StarZero All shows Try the podcast clipper →

Mar 2, 2017 · 18m · top-founders

EP 586: Zapnito ACV is $210K, Helping 12 Customers With Knowledge Networks and $650k Raised with CEO Charles Thiede

Charles Thiede · 8m spoken Nathan Latka · 7m spoken
0:00 / 0:00

gold bands on the timeline = statements, start to end. Hover to read, click to jump. CC turns on captions

Nathan Latka interviews Charles Thiede, co-founder and CEO of Zapnito, exploring how the white-label knowledge network platform scaled to 500,000 British pounds in ARR across 12 enterprise clients. Thiede details the company's 2014 pivot, multi-year contract structures, founder-led sales approach, and angel-backed capital efficiency.

How this conversation actually went

Every chapter scored 0–10 on four independent dynamics. Hover any point for the reasoning behind the score. Nathan holds 45.7% of the talking time here. How this is scored →

Nathan as informed peer 5.6 Guest teaching 2.0 Guest disagreement 1.2 Nathan pushing back 3.0
05100:0010:001:10–4:14 · Nathan as informed peer 6/10 Introducing Zapnito: Experts as a Service and Enterprise Thought Leadership Latka inspects the live website and client deployments like JP Morgan's UK Edge sub-domain to understand the exact mechanics of Zapnito. Thiede clearly explains the product's white-label enterprise knowledge network positioning relative to tools like Slack.4:15–7:19 · Nathan as informed peer 5/10 Business Model, Pricing Strategy, and Company Origins Latka explores pricing, contract length, and the founding history, clarifying whether 3-year contracts are paid upfront annually or multi-year. Thiede details the 2013 marketplace origin and the 2014 pivot to enterprise SaaS.7:20–10:44 · Nathan as informed peer 7/10 Customer Count, ARR Metrics, and Founder-Led Sales Structure Latka challenges Thiede's imprecise initial customer estimate and runs real-time currency conversions from GBP ARR to USD metrics. He also presses Thiede on founder-led sales allocation.10:44–14:42 · Nathan as informed peer 6/10 Customer Retention, Expansion Dynamics, and Angel Fundraising Latka examines net negative churn, expansion mechanics across enterprise divisions, and angel round structuring. Thiede explains account expansion using Springer Nature as an example.14:43–16:06 · Nathan as informed peer 4/10 The Famous Five Rapid-Fire Questions Latka guides Thiede through standard rapid-fire questions regarding tools, sleep patterns, age, and founding advice with brief probing on marital status.1:10–4:14 · Guest teaching 3/10 Introducing Zapnito: Experts as a Service and Enterprise Thought Leadership Latka inspects the live website and client deployments like JP Morgan's UK Edge sub-domain to understand the exact mechanics of Zapnito. Thiede clearly explains the product's white-label enterprise knowledge network positioning relative to tools like Slack.4:15–7:19 · Guest teaching 2/10 Business Model, Pricing Strategy, and Company Origins Latka explores pricing, contract length, and the founding history, clarifying whether 3-year contracts are paid upfront annually or multi-year. Thiede details the 2013 marketplace origin and the 2014 pivot to enterprise SaaS.7:20–10:44 · Guest teaching 2/10 Customer Count, ARR Metrics, and Founder-Led Sales Structure Latka challenges Thiede's imprecise initial customer estimate and runs real-time currency conversions from GBP ARR to USD metrics. He also presses Thiede on founder-led sales allocation.10:44–14:42 · Guest teaching 2/10 Customer Retention, Expansion Dynamics, and Angel Fundraising Latka examines net negative churn, expansion mechanics across enterprise divisions, and angel round structuring. Thiede explains account expansion using Springer Nature as an example.14:43–16:06 · Guest teaching 1/10 The Famous Five Rapid-Fire Questions Latka guides Thiede through standard rapid-fire questions regarding tools, sleep patterns, age, and founding advice with brief probing on marital status.1:10–4:14 · Guest disagreement 1/10 Introducing Zapnito: Experts as a Service and Enterprise Thought Leadership Latka inspects the live website and client deployments like JP Morgan's UK Edge sub-domain to understand the exact mechanics of Zapnito. Thiede clearly explains the product's white-label enterprise knowledge network positioning relative to tools like Slack.4:15–7:19 · Guest disagreement 1/10 Business Model, Pricing Strategy, and Company Origins Latka explores pricing, contract length, and the founding history, clarifying whether 3-year contracts are paid upfront annually or multi-year. Thiede details the 2013 marketplace origin and the 2014 pivot to enterprise SaaS.7:20–10:44 · Guest disagreement 2/10 Customer Count, ARR Metrics, and Founder-Led Sales Structure Latka challenges Thiede's imprecise initial customer estimate and runs real-time currency conversions from GBP ARR to USD metrics. He also presses Thiede on founder-led sales allocation.10:44–14:42 · Guest disagreement 1/10 Customer Retention, Expansion Dynamics, and Angel Fundraising Latka examines net negative churn, expansion mechanics across enterprise divisions, and angel round structuring. Thiede explains account expansion using Springer Nature as an example.14:43–16:06 · Guest disagreement 1/10 The Famous Five Rapid-Fire Questions Latka guides Thiede through standard rapid-fire questions regarding tools, sleep patterns, age, and founding advice with brief probing on marital status.1:10–4:14 · Nathan pushing back 2/10 Introducing Zapnito: Experts as a Service and Enterprise Thought Leadership Latka inspects the live website and client deployments like JP Morgan's UK Edge sub-domain to understand the exact mechanics of Zapnito. Thiede clearly explains the product's white-label enterprise knowledge network positioning relative to tools like Slack.4:15–7:19 · Nathan pushing back 3/10 Business Model, Pricing Strategy, and Company Origins Latka explores pricing, contract length, and the founding history, clarifying whether 3-year contracts are paid upfront annually or multi-year. Thiede details the 2013 marketplace origin and the 2014 pivot to enterprise SaaS.7:20–10:44 · Nathan pushing back 5/10 Customer Count, ARR Metrics, and Founder-Led Sales Structure Latka challenges Thiede's imprecise initial customer estimate and runs real-time currency conversions from GBP ARR to USD metrics. He also presses Thiede on founder-led sales allocation.10:44–14:42 · Nathan pushing back 3/10 Customer Retention, Expansion Dynamics, and Angel Fundraising Latka examines net negative churn, expansion mechanics across enterprise divisions, and angel round structuring. Thiede explains account expansion using Springer Nature as an example.14:43–16:06 · Nathan pushing back 2/10 The Famous Five Rapid-Fire Questions Latka guides Thiede through standard rapid-fire questions regarding tools, sleep patterns, age, and founding advice with brief probing on marital status.

