TechEmpower SaaS

AUGUST 21, 2023

Common Signs You Need a Technical Review We’ve already mentioned the most common signs that you might need a technical review: Slow or late delivery: “I’ve authorized two new developers, and we’re still behind.” Are you preparing to expand, take your business in a new direction, or take on new partners? And what causes that?

Technical Review 390

Technical Review Software Review Development Team Review Systems Review 390

SaaStr

DECEMBER 7, 2024

Dear SaaStr: Why Is It So Easy For Entrepreneurs With Previous Success to Raise Funds From VCs for Their New Venture Despite Not Having Domain Expertise? As Dharmesh Shah co-founder and CTO notes in the SaaStr Annual deep dive below, the second time … they just really wanted to go big. It doesnt necessarily work better.

Venture Capital 237

Venture Capital New CTO CTO Product Marketing 237

Intercom, Inc.

JANUARY 31, 2023

Click here to join the beta waitlist for our AI features or receive AI news from Intercom. We’ve built some exciting new features into Intercom using this new GPT technology and have given access to several hundred customers – and the response has been astounding. Our team has been using the new AI Inbox features a lot.

AI 188

AI Artificial Intelligence New CTO ChatGPT 188

SaaStr

FEBRUARY 8, 2021

” — Jason Riedel, founder/CTO of Aspireship. “When on New Year’s Eve, customers kept sending us signed contracts.” “When customers get back $100k’s in minutes and want to pay us more” — Kanat Bekt, founder/CTO, SupplyPike. 20% conversion. ” — Drew Naugher.

CTO Hire 277

CTO Hire New CTO CTO Healthcare 277

SaaStr

JULY 21, 2020

Your investors and others will learn a lot more hearing about sales from your VP of Sales, your CTO co-founder … and not you. Just assume none of your investors invest again. But there are 1,000+ new firms since 2016 alone. Professional investors can even write off any given investment if they have to.

Sales Recruiting 326

Sales Recruiting New CTO Scale CTO 326

SaaStr

JANUARY 22, 2021

Ciara Peter (Gainsight VP of Product & Design) and Mickey Alon (CTO & Founder of Gainsight PX) share their practical tips for product leaders looking to achieve business growth. Every year, millions of new products are created and launched. The return on marketing investment is much faster.

Scale 271

Scale New CTO CTO Acquisition 271

SaaStr

MARCH 7, 2021

Less and you under-invest. At $8m in ARR, if you have $2m of cash in the bank, you get real nervous investing much more than $500k-$750k, $1m max. It’s subtle, but in SaaS I’ve learned you under-invest if you have < 50% of your ARR in the bank. 5/ Moving from CTO-led -> VPE-led dev team. More here.

Part-Time VPE 269

Part-Time VPE Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Scale 269

SaaStr

FEBRUARY 7, 2023

The goal is to help each other learn something new, find mentorships, create partnerships, and exchange strategies. Braindates are 1:1 and small group networking sessions designed for you to share knowledge and network with like-minded SaaS leaders during SaaStr Europa.

VP of Engineering 242

VP of Engineering Technical Cofounder Outsourcing Services CTO Coach 242

SaaStr

JANUARY 4, 2024

“Doubling Down” is a new series where we hear from top B2B SaaS investors on their most recent activities and takes on the current market. What’s your most recent disclosed investment? What’s your most recent disclosed investment? What’s your sweet spot for investing — check size, stage, type of deal?

Management 221

Management CTO Hire New CTO CTO 221

SaaStr

DECEMBER 4, 2020

As the year starts to wind to a close, one exercise I go through with many CEOs I’ve invested in or am close to is this: Did you ship at least 3 truly game-changing features this year? Not launching 3 Truly Game-Changing Features doesn’t mean you didn’t ship any new code or features. Not just at $0.1m

New CTO 222

New CTO CTO Engineering Investment 222

SaaStr

MAY 19, 2023

Reference other great investments they’ve made, and why they are similar. Another month of progress, another set of new customers, etc. Share up front why your first CTO left. And no one is in a rush today to invest. But hiding both doesn’t help. #3. Truly hyper-personalize it. Share lots of details. Show the opposite.

New CTO 252

New CTO CTO Banking Cloud 252

Tom Tunguz

OCTOBER 28, 2024

On Monday, at TC Disrupt Colin Zima CEO of Omni , Jordan Tigani CEO of Motherduck , Daniel Svnova CEO of Superlinked & Toby Mao CTO of Tobiko Data who are leading the evolution of the Post Modern Data Stack discussed the trends they are seeing. Customers are excited about new architectures that significantly reduce cost.

Trends 186

Trends Data New CTO CTO 186

SaaStr

JUNE 25, 2023

A few that I’ve seen across the handful of investments I’ve made … that didn’t work out: Not really committed to going long. A great CTO usually can solve this problem just in time to save the customers, but without one, revenue stalls. Sometimes, in a new or emerging category you can be slow at first.

