YouSaid · the spoken record

Luciana Lixandru

lines on the record: 44
first: 2022-03-21
most recent: 2022-03-21
sittings or episodes: 1
sources: podcast

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“I love this one. It's called Vid. Atsiqua, we have a strong thesis that video is a new platform and that it will continue growing exponentially. And VED is the best online video editor out there. If you're a consumer and you want to build something for social media, if you're an SME, if you're part of a team in a company and want to build anything from a sales demo to a product demo, whatever it might be, V is the easiest online editor out there. And it's such a nice founding story and it took so much grit from the two founders, Saba and Tim. They didn't race for a long time. They were bootstrapped until we invested and they got to quite a meaningful scale without fundraising. Yeah, I really love their story.”
2022-03-21 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC Exclusive: Sequoia's Luciana Lixandru Unveils Sequoia's New 8 Week Accelerator, Arc | Biggest Takeaways from Working with Doug Leone and Roelof Botha | The Journey From a Small Town In Romania to Partner @ Sequoia · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“My honest insecurity is I was very fortunate to work with wonderful companies early on. Can I do it again? That's my insecurity.”
2022-03-21 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC Exclusive: Sequoia's Luciana Lixandru Unveils Sequoia's New 8 Week Accelerator, Arc | Biggest Takeaways from Working with Doug Leone and Roelof Botha | The Journey From a Small Town In Romania to Partner @ Sequoia · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I love what I do and I'm very driven. I think that's my biggest strength. And that means that I really tried really hard every single day. And I think it's compounds over time. I hope at least that's the dream. And my weakness, probably that I don't have a technical background. And I would say that our business, it does help and I don't have it. So there are ways to go around it, but I would say that's the one.”
2022-03-21 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC Exclusive: Sequoia's Luciana Lixandru Unveils Sequoia's New 8 Week Accelerator, Arc | Biggest Takeaways from Working with Doug Leone and Roelof Botha | The Journey From a Small Town In Romania to Partner @ Sequoia · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Okay, something fun. I did not want to watch squid games. I refused because I thought the concept was so tough and so violent. And then I watched it and I have to say was really well done. So that would be one funny thing.”
2022-03-21 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC Exclusive: Sequoia's Luciana Lixandru Unveils Sequoia's New 8 Week Accelerator, Arc | Biggest Takeaways from Working with Doug Leone and Roelof Botha | The Journey From a Small Town In Romania to Partner @ Sequoia · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Harry, I have a really hard time picking favorites with anything, but I'll tell you a book I recently read and could not put it down. It's called The Spy and the Traitor, and it's a real espionage story from the Cold War days, highly recommended. Could not put it down.”
2022-03-21 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC Exclusive: Sequoia's Luciana Lixandru Unveils Sequoia's New 8 Week Accelerator, Arc | Biggest Takeaways from Working with Doug Leone and Roelof Botha | The Journey From a Small Town In Romania to Partner @ Sequoia · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“For what kind of engineer? Where do you look for what kind of product person? So we will try to combine learnings that are the same for companies and that start in the US and companies that start in Europe and also local learnings from local operators and how they've done it.”
2022-03-21 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC Exclusive: Sequoia's Luciana Lixandru Unveils Sequoia's New 8 Week Accelerator, Arc | Biggest Takeaways from Working with Doug Leone and Roelof Botha | The Journey From a Small Town In Romania to Partner @ Sequoia · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Are spot on, and we thought about this a lot. We are going to have 15 companies in our European cohort, which we will launch soon. We want these companies to have the right level of attention from Sequoia, from our wonderful instructors who will be part of the program. It's open application. It's the first time Sequoia does something like this. So every founder from Europe will be able to apply to the program. It's a $1 million investment in the form of equity. I really want to emphasize, you know, building a company, there are some things that are in common to the US and Europe. So regardless of where you start in the world, there are things that are the same. But there are also things that are unique. For example, in Europe, going international, you have to think that about that since day one, right? Because each individual market is just not big enough to build a generational company. Technology recruiting across hubs in Europe. This is very specific to Europe as well. Eastern Europe, Southern Europe, where do you look?”