speaking balance: gold is Nathan, purple is the guest (3 minute bins)

0:00 · Nathan 57.6% · guest 42.4%0:00 · Nathan 57.6% · guest 42.4%3:00 · Nathan 32.8% · guest 67.2%3:00 · Nathan 32.8% · guest 67.2%6:00 · Nathan 48.8% · guest 51.2%6:00 · Nathan 48.8% · guest 51.2%9:00 · Nathan 20.9% · guest 79.1%9:00 · Nathan 20.9% · guest 79.1%12:00 · Nathan 30.7% · guest 69.3%12:00 · Nathan 30.7% · guest 69.3%15:00 · Nathan 83% · guest 17%15:00 · Nathan 83% · guest 17%18:00 · Nathan 0% · guest 0%18:00 · Nathan 0% · guest 0%
Sharpest disagreement ▶ 5:04 Correcting billing structure assumptions

Thiede directly counters Latka's assumption that clients pay three years upfront in full, specifying that payments are invoiced annually or quarterly.

 Hardest push from Nathan ▶ 7:19 Challenging customer count vagueness

Latka pushes back on Thiede's vague response about having 'about 15' customers, prompting Thiede to distinguish exactly between paying accounts and joint ventures.

 Biggest teaching moment ▶ 2:38 Explaining white-label thought leadership vs Slack

Thiede educates Latka on why Zapnito is not an internal messaging app like Slack, but rather an external white-label audience engagement platform for trusted brands.

