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Andrew Filev

Founder & CEO, Zencoder · 0 appearances on the record.

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founderexecutive@andrewsthoughts ↗LinkedIn ↗wrike.com ↗

He is best known for founding the collaborative work management platform Wrike in 2006, bootstrapping it through its early growth and leading it to a $2.25 billion acquisition by Citrix in 2021. Today, he leads Zencoder, an artificial intelligence startup focused on developer productivity and AI-assisted software creation.

11statements → 3claims → 0claims resolved → —average certainty → —average debate potential → 1said about them ↓

2 not checkable as stated how the 3 claims stand · each chip opens the sources

3 assertions · 6 insights · 2 disclosures · every statement was checked. The predictions and assertions are the 3 claims: statements the public record can support or contradict. 1 is resolved, and 2 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 Andrew 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
Wrike Bootstrapped Six Years to Thousands of Customers Before Raising Capital
“We bootstrapped for about six years, and when the first, when we first raised our first institutional capital, we already had thousands of paid customers”
Andrew Filev Aug 28, 2019 ▶ 2:52 "5 Dos and Dont's Lessons From My Bootstrapping Days" Wrike Founder and CEO Andrew Filev

Everything Andrew Filev said on the Official SaaStr Podcast that made the record, most notable first. Filter by type, assessment or year in the ledger →

Insight
Freemium Models Dangerously Delay Validating if Customers Will Actually Pay
“Freemium model is amazing to get to spread the word out, but it also delays the time when you truly test whether or not your product delivers the value to your customers.”
Andrew Filev Aug 28, 2019 ▶ 11:36 "5 Dos and Dont's Lessons From My Bootstrapping Days" Wrike Founder and CEO Andrew Filev
Insight
Filev: Partnerships Only Multiply Growth Once a Startup Reaches Scale
“Once you grow to a certain scale and size, then partnerships are extremely important. We have our full-blown BD team. We work with strategics. We work with smaller companies. We work with work with integration partners of size. So once you get the scale, partn…”
Andrew Filev Aug 28, 2019 ▶ 10:54 "5 Dos and Dont's Lessons From My Bootstrapping Days" Wrike Founder and CEO Andrew Filev
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Filev: Wrike Was Three Times More Capital Efficient Than Direct Competitors
“If you look at our revenue size to the amount of capital we raised and burned, We were usually three, literally three X better than direct comparables or competitors”
Andrew Filev Aug 28, 2019 ▶ 26:24 "5 Dos and Dont's Lessons From My Bootstrapping Days" Wrike Founder and CEO Andrew Filev
Insight
Filev: Product-Market Fit Is the Second Derivative of Startup Growth
“When you are just starting your company, that product market feed is literally critical. Think of it as a like this second derivative of your growth trajectory. So slight changes in that compounded over five years would mean whether you're sort of bust or a bi…”
Andrew Filev Aug 28, 2019 ▶ 7:26 "5 Dos and Dont's Lessons From My Bootstrapping Days" Wrike Founder and CEO Andrew Filev
Insight
Founders Must Call One Churned and One Happy Customer Every Week
“Once a week, ah, give a call to a customer who either loves you or hates you, right? And mix both, right? So, so, call to your best customers and understand why did they buy you, ah, how are they using you, what do they like, and why did they pick you rather t…”
Andrew Filev Aug 28, 2019 ▶ 7:56 "5 Dos and Dont's Lessons From My Bootstrapping Days" Wrike Founder and CEO Andrew Filev
Disclosure
Filev: Wrike's Early Distribution Partnerships Delivered Literally Zero Results
“So we invested over the years into multiple partnerships that ultimately brought us literally nothing.”
Andrew Filev Aug 28, 2019 ▶ 10:05 "5 Dos and Dont's Lessons From My Bootstrapping Days" Wrike Founder and CEO Andrew Filev
Insight
Large Company Employees Execute Existing Playbooks Rather Than Building Them
“In a very large company, they're, they, they're hired to run the existing playbook, rather than do a transformation and build the playbook. And so, if you're hiring somebody who only worked at large companies one, they can make a great hire, but be careful and…”
Andrew Filev Aug 28, 2019 ▶ 17:05 "5 Dos and Dont's Lessons From My Bootstrapping Days" Wrike Founder and CEO Andrew Filev
Insight
Filev: Trying to Out-Microsoft Microsoft Is Suicidal for Startups
“You're, again, you're not trying to out Microsoft Microsoft. That, that's suicidal. Don't do that. So, think about things that are truly different.”
Andrew Filev Aug 28, 2019 ▶ 20:20 "5 Dos and Dont's Lessons From My Bootstrapping Days" Wrike Founder and CEO Andrew Filev
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Wrike Acquired Thousands of Customers Before Hiring a Single Sales Rep
“I didn't have sales reps until, again, we had thousands of customers, and the way I approached it very unconventionally.”
Andrew Filev Aug 28, 2019 ▶ 23:23 "5 Dos and Dont's Lessons From My Bootstrapping Days" Wrike Founder and CEO Andrew Filev
Disclosure
Filev Intentionally Raised as Little Capital as Possible in Every Round
“Every round I did, I raised less than I could, and I try to raise as little as possible, like a lot of people try to raise as much as possible, I try to raise as little as possible”
Andrew Filev Aug 28, 2019 ▶ 26:03 "5 Dos and Dont's Lessons From My Bootstrapping Days" Wrike Founder and CEO Andrew Filev
Assertion Supported
Wrike Bootstrapped Six Years to Thousands of Customers Before Raising Capital
“We bootstrapped for about six years, and when the first, when we first raised our first institutional capital, we already had thousands of paid customers”
Andrew Filev Aug 28, 2019 ▶ 2:52 "5 Dos and Dont's Lessons From My Bootstrapping Days" Wrike Founder and CEO Andrew Filev

The other half of the tape: Andrew Filev's own voice is left out of every number here. Other people bring the name up 1 time in 1 episode on the Official SaaStr Podcast. every mention, with the transcript →

Who brings them up most Jason Lemkin 1

Every mention by year

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2026 1 mention in 1 episode

Played on the show (1)

Episodes where a recording of Andrew Filev was played rather than Andrew taking part, or where the tape carries an address with nobody putting questions to them. Listed because the words are on the record, kept out of every score on this page because they were not said on this show. We read this off the tape: who was spoken to, who was asked something, who answered whom.

EpisodeDateOn tapeWhat it is
"5 Dos and Dont's Lessons From My Bootstrapping Days" Wrike Founder and CEO Andrew Filev Aug 28, 2019 26m aired address
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