Startup 195

Startup New CTO CTO Investment 195

SaaStr

SEPTEMBER 10, 2021

Recently, I spent several hours with a new but great friend who has been on a vaguely similar journey to me. Investing at a breathtaking pace. In my first start-up as a founder, I had a great CTO and VPE and a pretty darn good VP Ops from the very beginning. This friend is one of the hardest working people in the industry.

Part-Time VPE 293

Part-Time VPE CTO Hire AWS New CTO 293

SaaStr

SEPTEMBER 17, 2020

“Our journey with JFrog started back in November 2015 when I first met CEO and co-founder Shlomi Ben Haim and the JFrog team,” said Jai Das, who is the president and managing director at Sapphire Ventures , which participated in the $50 million Series C investment. “One But even more appealing was the product vision the founders outlined.

New CTO 215

New CTO CTO Benchmarks Consulting 215

SaaStr

NOVEMBER 21, 2019

Since 2010 we’ve seen more startups, funds, and capital than ever before, but with this drastic increase, investors are seeing unexpected new trends reshaping the future of the industry. The panel that we are in is called Is Seed the New Series A, and this is a question that I’ve been asking informally yesterday and today.

New CTO 156

New CTO Sales Hiring B2C CTO Hire 156

SaaStock

MARCH 8, 2019

Before getting into the investment world, she started and sold two successful companies in edutainment, and made a prominent name in the tech field around the world. After five years at Ernst & Young in New York, she served as Vice President at Citigroup in the Big Apple. Jessie Lam. Diane Mensah. Kathleen Ting. Hande Cilingir.

VP of Engineering 264

VP of Engineering CTO Coach Venture Capital SaaS 264

SaaStr

JULY 5, 2024

Some are decades-old problems, while others have emerged from this new world we’re in. Also, determine whether you have the right CTO to handle these changes. If they aren’t sure how to integrate AI into your product, ask if you need a new CTO. Profitability isn’t the end state for investing or an exit.

CTO Hire 209

CTO Hire Sales Hiring New CTO Venture Capital 209

SaaStr

JANUARY 12, 2022

. “That it was much easier to do more in order to keep that customer than to get a new “top” customer. We all know this, but we forget about it, especially when the Hot New Deal and the sales team’s wants and needs consumes all of management’s resources. ” — Ankit Sindhi, Founder, Spurt.

CTO Hire 277

CTO Hire Sales Hiring New CTO CTO 277

SaaStr

SEPTEMBER 15, 2020

Our first introduction to sales tax was dealing with it as a liability,” CTO and Co-founder David Heinemeier Hansson says. “We By understanding what constitutes sales tax compliance by state, you decrease tax liability as you scale into new markets (e.g., SaaS company Basecamp discovered the nee d for these steps firsthand. “

Payment Services 262

Payment Services compliance SaaS Payments Scale 262

SaaStr

OCTOBER 25, 2023

You’re not building a product or getting any new customers. When Lemkin started investing ten years ago, his first five early-stage investments were wildly successful. Talkdesk is worth $10B, and he invested when it was just five people. Get a good CTO and commit to understanding your market and staying in the game.

Scale 242

Scale Sales Hiring AI Sales Recruiting 242

Valerian Tech

DECEMBER 30, 2022

The role of a Fractional Chief Technology Officer (CTO) is to provide technical expertise and leadership to a company on a part-time or temporary basis. This can be a useful option for startups or small businesses that may not have the resources to hire a full-time CTO or may not need one on a permanent basis.

Fractional CTO 52

Fractional CTO CTO Hire Part-Time CTO CTO 52

SaaStr

JULY 13, 2023

It’s too much to learn on the fly for most new VPs of Sales. Amazing, great emails that are perfect, that solve your problems as a buyer for real right now, or are a jaw-dropping investment, get opened,” says Lemkin. Q: What Do You Think About Specialization In This New Era Of Efficiency? They wanted a one-call close.

CTO Hire 172

CTO Hire Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Scale 172

SaaStr

JANUARY 17, 2024

Benjamin added, “I think a lot of people think about this new AI technology as something that’s gonna just come in and like work from day one. ” What are the Most Important Investments that Ensure a Future 50 Company Can Adopt? But actually, it turns out its still software. Compliance matters. Security matters.

AI 239

AI Enterprise Artificial Intelligence compliance 239

Valerian Tech

DECEMBER 14, 2022

There are many benefits to hiring a fractional CTO, also known as a part-time or interim CTO. A fractional CTO can bring a wealth of knowledge and experience to your organization without the added expense of a full-time executive. Overall, Valerian Technology can provide many benefits to your organization.