 Nathan holds their own ▶ 7:43 Live ARR and currency translation breakdown

Latka quickly converts customer count and contract sizes into monthly recurring figures and annual USD/GBP ranges, demonstrating strong domain command.
the scores for every segment, with the reasoning behind each
ChapterTopicNathan as informed peerGuest teachingGuest disagreementNathan pushing backWhy
Introducing Zapnito: Experts as a Service and Enterprise Thought Leadership 6312 Latka inspects the live website and client deployments like JP Morgan's UK Edge sub-domain to understand the exact mechanics of Zapnito. Thiede clearly explains the product's white-label enterprise knowledge network positioning relative to tools like Slack.
Business Model, Pricing Strategy, and Company Origins 5213 Latka explores pricing, contract length, and the founding history, clarifying whether 3-year contracts are paid upfront annually or multi-year. Thiede details the 2013 marketplace origin and the 2014 pivot to enterprise SaaS.
Customer Count, ARR Metrics, and Founder-Led Sales Structure 7225 Latka challenges Thiede's imprecise initial customer estimate and runs real-time currency conversions from GBP ARR to USD metrics. He also presses Thiede on founder-led sales allocation.
Customer Retention, Expansion Dynamics, and Angel Fundraising 6213 Latka examines net negative churn, expansion mechanics across enterprise divisions, and angel round structuring. Thiede explains account expansion using Springer Nature as an example.
The Famous Five Rapid-Fire Questions 4112 Latka guides Thiede through standard rapid-fire questions regarding tools, sleep patterns, age, and founding advice with brief probing on marital status.

Statements from this episode (10)

Assertion Supported
Zapnito counts JP Morgan and NASA among its clients
“So anything from JP Morgan to NASA those are kind of some of the organizations that we work with.”
Charles Thiede Mar 2, 2017 ▶ 2:07
Assertion Supported
Thiede: JP Morgan uses Zapnito for its UK Edge network
“So they have created a thought leadership network using that, you know, called the UK edge, which is all about the UK economy to drive leads and thought leadership in the fund industry.”
Charles Thiede Mar 2, 2017 ▶ 3:42
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Zapnito's average ACV is £60,000
“Average is about 60,000 pounds per year.”
Charles Thiede Mar 2, 2017 ▶ 4:42
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Zapnito has 12 paying enterprise customers
“It depends on how you consider customers, but yeah, paying customers is 12 customers.”
Charles Thiede Mar 2, 2017 ▶ 7:26
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Zapnito is approaching £500,000 in ARR
“We're about we're close to about 500,000 pounds annual reoccurring revenue.”
Charles Thiede Mar 2, 2017 ▶ 8:11
Disclosure
Zapnito has no dedicated salespeople other than the CEO
“And inside sales people, we don't have any sales people besides myself. So we are all in sales.”
Charles Thiede Mar 2, 2017 ▶ 9:02
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Zapnito claims a 100% customer renewal rate
“No, we've got a hundred percent renewal rates.”
Charles Thiede Mar 2, 2017 ▶ 10:53
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Thiede: Zapnito operates with net negative revenue churn
“We have a net negative churn. So our clients grow with us.”
Charles Thiede Mar 2, 2017 ▶ 10:57
Assertion Supported
Thiede: Zapnito grew Springer Nature deployment from 3 to ~15 networks
“Springer Nature, for example, which is a big publisher, second largest STM publisher. You know, we started out with three knowledge networks with them, and then we've scaled to close to 15.”
Charles Thiede Mar 2, 2017 ▶ 11:40
Disclosure
Zapnito has raised £650,000 to date
“We've raised about six, 650,000 pounds.”
Charles Thiede Mar 2, 2017 ▶ 13:36
Made with StarZero

Turn any episode into a week of clips.

This entire site, over 2,600 episodes transcribed, diarized, checked and made playable, runs on the StarZero media pipeline. Drop in your own episode and the podcast clipper finds the moments worth sharing, cuts them, captions them, and reframes them for every feed.

Try the podcast clipper Learn more