8 · coherence 4.5 · precision 3.9 · compression 3.9

answered every one of 36 assessed questions directly

This is a score against a rubric. It is not a rank. Every host question → answer exchange is scored with names hidden on directness, coherence, precision and compression, 1–5 each, on meaning alone: disfluencies are ignored, and only raw unedited episodes count. This is the score that measures thought. Every scored exchange, scores shown → · The rubric and its checks →

How they sound: speaking style how? →

246 words/min while actually speaking · 40.4 um and uh per 1k words

Measured by listening to the audio itself: 5,369 words across 2 episodes of raw-level tape, transcribed verbatim with every um and uh kept, each one attributed only where the alignment onto our timed stream is unambiguous. These are measurements of speaking style. We do not rank them: across this corpus, fluency and argument quality are nearly uncorrelated (ρ≈0.2), and smooth talking does not signal clear thinking. How it's measured →

How the interview went all their pushback → series average →

Across 2 rated episodes:

host pushback ▾ 1.5/10
pushed back at the host ▾ 2/10
setup questions received 75%

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

Assertion Not checkable as stated
Algolia closed its $53M Series B before finishing its pitch deck
“In the case of the build run, I mean, it went super fast. I mean, we actually closed the run before having, even having finished our funding deck, so it indeed went much faster than anticipated.”
Nicolas Dessaigne Jun 16, 2017 ▶ 4:12 20VC: Is Series B Really The Hardest To Raise? Should The Only Limiting Factor Post Series B Be Cash & When Is The Right Time To Move To The US with Nicolas Dessaigne, Founder & CEO @ Algolia
Opinion
San Francisco offers a superior talent pool for senior sales executives
“For a company, like a tech company like ours, definitely the talent pool for sales and marketing talents is San Francisco, especially for the highest positions. If you are looking for VP marketing, VP sales, The talent pool is much better here.”
Nicolas Dessaigne Jun 16, 2017 ▶ 12:11 20VC: Is Series B Really The Hardest To Raise? Should The Only Limiting Factor Post Series B Be Cash & When Is The Right Time To Move To The US with Nicolas Dessaigne, Founder & CEO @ Algolia
Opinion
Hiring top engineering talent is easier in Europe than San Francisco
“The concentration of, like, good tech people is probably better In Europe compared to, like, the competition you have here in SF. I mean, you have, like, crazy good people here, but the local industry is startup, so you are going to compete with so many other …”
Nicolas Dessaigne Jun 16, 2017 ▶ 13:12 20VC: Is Series B Really The Hardest To Raise? Should The Only Limiting Factor Post Series B Be Cash & When Is The Right Time To Move To The US with Nicolas Dessaigne, Founder & CEO @ Algolia
Insight
Pitching Investors Doubles as Customer Acquisition for B2B Startups
“Many of the portfolio companies of investors, of potential investors, actually potential customers for us. It was kind of like, you know, fundraising for us was also business. It was also a way to reach out to new companies. And the best ever due diligence we …”
Nicolas Dessaigne Apr 22, 2016 ▶ 16:18 20VC: Fundraising Is Also Business Development with Nicolas Dessaigne, Co-Founder & CEO @ Algolia
Insight
Pitching VCs doubles as business development for SaaS startups
“At least in the context of a SaaS company like ours that could work with any of these investors' portfolio companies, it's actually a very good business development approach as you are Working with these new, like, investors, winning this relationship, it's al…”
Nicolas Dessaigne Jun 16, 2017 ▶ 5:20 20VC: Is Series B Really The Hardest To Raise? Should The Only Limiting Factor Post Series B Be Cash & When Is The Right Time To Move To The US with Nicolas Dessaigne, Founder & CEO @ Algolia
Insight
Growth startups should target two years of runway over 18 months
“In our case, I would look more at two years than 18 months, and when you're looking at that, you are like, Working with the assumptions that you are going to be very aggressive on the market, on investment and growth, so that there is no bad surprise.”
Nicolas Dessaigne Jun 16, 2017 ▶ 7:00 20VC: Is Series B Really The Hardest To Raise? Should The Only Limiting Factor Post Series B Be Cash & When Is The Right Time To Move To The US with Nicolas Dessaigne, Founder & CEO @ Algolia
Prediction Not checkable as stated
Search will shift from keywords to conversational interfaces
“The way really we see things evolving is that tomorrow we are not going to search as we do today with keywords type enter and wait for an answer. It's going to become more and more interactive and then conversational. And so I believe that in the, in a few yea…”
Nicolas Dessaigne Jun 16, 2017 ▶ 17:57 20VC: Is Series B Really The Hardest To Raise? Should The Only Limiting Factor Post Series B Be Cash & When Is The Right Time To Move To The US with Nicolas Dessaigne, Founder & CEO @ Algolia
Insight
Co-Founder Alignment on Core Values Matters More Than Skill Complementarity