2022-03-21 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC Exclusive: Sequoia's Luciana Lixandru Unveils Sequoia's New 8 Week Accelerator, Arc | Biggest Takeaways from Working with Doug Leone and Roelof Botha | The Journey From a Small Town In Romania to Partner @ Sequoia · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Resilience How do you get the right support around you? We think these are topics that we just oftentimes don't dig in enough. So that's the second core foundation of the program. And the third one is the Sequa network. And I mentioned we'll take a trip to one of our companies that we think is legendary or on its way to becoming legendary. It's our Sequoia network for recruiting and customer introductions. And honestly, it's the community of this particular cohort as well. And hopefully not feeling so lonely doing the job, especially in the early days.”
2022-03-21 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC Exclusive: Sequoia's Luciana Lixandru Unveils Sequoia's New 8 Week Accelerator, Arc | Biggest Takeaways from Working with Doug Leone and Roelof Botha | The Journey From a Small Town In Romania to Partner @ Sequoia · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“We start with a week together. The first cohort will be in London. We're going to rotate and go to other European hubs as well. So we start with a week in London. We have six weeks remotely, and that's over Zoom with Sequoia partners, with instructors, with office hours, hopefully some community building. And then for every cohort, we have one trip to one company that we think is legendary in order for this cohort of founders to also see one of our companies in action. And we end with another week in person in our California office for this particular cohort. And that's a format for the eight weeks. Going back to my early point on Arg, there are three core parts. There is the foundations part around company building. A second part around outlier mindset. And we really think this is something that we don't talk enough about. What does it take? Resilience? How do you nurture ambition?”
2022-03-21 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC Exclusive: Sequoia's Luciana Lixandru Unveils Sequoia's New 8 Week Accelerator, Arc | Biggest Takeaways from Working with Doug Leone and Roelof Botha | The Journey From a Small Town In Romania to Partner @ Sequoia · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Grow from idea stage to IPO. And we try to distill those learnings into company building foundations for a decade, not for the following quarter, not for the next fundraise, but really for the long term. And this is everything from product, go-to-market, tech recruiting, culture, taught by wonderful Sequoia partners who are world-class operators themselves like Alfred Lennon or Carl Eschenbah and the list goes on and local operators. And we think that's really important because there are specific things to starting a company in Europe and to starting a company in the US. So it's going to be a combination of Sequoia partners with wonderful operating backgrounds and local instructors in each geography.”
2022-03-21 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC Exclusive: Sequoia's Luciana Lixandru Unveils Sequoia's New 8 Week Accelerator, Arc | Biggest Takeaways from Working with Doug Leone and Roelof Botha | The Journey From a Small Town In Romania to Partner @ Sequoia · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Harry, I am so happy to be able to talk about this publicly, first of all, because we've been thinking about this and we've been working on this behind the scenes for quite some time. Thrilled to be able to share with the world and with founders and with you. You know, my team pretty well, you've known Sequoia for years, right? That if you ask any person at Sequoia any time of the day about our mission, everyone will say our mission is help the daring build legendary companies. And we always ask ourselves, how can we do things differently? How can we help our founders more? And this is how we came up with the idea for Arc. So Arc is an eight-week seed catalyst program for US founders and European founders. It's going to be two separate cohorts and we actually launch in Europe first. So I'm extra excited about this. And it focuses on three things. Firstly, it's company building foundations. We feel that we're in a very privileged position having seen wonderful companies over the past five decades.”
2022-03-21 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC Exclusive: Sequoia's Luciana Lixandru Unveils Sequoia's New 8 Week Accelerator, Arc | Biggest Takeaways from Working with Doug Leone and Roelof Botha | The Journey From a Small Town In Romania to Partner @ Sequoia · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Invest in great founders. You know why? One of the biggest mistakes I made in my early days was focus too much on market size, let's say. And I used to go and do my little spreadsheet and do the math and try to calculate no, throw out the window that spreadsheet at seed because these founders are creating new categories. These founders, if they're world class, they will expand an existing category. They will, you know, zig and zag until they find the right business model. My advice is world-class founder, idea that for you doesn't make sense. Invest a seed stage.”
