SaaStr

MARCH 12, 2025

With 10+ years as a CMO at companies ranging from $1M to $1B in revenue, another 10+ years as CEO of companies in the $0-$100M range, and extensive experience as an independent director on startup boards, Dave offers a 360-degree perspective on marketing’s role in SaaS success. This isn’t a generic Marketing 101 course.

Sales Hiring 202

Sales Hiring Marketing Technical Review Underperforming Technical Team 202

SaaStr

MARCH 23, 2025

Codeium has emerged as one of the hottest AI startups, growing from 30 to 150 employees in just one year, with a valuation already exceeding $1 billion. Technical customers report that tasks that previously took weeks are now completed in hours. I really liked this one and wanted to write up a few more learnings.

Sales Recruiting 242

Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Scale AI 242

SaaStr

FEBRUARY 6, 2025

The Speakers: Mayada Gonimah (Founder, Thread AI) Maya is the co-founder of Thread AI, which helps large enterprises embed AI into their existing workflows and applications without disrupting their tech stack. AI Should Never Be a Workflow – It Should Enhance Existing Ones The biggest mistake enterprises make?

AI 189

AI Cloud Enterprise Technical Review 189

SaaStr

MARCH 18, 2025

Demand Was the Ceiling, Not Cash Unlike most startups that struggle to generate sufficient pipeline, Wiz faced the opposite problem: “The company had a problem with managing high demand, having calendars full of demos and struggling to find time for team meetings outside of customer interactions.”

Scale 185

Scale Sales Hiring Scaling Headcount 185

SaaStr

APRIL 20, 2024

AI in Sales and Marketing AI is disrupting sales and marketing, particularly in support and SDR /BDR functions, due to the shortage of skilled workers and the potential for increased efficiency and cost savings. Product Marketing and Early-Stage Priorities Product marketing is not a priority for most startups. And so much more!

Sales Hiring 301

Sales Hiring Startup Marketing Technical Review 301

Intercom, Inc.

DECEMBER 12, 2018

Known as the Martech 5000 — nicknamed after the 5,000 companies that were competing in the global marketing technology space in 2017, it’s said to be the most frequently shared slide of all time. Marketing technology is now the largest portion of total marketing budget (29% on average according to Gartner ).

Technical Review 223

Technical Review Technology Scale Marketing 223

TechEmpower SaaS

JULY 24, 2023

At TechEmpower, we frequently talk to startup founders, CEOs, product leaders, and other innovators about their next big tech initiative. After all, that’s what tech innovation is all about. What are your key Startup Metrics ? Do you have a custom algorithm or other technology? How do you make your money?

Innovation 780

Innovation Development CTO Hire Technical Review 780

SaaStr

JUNE 14, 2023

At SaaStr Europa, UiPath’s Dines shared five insights from growing a company from nothing, so other founders can learn what it takes to scale a SaaS startup to $1B+ ARR. UiPath was founded back in 2005, and its origin story is similar to many technical engineers-turned-founders.

Scale 246

Scale Artificial Intelligence Technical Review Software Review 246

SaaStr

JANUARY 19, 2023

For startups, a successful business partnership could mean access to new products, the opportunity to reach new markets, or increase customer loyalty. Technical and Business compatibility It is important to ensure there is a non-disruptive clear path to extend, build-on or infuse solutions from a technical perspective.

Technical Review 261

Technical Review Startup Scale Sales Hiring 261

SaaStr

FEBRUARY 14, 2021

There are a lot of subtle pros and cons and issues, but for most Big Tech Companies, the pro to buying a startup is time and scale: Being able to enter a space or category quicker. And a practical level, if a BigCo is falling behind due to a competitive thread, these “pros” and even bigger. Technical debt and integration issues.

Startup 210

Startup Technical Review Software Review Acquisition 210

SaaStr

MARCH 14, 2022

Someone that was a good or decent VP of Sales, often at a well-known startup or company, that just … didn’t want to do it anymore. But I see these ex-VPs of Sales sometimes get lured back by the glamor of a hot startup, and actively hunt them. There are many gems there, go hunt those candidates. They’d had enough.

Sales Recruiting 300

Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Technical Review Scale 300

SaaStr

JULY 20, 2022

For whatever reason, the company is ready to exit startup status and prepare to scale-up. Dave Kellogg, Executive-In-Residence at Balderton Capital, breaks down the most common mistakes companies make when going from startup to scale-up. To get a startup off the ground, company operators thrive with those who can figure anything out.

