Poojan Kumar, founder and CEO of Clumio, discusses capital efficiency and stealth development between Series A and Series B.
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Kumar: PernixData and Clumio raised Series A rounds off pitch decks alone
“And in Pernik's case, we went and there's 11, seven million dollar series A with basically a PowerPoint deck with all the three things. And then Clumio did the same thing.”
Insight
Kumar: Founders should pitch lower-priority VCs first to refine their deck
“I tell folks, don't go to your Perfect target in the first testing. It's okay, you've got to burn a little, you know, burn a couple folks to perfect it.”
Opinion
Kumar: On-Prem Data Center Architectures Cannot Be Retrofitted to the Cloud
“Can I take a on-prem architecture, data center architecture and really retrofit it to the cloud? Not really.”
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Kumar secured Pernix's first $15k customer by pitching a competitor's booth attendee
“That
Guy, whom I actually caught at the booth, became our first customer, first paying customer at Purnix.
More, 15,000 dollar deal.
He bought it for two servers.
First paying customer.
And not only that, he actually went ahead and joined the company also as o…”
Insight
Kumar: Enterprise tire-kickers will not spend time testing free software
“These folks, at least in the space we play in, they won't give you the time. They don't have the time to give you. You're asking for real time, right? Maybe one hour a week, You know, installing the software in their environment, asking for feedback and all of…”
Insight
Kumar: Enterprise PMF Is Reached When Sales Reps Predictably Close Deals
“I think product market fit in a, in both cases, like it's about finding the repeatability. Can you hire You know, a new sales rep, and can you point them in the right direction, which they call, say, an ICP, ideal customer profile, and train them on the two or…”