“Complementary is better, but make sure that you are aligned about like the core things you want to build.”
Nicolas Dessaigne Apr 22, 2016 ▶ 5:05 20VC: Fundraising Is Also Business Development with Nicolas Dessaigne, Co-Founder & CEO @ Algolia
Insight
New Hires Will Not Learn Startup Culture Passively During Rapid Growth
“If you just assume that as they join the company, they will learn as they go, it's not going to work.”
Nicolas Dessaigne Apr 22, 2016 ▶ 9:50 20VC: Fundraising Is Also Business Development with Nicolas Dessaigne, Co-Founder & CEO @ Algolia
Disclosure
Algolia Delayed Post-YC Series A to Take Small Investment From Jason Lemkin
“And so we finally decided not to raise any series A after weight combinator, but to take the risk to just raise a very small round to onboard new investors that we thought could provide a lot of value. That's when Jason Lemkin joined, joined us as an investor.”
Nicolas Dessaigne Apr 22, 2016 ▶ 13:34 20VC: Fundraising Is Also Business Development with Nicolas Dessaigne, Co-Founder & CEO @ Algolia
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Algolia Averaged 30% Month-Over-Month Growth Leading to Its Series A
“On average at that time we did 30% growth month over month, so it was what triggered that series A.”
Nicolas Dessaigne Apr 22, 2016 ▶ 15:18 20VC: Fundraising Is Also Business Development with Nicolas Dessaigne, Co-Founder & CEO @ Algolia
Opinion
Moving Algolia's Entire Team to Silicon Valley Was Their Best Decision
“We did the, probably the best ever decision by moving every one of the company in in the Silicon Valley at that time.”
Nicolas Dessaigne Apr 22, 2016 ▶ 18:37 20VC: Fundraising Is Also Business Development with Nicolas Dessaigne, Co-Founder & CEO @ Algolia
Insight
Founders Must Lean Into Authentic Strengths Rather Than Imitating Steve Jobs
“If you have someone who is very good at, very charismatic, but is not believable, It's not going to work either. You need to play your strengths, and my strengths are not like into the I'm not Steve Jobs or these kind of leaders, kind of leader could I be? And…”
Nicolas Dessaigne Apr 22, 2016 ▶ 21:26 20VC: Fundraising Is Also Business Development with Nicolas Dessaigne, Co-Founder & CEO @ Algolia
Prediction Didn’t hold up
SaaS Search Will Overtake On-Premise Search by 2021
“Search Is moving from on-premise to SaaS, and it's going to accelerate in the next five years. And so I believe that in five years SaaS will be actually much stronger than on-premise.”
Nicolas Dessaigne Apr 22, 2016 ▶ 22:37 20VC: Fundraising Is Also Business Development with Nicolas Dessaigne, Co-Founder & CEO @ Algolia
Disclosure
Algolia Sacrifices Short-Term Revenue by Refusing On-Premise Deployments
“This focus led us to decide not to provide any on-premise solution today. While it could help us to get much more revenue at short term, we believe that because we want to be the Best player tomorrow for the SaaS market. We need to keep our focus on the produc…”
Nicolas Dessaigne Apr 22, 2016 ▶ 22:54 20VC: Fundraising Is Also Business Development with Nicolas Dessaigne, Co-Founder & CEO @ Algolia
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Algolia had more U.S. customers than anywhere else from day one
“From day one, We had more customers in the U.S. Than anywhere else.”
Nicolas Dessaigne Jun 16, 2017 ▶ 10:27 20VC: Is Series B Really The Hardest To Raise? Should The Only Limiting Factor Post Series B Be Cash & When Is The Right Time To Move To The US with Nicolas Dessaigne, Founder & CEO @ Algolia
Disclosure
Algolia's Co-Founders Were Both Technical Rather Than Complementary
“I wouldn't say we were such complementary partners in our case, because we were both technical, like the way we wanted to build the team, the important things for a company, all of that things were like the core things we agreed upon.”
Nicolas Dessaigne Apr 22, 2016 ▶ 4:17 20VC: Fundraising Is Also Business Development with Nicolas Dessaigne, Co-Founder & CEO @ Algolia
Assertion Supported
Algolia Doubled Its Company Headcount in Six Months
“I sometimes would double the size of the company in six months.”
Nicolas Dessaigne Apr 22, 2016 ▶ 10:04 20VC: Fundraising Is Also Business Development with Nicolas Dessaigne, Co-Founder & CEO @ Algolia
Insight
A Company Inherits Its Founders' Culture If They Prioritize It
“I mean, the culture in the end, it's embodied by the founders. I mean the company has the culture of the founders as long as the founders consider the culture important.”
Nicolas Dessaigne Apr 22, 2016 ▶ 11:08 20VC: Fundraising Is Also Business Development with Nicolas Dessaigne, Co-Founder & CEO @ Algolia
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Algolia Was Inspired by Stack Overflow Questions About Lucene
“Algolia in itself, Came to being because of questions on Stack Overflow. If you don't know Stack Overflow, it's a very, very famous developers forum, and we saw many questions and answered questions about app developers wanting to embed Lucene, which is a sear…”
Nicolas Dessaigne Apr 22, 2016 ▶ 3:13 20VC: Fundraising Is Also Business Development with Nicolas Dessaigne, Co-Founder & CEO @ Algolia