2022-03-21 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC Exclusive: Sequoia's Luciana Lixandru Unveils Sequoia's New 8 Week Accelerator, Arc | Biggest Takeaways from Working with Doug Leone and Roelof Botha | The Journey From a Small Town In Romania to Partner @ Sequoia · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Well, firstly, please do not say that you feel old because you make me feel very old, but I completely agree, Harry. Those were the days, right? And I don't know that I appreciated it enough. I thought that was normal. The pace is very different today. I think in some ways it's a positive because it means there's more capital and more access to capital. But yeah, of course it makes our job harder. We have to get to the right answer faster. We have to do our homework faster. And it makes our job more challenging. Absolutely. We try to focus on certain areas and understand them already before we meet founders. And I find that that helps a lot when you have a view on a particular space. In some situations, you meet a team and you have a great instinct. Your heart says there's something there and then you have to get your mind there within a week and you just have to do your homework quickly and try to reach the best decision. And I think when that intersection happens of great instinct and then”
2022-03-21 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC Exclusive: Sequoia's Luciana Lixandru Unveils Sequoia's New 8 Week Accelerator, Arc | Biggest Takeaways from Working with Doug Leone and Roelof Botha | The Journey From a Small Town In Romania to Partner @ Sequoia · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“A couple of things come to mind. One is just so specific to Europe. If you think about the US, many successful companies started in Silicon Valley. In Europe, however, it's incredibly fragmented. Companies starting in Eastern Europe, Paris, Berlin, Stockholm, it's not one big ecosystem, it's many smaller local ecosystems. So for us, the challenge is finding these wonderful founders early on across all these different cities. That's something we've been thinking about a lot. The other thing that comes to mind is there is this misconception often from founders that they are not ready for Sequoia, quote unquote. They will come and speak with us, and we're very grateful that they do, but they come speak with us after they rehearse a few times, let's say, so later in the process. And that becomes challenging for us because, you know, we're super grateful to be.”
2022-03-21 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC Exclusive: Sequoia's Luciana Lixandru Unveils Sequoia's New 8 Week Accelerator, Arc | Biggest Takeaways from Working with Doug Leone and Roelof Botha | The Journey From a Small Town In Romania to Partner @ Sequoia · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“That's a great question. By definition, we want to invest in outliers. And outliers in the early days are not obvious. So I can say that many of our best decisions and many of our best investments long term were the non-obvious ones in the early days. And we have very honest, open intellectual conversations. The quote unquote secret is if you look at people like Doug or Roloff, they listen and they pay attention when someone would just join Sequoia the previous week speaks as much as they do when Alfred speaks, let's say. Having that sort of respect across the entire team is really important and then it's just trust between partners or a partnership at the end of the day we work as a team.”
2022-03-21 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC Exclusive: Sequoia's Luciana Lixandru Unveils Sequoia's New 8 Week Accelerator, Arc | Biggest Takeaways from Working with Doug Leone and Roelof Botha | The Journey From a Small Town In Romania to Partner @ Sequoia · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“To be the leader in this category, and UiPath happens to be a European company. And this is happening more and more. So we work as one team between the two geographies on Mondays. We get together on Zooms. We make decisions together. We look at both geographies and try to pick the one company that we think has the best chance of becoming the long-term leader.”
2022-03-21 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC Exclusive: Sequoia's Luciana Lixandru Unveils Sequoia's New 8 Week Accelerator, Arc | Biggest Takeaways from Working with Doug Leone and Roelof Botha | The Journey From a Small Town In Romania to Partner @ Sequoia · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“We do not think about it as sequoia and sequoia Europe. We just think about it as Sequoia. We changed our name actually. It's USE, so US Europe as one team, one pool of capital, same founders, more and more category leaders are starting in Europe. We don't only invest in a category, we don't invest in competitive companies. When we choose a company in a particular category, it's because we think this one company will dominate long term. And when we choose a company, we just try to do all the work possible and put the entire weight of Sequoia behind that one particular company. For us, it was very important since day one to look at both markets, both the US and Europe, in order to be able to make this choice. SePath is a good example when Sequoia invested, they looked at robotic process automation globally, they looked at US-based companies, they looked at European companies. And I say they, because I wasn't there yet. And at the time, they decided that UiPath was going”
2022-03-21 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC Exclusive: Sequoia's Luciana Lixandru Unveils Sequoia's New 8 Week Accelerator, Arc | Biggest Takeaways from Working with Doug Leone and Roelof Botha | The Journey From a Small Town In Romania to Partner @ Sequoia · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Actually, I find it a little bit easier, interestingly enough, because it's so easy to include people no matter where they are in the world. The one tip I have is after every meeting have a little debrief and share thoughts how you think about the meeting, how you think about the key questions for that particular company, how you think about the space. I think I find that having these quick debriefs makes a really big difference long term.”