Scale 258

Scale Technical Advisors Sales Hiring Technical Review 258

SaaStr

JANUARY 11, 2024

We often start speaking with a startup when they have GTM questions rather than seeking capital which then leads to an investment opportunity over time. We have had arguably the most macro disruptions to the startup ecosystem in the last 5 years than any other time in at least my lifetime. Our current fund, Fund III, is $150M. #3.

Technical Review 301

Technical Review Scale Management Sales Hiring 301

Intercom, Inc.

APRIL 2, 2018

Instead of submitting your work for review, afraid of the amount of feedback you’re going to get, embrace the process and seek out the opinions of those who will give you the most feedback from day one. Our technical design process. Own your technical design…to the end. Brainstorm potential solutions with them.

Technical Review 219

Technical Review Software Review Systems Review Engineering 219

SaaStr

APRIL 23, 2024

Like many SaaS startups, Databricks had a big vision from the beginning, when people believed that no one cared about a unified data platform. It’s very common with good founders and can drive a startup team crazy. The founders were very hands-on with R&D and other aspects of the organization, such as detailed technical reviews.

Technical Review 292

Technical Review Government Innovation Engineering 292

SaaStr

JANUARY 5, 2021

It’s been a fun experience being on Quora for … a decade We’ve crossed 60,000,000 views of our answers there, so let’s take a look at the Top 50 most viewed SaaStr Answers on Quora in 2020: Why do many startup owners sell their firm and move on instead of planning on making it a big player like Google, Microsoft, etc.?

Software Review 293

Software Review CTO Coach Technical Review Sales Recruiting 293

SaaStr

JANUARY 6, 2020

Q: How can anyone start a big business by small startup? A Fortune 100 company doesn’t want to risk everything with a raw startup. Find technology and integration partners. They write about you, tweet about you, write 5 star reviews about you. The post How can anyone start a big business by small startup?

Startup 312

Startup Business Technical Review Enterprise 312

SaaStr

JANUARY 24, 2022

During your first or next round of financing, or during any type of financial decision involving a third party, some type of due diligence will be performed by accountants that will define revenue per Generally Accepted Accounting Practices (GAAP). If they get too technical, ask them to explain it again in non-accountant speak.

Finance 332

Finance Outsourcing Services Systems Review Technical Review 332

SaaStr

APRIL 3, 2024

The three co-founders were gathering data in hot storage to respond more effectively to instances with the benefit of historical and technical context. That’s where true automation will be, in the disruptive work that people are freed up and enabled to do and do more effectively and quickly due to having the assistance and rich context.

Generative AI 299

Generative AI AI Technical Review Software Review 299

User Pilot

NOVEMBER 7, 2024

Let’s review everything your customer success team has to do in the absence of any customer success tools. Best customer success software for startups and small companies. out of 5 stars Pricing : Only available upon request, but customer reviews suggest basic pricing starts at $15,000 per year. G2 rating : 4.4

Customer Success 105

Customer Success Enterprise Software Review Startup 105

SaaStr

APRIL 3, 2022

Tiger does more than startup investments, but that segment of its portfolio is voracious. Now that’s for all of Tiger Global, and a lot of the exposure it due to China, which is less relevant to most tech startups. Rough on everyone in tech. Some VCs still feel like geniuses if they had big mark-ups in 2021.

Technical Review 332

Technical Review Startup Investment Pricing 332

SaaStr

FEBRUARY 12, 2019

An acquisition can make or break your startup. At worst, a disastrous deal leads to wasted wasted time and money, a startup’s two most precious resources. What I’ve learned is that true due diligence requires more than a scan through boxes of contracts and reviewing the balance sheet. In 2005, eBay spent $2.6

Acquisition 217

Acquisition Technical Review Artificial Intelligence Machine Learning 217

User Pilot

OCTOBER 19, 2024

It is tailored for product teams who need to send NPS surveys inside their app and analyze it without technical expertise. Pricing : Userpilot offers flexible plans tailored to startups and mid-sized SaaS businesses, with pricing starting at $249 per month for the basic plan.

Software Review 105

Software Review Technical Review Software B2C 105

Tom Tunguz

FEBRUARY 17, 2022

Over the last few years, I’ve been lucky to work with founders and management teams to sell about $5b of startups. Startups are sold to individuals, not to companies. The champion - often a product leader, the CEO, or a general manager - risks their career by buying a startup. As Simon Sinek would say, start with the why.

Technical Review 279

Technical Review Construction Compensation Acquisition 279

Tom Tunguz

SEPTEMBER 30, 2020

Treading Water - the team sustains a good pace, but can’t embark on new projects or reduce technical debt. Recently, many startups have tried to measure engineering throughput. If you manage engineering teams or are a startup leadership member, I highly recommend reading Will Larson’s book. Morale is low.

