Frank Meehan
Co-Founder & Partner, SparkLabs Group. On 2 shows, 2 appearances. The Shows tab opens the full record on each.
investorfounderexecutiveengineer@frank_meehan ↗LinkedIn ↗sparklabsglobal.com ↗
Frank Meehan is an investor and entrepreneur who previously represented Horizons Ventures on the boards of breakout companies including Spotify, Siri, Summly, and Affectiva. He went on to co-found SparkLabs Global Ventures, micro-learning platform SmartUp.io, and multiple AI and climate-tech initiatives.
2shows
2appearances
20statements
2resolved
1supported
1contradicted
50%fully supported
3said about them ↓ Everything Frank Meehan said on any show that made the record, most notable first. Each card names its show and opens the statement there.
Asian SaaS startups with $1M ARR can command $50M Series A valuations
“If it's a SaaS model, they could easily be looking at 3040, depending on the market, fifty million dollar valuations.”
Asia's tech market favors recycled 2000s e-commerce and marketplace models
“There's not that much SaaS in Asia. It's much more marketplace in e-commerce. It's almost, Dust off a business plan from 2002 thousand. Bring it back. And run it in Asia and it's running really well.”
Meehan: Overfunding Idea-Stage Startups Like Clinkle Ends in Disaster
“You know, you get things like Clinkle, where for some reason, investors invest in it in an idea which isn't fully formed in a prototype that isn't built, and of course, you know, it ends up being a, they invest too much, and it ends up being a disaster.”
Frank Meehan: Startup founders do not need to learn coding
“Oh, I think that's I don't think that's necessary. I think an understanding of it so that you can have an understanding of how things work and an understanding of the principles of the technology behind it is, is, is actually probably even more important so th…”
Meehan: The hottest seed rounds have 8 to 10 investors
“And, you know, the best rounds and the hottest companies in the valley now will not have one or two investors in them. They will have a good eight or nine or 10 because it's a network effect.”
Meehan: Spark Labs will not invest without top-tier co-investors
“We won't invest unless there's other very top tier investors in it, be that is, you know, private individuals or firms because you've got to get the collective validation.”
Meehan: Competitive Seed Rounds Do Not Drive Up Valuations
“Later on in a series C and a series D, when you've got Big, big players like a Goldman's or something jostling around, then the price does get driven up, but not in an early stage, not when you're trying to put that initial really core investor group together,…”
Meehan: European e-commerce is too saturated to be attractive
“I wouldn't invest in an e-commerce business in Europe because it's so saturated that it's all about just operations and how much cash you can raise. That's not interesting for me. It's just a brand play.”
Meehan: Small domestic markets force startups in Sweden and Israel to go global
“The reason is, is because Swedes very similar to Israelis, very similar to Koreans work very hard, but have to go global. There's no real big home market. And I'm always like those type of markets because it forces the company to go global. It can't just sit o…”
Founders should distribute decks early and resolve off-agenda topics pre-meeting
“So the trick there is that you really absolutely must say to your board, okay, I'm going to give you the slides to the board meeting a week before, and anything, and I'm going to, in the board slides, say these are the things that are going to be discussed, an…”
Meehan: Sequoia is the biggest VC player in Asia
“Sequoia is the biggest player in Asia right across the board.
Interesting.
Yeah, absolutely.
I mean, they're amazing in Asia.
Very, very strong.
They are the biggest in Asia.”
SparkLabs pitched LPs on global network access rather than target IRRs
“We didn't actually. We just said that we will, we are a group of people who are incredibly well connected and that we can be, we can see the hottest company you know, within 10 hours of it landing on our desk because we're in all the, all of the key locations.”
Founders and young professionals need to be much more ruthless
“I'll tell you what, be more ruthless.”
Meehan: Understanding tech trends like blockchain matters more than coding
“So and, you know, just an understanding of how the world is moving, you know, it may be more important for you as a founder to know the deep ins and outs of how blockchain technology works than actual coding.”
Meehan: Early-Stage Investors Fail to Match Startups' Global Scope
“But investors are very local, and investors, especially at early stage, have not matched the global expansions of startups these days.”
Meehan: Only tech giants can afford proper two-factor authentication
“Only the very big guys, the Googles and Facebooks, et cetera, can afford to implement, like, proper two-stage authentication, which I didn't know, but is very, very expensive, so, which is why the only big guys do it”
Meehan: Asian e-commerce is early-stage and rapidly growing
“So in Asia, we don't do e-commerce really anywhere except in Asia, but in Asia, e-commerce is so early and so, and growing so fast that it's a fantastic opportunity.”
Frank Meehan: Asian tech market expanding into deep tech and smart cities
“It's, the future of the Asian tech market is, is huge. Initially, it's going to be driven around e-commerce and gaming, but already you can see deeper tech and particularly internet of things, smart cities”
Horizons Ventures backed Spotify in 2010 when it was only in Sweden
“You know, we went into Spotify when they were still just in Sweden and just watched as it grew out. That's 2010.”
The other half of the tape: Frank Meehan's own voice is left out of every number here. Other people bring the name up 3 times in 1 episode across the shows. every mention, with the transcript →
Who brings them up most Harry Stebbings 3
Every mention by year
tap a year for its mentions
20VC 3
2015 3 mentions in 1 episode
One line per show, most statements first. The link opens Frank's full record on that show: the calibration, argument clarity, speaking style and every statement made there.
| Show | Role there | Eps | Statements | Record | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 20VCLEDGER | Co-Founder & Partner, SparkLabs Group | 1 | 12 | 100% 1/1 | full record on 20VC → |
 TOP FOUNDERSLEDGER | Co-Founder & Partner, SparkLabs Group | 1 | 8 | 0% 0/1 | full record on Top Founders → |