Smith: Sears and Kmart used Qualtrics through bankruptcy until final days
Ryan Smith · The Things Nobody Tells You About An $8B Acquisition with Ryan Smith from Qualtrics · Feb 17, 2019 · at 35:55
Qualtrics CEO Ryan Smith illustrates how mission-critical experience data software is, even for distressed retailers.
0:00 / 0:08exact quote · 8.5s
▶ Watch the full episode on YouTube → 720p mp4 · rendered on demand · StarZero watermark
“Sears was in bankruptcy and in Kmart, they were all using Qualtrics even up to the last couple days, and I was like, wow, this is phenomenal.”
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 Ryan Smith
Smith: Venture funding would have prevented Qualtrics from pivoting to XM
“If we would have just bought our way through, I don't think we would have had that confidence or DNA to pivot the whole company and create this new category of experience management, which is really what SAP wanted.”
Smith: Accel and Sequoia totally underestimated Qualtrics' TAM
“And I think Excel and Sequoia totally shorted our TAM.”
Smith: SAP will pause M&A after $8B Qualtrics deal
“SAP's not buying anything for a while. We took all their powder.”
Smith: Acquirers will not move without a compelling event like an IPO
“If you're not building a company that can stand up and go public, Then you're probably going to be, no one's going to want it anyways. And you, there's going to be an outlier or two where you're going to point to and say that, but no one ever really, I mean, S…”