2022-03-21 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC Exclusive: Sequoia's Luciana Lixandru Unveils Sequoia's New 8 Week Accelerator, Arc | Biggest Takeaways from Working with Doug Leone and Roelof Botha | The Journey From a Small Town In Romania to Partner @ Sequoia · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I think at the end of the day, this is an apprenticeship business. Whenever someone joins our team in London, I try to spend the first six months 100% working with that person and include them in every founder meeting, include them in every due diligence call, include them in every board meeting, because I really think inventor you learn by seeing and also by doing, that's the best way, just having this one-on-one partnership for some time. For me, that's the best way. I think that's how I learned when I was quote unquote growing up in venture. I don't think there is any other secret to it other than just involving people as much as possible.”
2022-03-21 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC Exclusive: Sequoia's Luciana Lixandru Unveils Sequoia's New 8 Week Accelerator, Arc | Biggest Takeaways from Working with Doug Leone and Roelof Botha | The Journey From a Small Town In Romania to Partner @ Sequoia · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“With all Fred, what I'm learning from him every day is he's so focused on the team. He's so focused on the next generations. He's so focused on recruiting, on mentorship. That's one area where I'm really learning every day from him. Ruloff, Rulov is a tough one because he operates at peak performance in every area of the job. I am more of an 80-20 person. He is 100% in everything he does, and I think he's just inspires people around him to try to be better and do their best. And again, I don't know what his secret is. Pat, right? You asked about Pat. I think Pat is a wonderful storyteller. I just love listening to Pat talk about a company, even talk about an investment thesis. Whatever it might be, he has such a gift when it comes to storytelling, and I think it's so powerful. People really listen when he speaks.”
2022-03-21 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC Exclusive: Sequoia's Luciana Lixandru Unveils Sequoia's New 8 Week Accelerator, Arc | Biggest Takeaways from Working with Doug Leone and Roelof Botha | The Journey From a Small Town In Romania to Partner @ Sequoia · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Fascinating, my partner, George Robson, he told me once, you know, I felt that when I was meeting the Sequoia team, I was pretty much mainly just talking about my childhood. People focus a lot on who you are as a person and not as much on what you've done, but who you are and what drives you. And again, I think Doug is the best at this. I don't know how he does it. I wish I did. I think it's a gift. But I definitely, from my first conversations with him, I felt heard and I felt understood. And I think that's a real skill, you know, it's a people business at the end of the day.”
2022-03-21 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC Exclusive: Sequoia's Luciana Lixandru Unveils Sequoia's New 8 Week Accelerator, Arc | Biggest Takeaways from Working with Doug Leone and Roelof Botha | The Journey From a Small Town In Romania to Partner @ Sequoia · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“It is a challenge, and then again it's up to the founder and what the founder thinks makes sense. Some founders just want to stay heads down and continue working on the business and not focus on raising money until they feel that they need to raise money again. Other founders see it as an opportunity to put more dollars on the balance sheet in case things change. And I think it's really up to them. But absolutely, we're seeing a lot of this happen.”
2022-03-21 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC Exclusive: Sequoia's Luciana Lixandru Unveils Sequoia's New 8 Week Accelerator, Arc | Biggest Takeaways from Working with Doug Leone and Roelof Botha | The Journey From a Small Town In Romania to Partner @ Sequoia · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“The honest answer is that a lot of our companies get preempted. It's completely up to the founder then to decide if they want more people and more firms around the table. But again, I say this. I just joined Sequi, such a wonderful brand and a wonderful platform, and I'm so lucky to work on it, but I was not part of it until recently. So I hope I can say this without sounding arrogant, but I think already Sequoia investing early on is a positive signal oftentimes. So a lot of our companies get preempted, actually.”