The other half of the tape: Nicolas Dessaigne's own voice is left out of every number here. Other people bring the name up 14 times in 7 episodes on 20VC. 3 statements on the record name them. every mention, with the transcript →

Who brings them up most Harry Stebbings 7Jason Lemkin 5

Statements about Nicolas Dessaigne, by other people (3)

Assertion Supported
O'Driscoll: AI startups with poor margins historically raised capital successfully
“The objective reality is that's not what was happening. In other words, companies with tough gross margin profiles and hyper growth have been getting funded and frankly have been able to improve their gross margins and pull it off. And you can, the foundation,…”
Rory O'Driscoll Jun 25, 2026 ▶ 49:22 DeepSeek Raises at $50B | The Rise of Open Source vs OpenAI & Anthropic | OpenAI Builds Own Chip · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Disclosure
Lemkin: Algolia co-founder stepped down near $100M ARR
“Nicholas did step down as they were approaching a hundred million and Bernadette took over.”
Jason Lemkin Nov 30, 2022 ▶ 40:13 Jason Lemkin: Cold Email Tips; Why Only 15% of Founders Listen to their VCs | 20VC #954 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Assertion Supported
Algolia raised a $53 million Series B led by Accel
“Just last week, he raised a whopping fifty-three million dollar Series B, led by Excel, with participation from Sasta, Des Trainer at Intercom, Jotty Bansal at AppDynamics, and Carl Valberg at Envision, including Prior Investors .9 Capital and Alvin.”
Harry Stebbings Jun 16, 2017 ▶ 0:15 20VC: Is Series B Really The Hardest To Raise? Should The Only Limiting Factor Post Series B Be Cash & When Is The Right Time To Move To The US with Nicolas Dessaigne, Founder & CEO @ Algolia

Every mention by year

tap a year for its mentions
00315220162017201820192020202120222023202420252026episodesmentions
01220162017201820192020202120222023202420252026episodes it came up in
00214220162017201820192020202120222023202420252026episodesmentions per episode
2026 4 mentions in 1 episode
2025 2 mentions in 1 episode
2022 5 mentions in 2 episodes 3 per episode
2017 1 mention in 1 episode
2016 2 mentions in 2 episodes 1 per episode

Appearances (2)

EpisodeDateSpeaking time
20VC: Is Series B Really The Hardest To Raise? Should The Only Limiting Factor Post Series Jun 16, 2017 11m
20VC: Fundraising Is Also Business Development with Nicolas Dessaigne, Co-Founder & CEO @ Apr 22, 2016 14m
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