CTO Hire 52

CTO Hire New CTO CTO Technology 52

Valerian Tech

JANUARY 5, 2023

It can be beneficial to hire a fractional CTO (Chief Technology Officer) in a variety of situations. They can provide guidance on which technologies to invest in and help you create a roadmap for the future. When you need specialized expertise: A fractional CTO can bring a level of expertise that you may not have in-house.

Fractional CTO 52

Fractional CTO CTO Hire Part-Time CTO CTO 52

SaaStr

NOVEMBER 11, 2022

They were aware of it, but startups that I work with closely or invested in, if they got all the way to 25 million with 75% NRR, I would tell them to quit today. Jason Lemkin: I think I noticed a pattern, and I wrote it up a couple of years ago and refreshed it, and then I’ll add a new anecdote. VCs can only invest in outliers.

Outsourcing Services 177

Outsourcing Services Banking CTO Hire New CTO 177

Tom Tunguz

MAY 7, 2014

Unlike most business stories which are penned from the point of view of the CEO, this one is written by the CTO/founder, David Hitz. Other chapters focus on risk, including evaluating the risk of entering new markets, of changing corporate culture and attitudes, and of changing CEOs. and building a startup. That’s the luck part.

Underperforming Technical Team 157

Underperforming Technical Team New CTO CTO Government 157

OpenView Labs

APRIL 12, 2019

Does a new senior member have the right to challenge a historical decision made by a junior developer? We needed a CTO. If the challenges around hiring a senior developer late in the game are high, hiring a CTO can be even tougher. But we can hire 3 x junior developers for the cost of a CTO!” Let’s talk about the CTO.

CTO Hire 64

CTO Hire Investment New CTO CTO 64

SaaStr

JUNE 1, 2021

Co-founder and CTO Dharmesh Shah shared with us how they got there — and the top mistakes they made — just 3 quarters after their IPO. We have someone that probably 98 percent of you know virtually or socially in some sense, Dharmesh Shah, founder and CTO of HubSpot. But of course, it wasn’t always quite that big!

Part-Time VPE 224

Part-Time VPE Technical Cofounder CTO Hire New CTO 224

Intercom, Inc.

APRIL 22, 2021

For those who don’t know him, Will has over 10 years of experience in the likes of Yahoo, Digg, Uber, and Stripe, and he’s currently the CTO of Calm , the mindfulness app that helps millions of people to lower their stress levels and sleep better. They often superimpose it on the new company they’ve joined.

Technical Review 274

Technical Review Leadership VP of Engineering CTO Coach 274

SaaStr

SEPTEMBER 18, 2020

They’ve invested in all of these other businesses. Jason Lemkin: 50 reps in a new city that you’ve never met, and hired in 60 days when you’re in the low millions ARR. So number six, thinking you’re getting away with under investing in management, up scaling in HR. We all under invest.

Sales Hiring 238

Sales Hiring CTO Hire Scale Investment 238

The Angel VC

FEBRUARY 29, 2012

If I think about the founders of "my" SaaS startups, these are the three qualities that all of them have – in addition to a huge amount of intelligence, motivation and commitment, which allows them to quickly acquire new skills as the company grows. The second best option is two, and the third best option is one, four or five.

CTO Hire 106

CTO Hire Startup Sales Hiring New CTO 106

Intercom, Inc.

APRIL 19, 2018

Ciaran, our CTO , came up with this magical line. We invested more heavily in particular types of training in order to build even more muscle in those core technologies, and we built some interesting tooling to support those core technologies. He said, “I want to run less software, not more software. I thought, wow, the system works.

Outsourcing Services 192

Outsourcing Services Part-Time VPE Software AWS 192

SaaStr

JUNE 26, 2024

Growth is still good for them, but they had no net new customers last quarter. HubSpots NRR has fallen to 100%, so to grow 23%, they must add 23% net new customers. Are brand-new companies that seem epic with no revenue really worth $1.5B Maybe if you have the ex-CTO of Github, but that’s still a super speculative bet.

CTO Hire 144

CTO Hire AI Venture Capital Sales Hiring 144

SaaStr

JULY 10, 2021

As you said, people take it hard if suddenly you say, “Hey, this is your new EVP. In the good sense, like go and build the kind of organization and process that made them successful in the past, but you need to hire that kind of person when you’re willing to make a big investment and a big change in that area. What is good?

Sales Hiring 259

Sales Hiring Underperforming Technical Team Development Team Review CTO Hire 259

Andreessen Horowitz

DECEMBER 4, 2023

And, especially when you’re considering integrating a new technology platform into your business—like AI today, or cloud a decade ago—how do you invest in innovation without losing control of your runway and budget? Some investments will generate returns within a few months, while others may take years to produce results.

Underperforming Technical Team 120

Underperforming Technical Team Benchmarks CTO Hire New CTO 120