2022-03-21 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC Exclusive: Sequoia's Luciana Lixandru Unveils Sequoia's New 8 Week Accelerator, Arc | Biggest Takeaways from Working with Doug Leone and Roelof Botha | The Journey From a Small Town In Romania to Partner @ Sequoia · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I have had many of those misses as well. You are not alone, Harry You know, it's human psychology, you're already part of the journey, you're just so thrilled to be part of the journey, and you think to yourself, well, the next one just feels too expensive. Again, I honestly think it's learning through experience and seeing some of these journeys of companies where I wish we had invested more in follow-on rounds. And I will say that now I think that my mindset has changed. I mean, a good example is recently we led two rounds in a French company called Penny Lane. We just announced a growth round and we had led the previous round nine months before. We're thrilled about the company. They're building a financial operating system for SMEs, which are so underserved in Europe. So I'm hoping that I learning from these mistakes earlier in my career. But Harry, we're all with you. We all have our own portfolio as anti-portfolio.”
2022-03-21 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC Exclusive: Sequoia's Luciana Lixandru Unveils Sequoia's New 8 Week Accelerator, Arc | Biggest Takeaways from Working with Doug Leone and Roelof Botha | The Journey From a Small Town In Romania to Partner @ Sequoia · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Would not have a different answer. I would have exactly the same answer. I think selecting the right company in the early stages is all that matters. I mean, I remember with Hoppin at the seat, I think it was one of the most quote-unquote expensive seeds in Europe at the time. I think in the early stages, you just have to focus on team founder, be able to dream with a founder. I think that matters a lot more.”
2022-03-21 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC Exclusive: Sequoia's Luciana Lixandru Unveils Sequoia's New 8 Week Accelerator, Arc | Biggest Takeaways from Working with Doug Leone and Roelof Botha | The Journey From a Small Town In Romania to Partner @ Sequoia · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Is right. So I'm just being transparent. With growth, I do think it's different. With growth, I really think you need to stay sober by definition given the upside in venture versus growth. I think you have less room to play with pricing on the growth side”
2022-03-21 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC Exclusive: Sequoia's Luciana Lixandru Unveils Sequoia's New 8 Week Accelerator, Arc | Biggest Takeaways from Working with Doug Leone and Roelof Botha | The Journey From a Small Town In Romania to Partner @ Sequoia · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I would say a lot of learnings actually, and I would decouple the answer for early stage investing and for growth stage investing. We thought about this a lot as a team. When we have discussions on early stage opportunities, Oeda and Series A, we leave price dynamics aside. We focus on the company, we focus on the founder, and we really think that at this stage, selecting the right opportunity and selecting the right company trumps the pricing dynamics because long term, there's still so much upside potential. I should not say this, by the way. I'm ruining my negotiation stance in early stage investment going forward, but it's the truth.”
2022-03-21 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC Exclusive: Sequoia's Luciana Lixandru Unveils Sequoia's New 8 Week Accelerator, Arc | Biggest Takeaways from Working with Doug Leone and Roelof Botha | The Journey From a Small Town In Romania to Partner @ Sequoia · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Something I learned over the years is to focus on the questions that really matter and really focus on first order principles. If you look at any company, there are a thousand questions you can ask that might have a negative answer and there are a thousand different ways for any company to not be successful. But there are only a few questions that really matter. So I would say focus on those.”
2022-03-21 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC Exclusive: Sequoia's Luciana Lixandru Unveils Sequoia's New 8 Week Accelerator, Arc | Biggest Takeaways from Working with Doug Leone and Roelof Botha | The Journey From a Small Town In Romania to Partner @ Sequoia · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Luciana was too tough on that particular occasion or not enough empathy, but I think trying to strike the right balance is really important.”
2022-03-21 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC Exclusive: Sequoia's Luciana Lixandru Unveils Sequoia's New 8 Week Accelerator, Arc | Biggest Takeaways from Working with Doug Leone and Roelof Botha | The Journey From a Small Town In Romania to Partner @ Sequoia · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Like to think of myself as someone who cool had when things are going well and keeps on pushing when things are going well and is really supportive when things might not go so well and that's a bit counterintuitive and it's easy to surround yourself by cheerleaders when things are going well but what's really important is to surround yourself by people who still push you when everything is up and to the right and who are really supportive and helpful when things are not up and to the right because there will be those moments. And by the way, this is something that I learned myself. I'm Eastern Europeans, I'm very direct and I had to learn how to be direct and do it with empathy because people are giving it their all, blood, sweat and tears trying to build what they're building. So asking the tough questions but doing it with empathy I think is really key. And by the way, I'm sure I also get it wrong at some point. I'm sure there's some founder out there listening to this who will say, well,”
2022-03-21 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC Exclusive: Sequoia's Luciana Lixandru Unveils Sequoia's New 8 Week Accelerator, Arc | Biggest Takeaways from Working with Doug Leone and Roelof Botha | The Journey From a Small Town In Romania to Partner @ Sequoia · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I think this is a real issue in venture because of what I just said, because some stuff, you know, even the most successful companies, by the way, have ups and downs. I bet you with every success, there was some moment when the founder and people might not have been sure this was going to be the success that it eventually became. I just think you need resilience. Unfortunately, I wish I had a secret answer or a secret formula. I just think you need to pick yourself up.”
