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Feb 19, 2017 · 15m · top-founders

EP 575: Fruitstreet Raises $6m From 180 Customers for HealthTech, New Kind of VC with CEO Laurence Girard

Lawrence Girard · 7m spoken Nathan Latka · 6m spoken
0:00 / 0:00

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In this episode of The Top, host Nathan Latka interviews Laurence Girard, founder and CEO of Fruit Street, discussing how his telehealth SaaS platform scaled to $15k in MRR and raised $6 million directly from 180 practicing physician investors.

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 44.1% of the talking time here. How this is scored →

Nathan as informed peer 3.4 Guest teaching 1.6 Guest disagreement 0.6 Nathan pushing back 2.0
05100:0010:002:03–5:57 · Nathan as informed peer 6/10 Overview of Fruit Street Telemedicine Software Nathan systematically digs into Fruit Street's SaaS unit economics, pressing Lawrence on whether customer churn is annual or monthly and inquiring about lifetime value. When Girard is unable to provide an LTV number, Nathan demonstrates his domain expertise by explaining how LTV is extrapolated from ARPU and churn.5:58–8:43 · Nathan as informed peer 4/10 Team Structure and VSee Joint Venture Partnership Girard explains Fruit Street's engineering joint venture with VSee and their unique physician-investor funding model. When Latka asks about tax advantages for public benefit corporations, Girard educates him that there are no tax benefits, clarifying the corporate governance and mission-alignment rationale.8:44–11:40 · Nathan as informed peer 5/10 Cap Table Management and Dual-Class Governance Nathan inquires about the logistical difficulties of managing 180 angel investors on a cap table. Girard details using eShares, full-time legal counsel, dual-class shares to maintain founder voting control, and SEC shareholder thresholds.11:42–13:50 · Nathan as informed peer 2/10 The Famous Five Rapid-Fire Questions A friendly and collaborative Famous Five rapid-fire segment covering book recommendations, mentors, software tools, and early life lessons.13:51–14:20 · Nathan as informed peer 0/10 Interview Recap and Key Takeaways Solo host outro summarizing Girard's metrics and raising methodology before transitioning to sponsor ads.2:03–5:57 · Guest teaching 1/10 Overview of Fruit Street Telemedicine Software Nathan systematically digs into Fruit Street's SaaS unit economics, pressing Lawrence on whether customer churn is annual or monthly and inquiring about lifetime value. When Girard is unable to provide an LTV number, Nathan demonstrates his domain expertise by explaining how LTV is extrapolated from ARPU and churn.5:58–8:43 · Guest teaching 4/10 Team Structure and VSee Joint Venture Partnership Girard explains Fruit Street's engineering joint venture with VSee and their unique physician-investor funding model. When Latka asks about tax advantages for public benefit corporations, Girard educates him that there are no tax benefits, clarifying the corporate governance and mission-alignment rationale.8:44–11:40 · Guest teaching 2/10 Cap Table Management and Dual-Class Governance Nathan inquires about the logistical difficulties of managing 180 angel investors on a cap table. Girard details using eShares, full-time legal counsel, dual-class shares to maintain founder voting control, and SEC shareholder