Engineering 363

Engineering Software Review Systems Review Technical Review 363

SaaStr

AUGUST 12, 2020

So, the company starts getting divided up into functional areas, or silos, product management, sales, customers support, marketing and so on, and this siloing of the org chart I think means that not everyone knows what everyone else is doing, and there’s a general feeling of disorganization or chaos in most startups.

Startup 293

Startup Software Review Scale Systems Review 293

Tom Tunguz

FEBRUARY 25, 2023

We’re entering a period wherein governments regulate large technology businesses more actively. Startups evaluating M&A have additional factors to consider. I served on the boards of two companies that plodded through regulatory review. Customer ask, is the startup standalone or part of a larger company?

Acquisition 216

Acquisition Startup Government Technical Review 216

Sales Hacker

NOVEMBER 29, 2024

HG Insights has been writing market reports for years as the pioneer of tech adoption and market insights and is trusted by GTM leaders at the likes of Snowflake Five9 and Google Cloud to improve GTM efficiency. Constantly leveraging our GTM LP community network to diligence new businesses and verticals better.

Investment 113

Investment Technical Review Development Team Review Scale 113

SaaStr

NOVEMBER 1, 2019

In 2001 David joined Matrix Partners, who had backed his last two startups, as a General Partner. David’s successful exits as an investor at Matrix include HubSpot, JBoss, AppIQ, Tabblo, Netezza, Diligent Technologies, CloudSwitch, TribeHR, GrabCAD, OpenSpan, and Enservio. Episode No. That is where John Barrows comes in.

Technical Review 205

Technical Review Development Team Review Software Review Scale 205

SaaStr

JULY 3, 2020

349: Startups can get messy. And, wouldn’t it be nice if somehow we could turn this s**t show into an army where instead of having this startup chaos, we could get the team working in lock step. Basically, it’s based on a few very simple insights, but very few startups are actually doing these things.

Software Review 265

Software Review Scale Systems Review Startup 265

TechEmpower SaaS

DECEMBER 11, 2023

Are specific technologies or platforms involved in your project? Do they have experience with the technologies involved in your project? Although noteworthy, working with large corporations differs remarkably from working with startups. What are the review periods and your responsibility in the process?

Software Development 443

Software Development Development Software Review Software 443

SaaStr

MAY 27, 2023

In our early days, we were like elves in Santa’s tech workshop. Let’s talk about implementation and past challenges when deploying technology. That’s when you’ve got to take the diligence to the next level. When it’s early days in the startup world, you don’t have many formal processes. We’d build. We’d build some more.

Technical Review 242

Technical Review Leadership Company Culture Startup 242

SaaStr

FEBRUARY 22, 2023

Despite all the advancements in technology, creating a product with a great user experience remains challenging. Stripe follows this approach by creating a minimum viable product and getting users to review it. For instance, their earliest product responded to the online payment problem startups were experiencing.

CTO Hire 292

CTO Hire CTO Payment Methods Payment Solutions 292

SaaStr

MAY 24, 2024

Lemkin emphasizes the need to hire “Pirates and Romantics,” passionate and quirky individuals who are dedicated to the company’s mission, in contrast to the majority of job workers in the tech industry. Even small startups should build a marketing team as everyone needs support to achieve their goals.

Sales Hiring 293

Sales Hiring Outsourcing Services Technical Review Scale 293

Buffer Resources

APRIL 11, 2024

Think nonprofits and Silicon Valley startups have nothing in common?   As a tech writer and editor, I’ve also steeped in the “rocket fuel” of the startup world.   As a tech writer and editor, I’ve also steeped in the “rocket fuel” of the startup world.

Technical Review 123

Technical Review Startup Social Media Marketing 123

SaaStr

SEPTEMBER 20, 2024

The discussion will cover the importance of due diligence, understanding the product, embracing sales involvement post-hire, and recognizing the signs of jaded or broken candidates. Four minutes into an interview, they’ll say how the CEO or VC screwed them over, or the startup didn’t make it, and it wasn’t their fault.

Sales Hiring 304

Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting Scale Technical Review 304

FastSpring

MARCH 8, 2021

Tell me you’re a woman working in tech, without telling me you’re a woman working in tech. We’ll go first––only 5% of leadership roles within the tech industry are women. Historically the tech industry has struggled with gender diversity in the workplace. The great thing about tech is that you become so well-rounded.

Technical Review 148

Technical Review Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Leadership 148