Daher: Pilot's lead investor Mark Goldberg previously worked with him at Dropbox
Wasim Daher · 20VC: Why Passion Is Overrated When It Comes To Starting Companies, Why VC Is Overrated As A Financing Mechanism & Why You Should Never Sell Your Company with Waseem Daher, Founder & CEO @ Pilot · Aug 2, 2019 · at 16:24
Waseem Daher is the founder and CEO of Pilot. He explains how pre-existing relationships with venture investors like Index Ventures partner Mark Goldberg helped Pilot during fundraising.
0:00 / 0:07exact quote · 7.7s
720p mp4 · rendered on demand · StarZero watermark
“I mean, for us, our investors were all people that we had already known. In other words, the lead investor from Index, Mark Goldberg, we worked together at Dropbox.”
quote is from the automated transcript, cleaned for reading: filler sounds and stutters are removed, nothing is rephrased. names can be misheard (the analysis reads context, assessments check outside sources). how →
More from Wasim Daher
Daher: Owning 100% of a $10M company is easier than 1% of $1B
“If your goal is wealth creation, I think it's much easier to make A hundred percent of the ten million dollar company than one percent of the billion dollar company.”
Daher: Passion for a mission alone will not sustain founders
“If you have a mission you're really, really passionate about, that's great. And that's awesome. But that alone will not get you through the hard times of the company. It's kind of piece one. And then piece two is, I think, you really develop a passion for the …”
Daher: Founders want bookkeeping solved, not more accounting software
“No founder has ever said, I really would love some more accounting software. What business owners actually want is to have the problem solved for them.”
Daher: Co-founder drama is one of the biggest startup risk factors
“One of the biggest risk factors to any company really is founder drama, founder relationships, tensions there.”
Daher: Pilot acquired its first three customers on day one via cold calls
“On day one, we signed up our first three customers because I just called them up and I said, Hey, who's doing your bookkeeping today? Oh, you know, we can actually do it better. You should sign up with pilot. And the way that we provided the services, I just d…”
Daher: Optimizing solely for VC valuation terms is short-sighted
“If you're viewing it from a transactional perspective about, well, let me just optimize for the absolute best terms. I think you're being a bit short-sighted because you're going to spend so much time with your board member over the course of this company.”