thresholds.11:42–13:50 · Guest teaching 1/10 The Famous Five Rapid-Fire Questions A friendly and collaborative Famous Five rapid-fire segment covering book recommendations, mentors, software tools, and early life lessons.13:51–14:20 · Guest teaching 0/10 Interview Recap and Key Takeaways Solo host outro summarizing Girard's metrics and raising methodology before transitioning to sponsor ads.2:03–5:57 · Guest disagreement 1/10 Overview of Fruit Street Telemedicine Software Nathan systematically digs into Fruit Street's SaaS unit economics, pressing Lawrence on whether customer churn is annual or monthly and inquiring about lifetime value. When Girard is unable to provide an LTV number, Nathan demonstrates his domain expertise by explaining how LTV is extrapolated from ARPU and churn.5:58–8:43 · Guest disagreement 1/10 Team Structure and VSee Joint Venture Partnership Girard explains Fruit Street's engineering joint venture with VSee and their unique physician-investor funding model. When Latka asks about tax advantages for public benefit corporations, Girard educates him that there are no tax benefits, clarifying the corporate governance and mission-alignment rationale.8:44–11:40 · Guest disagreement 1/10 Cap Table Management and Dual-Class Governance Nathan inquires about the logistical difficulties of managing 180 angel investors on a cap table. Girard details using eShares, full-time legal counsel, dual-class shares to maintain founder voting control, and SEC shareholder thresholds.11:42–13:50 · Guest disagreement 0/10 The Famous Five Rapid-Fire Questions A friendly and collaborative Famous Five rapid-fire segment covering book recommendations, mentors, software tools, and early life lessons.13:51–14:20 · Guest disagreement 0/10 Interview Recap and Key Takeaways Solo host outro summarizing Girard's metrics and raising methodology before transitioning to sponsor ads.2:03–5:57 · Nathan pushing back 4/10 Overview of Fruit Street Telemedicine Software Nathan systematically digs into Fruit Street's SaaS unit economics, pressing Lawrence on whether customer churn is annual or monthly and inquiring about lifetime value. When Girard is unable to provide an LTV number, Nathan demonstrates his domain expertise by explaining how LTV is extrapolated from ARPU and churn.5:58–8:43 · Nathan pushing back 2/10 Team Structure and VSee Joint Venture Partnership Girard explains Fruit Street's engineering joint venture with VSee and their unique physician-investor funding model. When Latka asks about tax advantages for public benefit corporations, Girard educates him that there are no tax benefits, clarifying the corporate governance and mission-alignment rationale.8:44–11:40 · Nathan pushing back 3/10 Cap Table Management and Dual-Class Governance Nathan inquires about the logistical difficulties of managing 180 angel investors on a cap table. Girard details using eShares, full-time legal counsel, dual-class shares to maintain founder voting control, and SEC shareholder thresholds.11:42–13:50 · Nathan pushing back 1/10 The Famous Five Rapid-Fire Questions A friendly and collaborative Famous Five rapid-fire segment covering book recommendations, mentors, software tools, and early life lessons.13:51–14:20 · Nathan pushing back 0/10 Interview Recap and Key Takeaways Solo host outro summarizing Girard's metrics and raising methodology before transitioning to sponsor ads.

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

0:00 · Nathan 71.4% · guest 28.6%0:00 · Nathan 71.4% · guest 28.6%3:00 · Nathan 28% · guest 72%3:00 · Nathan 28% · guest 72%6:00 · Nathan 13.1% · guest 86.9%6:00 · Nathan 13.1% · guest 86.9%9:00 · Nathan 47.2% · guest 52.8%9:00 · Nathan 47.2% · guest 52.8%12:00 · Nathan 50.8% · guest 49.2%12:00 · Nathan 50.8% · guest 49.2%15:00 · Nathan 100% · guest 0%15:00 · Nathan 100% · guest 0%
Sharpest disagreement ▶ 4:47 Girard pushes back on metric tracking expectations

Girard resists the expectation of refined cohort metrics by emphasizing that the company is early-stage and was primarily focused on finding product-market fit.

 Hardest push from Nathan ▶ 4:47 Latka presses on churn frequency

Latka immediately interrupts Girard's 10% churn estimate to demand whether that metric represents an annual or monthly figure.

 Biggest teaching moment ▶ 8:04 Girard corrects tax assumption about benefit corporations

Girard informs Latka that Public Benefit Corporations offer zero tax deductions, explaining that the structure is purely for governance and mission preservation.

 Nathan holds their own ▶ 5:45 Latka breaks down LTV extrapolation formula

When Girard declines to estimate LTV, Latka jumps in to articulate how early-stage SaaS businesses mathematically derive LTV from ARPU and churn.
the scores for every segment, with the reasoning behind each
ChapterTopicNathan as informed peerGuest teachingGuest disagreementNathan pushing backWhy
Overview of Fruit Street Telemedicine Software 6114 Nathan systematically digs into Fruit Street's SaaS unit economics, pressing Lawrence on whether customer churn is annual or monthly and inquiring about lifetime value. When Girard is unable to provide an LTV number, Nathan demonstrates his domain expertise by explaining how LTV is extrapolated from ARPU and churn.
Team Structure and VSee Joint Venture Partnership 4412 Girard explains Fruit Street's engineering joint venture with VSee and their unique physician-investor funding model. When Latka asks about tax advantages for public benefit corporations, Girard educates him that there are no tax benefits, clarifying the corporate governance and mission-alignment rationale.
Cap Table Management and Dual-Class Governance 5213 Nathan inquires about the logistical difficulties of managing 180 angel investors on a cap table. Girard details using eShares, full-time legal counsel, dual-class shares to maintain founder voting control, and SEC shareholder thresholds.
The Famous Five Rapid-Fire Questions 2101 A friendly and collaborative Famous Five rapid-fire segment covering book recommendations, mentors, software tools, and early life lessons.
Interview Recap and Key Takeaways 0000 Solo host outro summarizing Girard's metrics and raising methodology before transitioning to sponsor ads.

Statements from this episode (10)

Assertion Not checkable as stated
Girard: Fruit Street generates $15,000 in monthly recurring revenue
“So we're at 15,000 a month in a monthly recurring revenue.”
Lawrence Girard Feb 19, 2017 ▶ 3:08
Assertion Supported
Girard: Fruit Street raised $6M from 180 physician investors
“The company started in May of 2014 and, you know, we've raised about six million dollars of funding from a 180 physicians that have invested in the company as well.”
Lawrence Girard Feb 19, 2017 ▶ 3:12
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Girard: Fruit Street has approximately 100 medical practice customers
“Right now there's around a hundred customers. In some cases we've given discounts, which is Kind of how it comes out to about 15,000 a month of revenue. There's about a hundred practices using the software right now.”
Lawrence Girard Feb 19, 2017 ▶ 3:57
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Girard: Fruit Street has generated $130,000 in cumulative total revenue
“We're at about a hundred K annual run rate right now. We've generated about a 130,000 dollars of total revenue. And so, you know, most of it came in 2016.”
Lawrence Girard Feb 19, 2017 ▶ 4:17
Disclosure
Girard: VSee engineers build Fruit Street's product for company equity
“They have about 52 full-time employees, and about 10 of them work on Fruit Street on the design and engineering side, and so they own a portion of our company and develop our product through a joint venture agreement, which would make the team size in total, y…”
Lawrence Girard Feb 19, 2017 ▶ 6:15
Opinion
Girard: Physician investors are often more valuable than VCs for healthtech
“We feel that since we're developing a medical product that we would have very valuable input from physicians that could actually use the product with patients in their practice and give us feedback from their patients and their healthcare providers on how we c…”
Lawrence Girard Feb 19, 2017 ▶ 6:57
Disclosure
Girard: Fruit Street is legally structured as a public benefit corporation
“Fruit Street's actually a public benefit corporation, which means we are for profit, but we also write our social mission into the bylaws of our company, which is to prevent and treat lifestyle-related disease using telemedicine, wearable devices, and mobile a…”
Lawrence Girard Feb 19, 2017 ▶ 7:28
Disclosure
Fruit Street uses dual-class shares so Girard retains full voting control
“And then we also have a dual class stock structure similar to the way that Facebook is structured where I've actually retained full voting control of the company, even though we have five board members.”
Lawrence Girard Feb 19, 2017 ▶ 9:20
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Fruit Street carries 180 direct shareholders rather than a syndicate
“Yeah, there's literally a 180 shareholders, so they're not in a syndicate.”
Lawrence Girard Feb 19, 2017 ▶ 9:59
Prediction Not checkable as stated
Girard: VSee CEO Milton Chen will achieve Cuban- or Page-level fame
“You know, maybe not you know, world famous on the level of Mark Cuban or Larry Page quite yet, but I think he will be one day.”
Lawrence Girard Feb 19, 2017 ▶ 12:24
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