2022-03-21 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC Exclusive: Sequoia's Luciana Lixandru Unveils Sequoia's New 8 Week Accelerator, Arc | Biggest Takeaways from Working with Doug Leone and Roelof Botha | The Journey From a Small Town In Romania to Partner @ Sequoia · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“That did not work out as well as they would have hoped. That is the reality of our job. So actually, I find this job incredibly humbling on a daily basis.”
2022-03-21 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC Exclusive: Sequoia's Luciana Lixandru Unveils Sequoia's New 8 Week Accelerator, Arc | Biggest Takeaways from Working with Doug Leone and Roelof Botha | The Journey From a Small Town In Romania to Partner @ Sequoia · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Firstly, I take it as a huge compliment that Doug would say that we think the same way. So thank you to Doug for saying that. The first part of the question, you know, I mentioned when I started Adventure in 2011, there were not as many successful companies coming out of Europe. So I think that getting to see some of these founders in the early days in Europe that were really building something special and that were building the winners in their categories globally but starting in Europe, I just think it opened my mind to what impact and what scale these companies could achieve. And I'm not sure I would have been able to dream it up myself if I hadn't seen it quite early on. So I really think this opened my mind a lot. The second part to your question was around confidence. I actually find this job to be really humbling because if you look at every great investor, the best investors in history inventure, they will also have many companies.”
2022-03-21 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC Exclusive: Sequoia's Luciana Lixandru Unveils Sequoia's New 8 Week Accelerator, Arc | Biggest Takeaways from Working with Doug Leone and Roelof Botha | The Journey From a Small Town In Romania to Partner @ Sequoia · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Be 100% honest, the early traction once deliver launched was really impressive. I have rarely seen Such growth, such retention, and so much virality in a product. And this was pretty much no marketing, all word of mouth. And you could really tell they had hit the nail on the head in terms of customer demand. And then the question was still market size, was this going to be a London proposition and a Paris proposition or was this going to be a global proposition that applies to every small city out there? And that was the thesis at the time and the bat at the time. But yeah, that was one learning around, hey, you really have to dream about what the market might become.”
2022-03-21 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC Exclusive: Sequoia's Luciana Lixandru Unveils Sequoia's New 8 Week Accelerator, Arc | Biggest Takeaways from Working with Doug Leone and Roelof Botha | The Journey From a Small Town In Romania to Partner @ Sequoia · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“That's a great question. Intellectual humility is really important in this business. And it's not only about spaces, it's even about businesses. Sometimes we see a business and we just don't get the right answer the first time around and we have to be intellectually humble in order to fix our mistake the next time around if we have an opportunity. And by the way, I have a long list of examples when it comes to that one that comes to mind, honestly, is delivered. I remember many years ago, I got a call from a friend and he said, hey, my friend Will is moving back to London from business school and he wants to start a company in food delivery. And he explained the model. And I thought to myself, oh, there are going to be like three people in South Kensington. They're going to pay the two pound delivery fee and that are going to pay for a specific restaurant. And I mean, I was so wrong. It's such a mass market proposition. I was fortunate enough to be able to revisit that decision. But I think that, yes.”
2022-03-21 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC Exclusive: Sequoia's Luciana Lixandru Unveils Sequoia's New 8 Week Accelerator, Arc | Biggest Takeaways from Working with Doug Leone and Roelof Botha | The Journey From a Small Town In Romania to Partner @ Sequoia · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Absolutely. We trust our instinct more and more. The more we see, the more wonderful stories, wonderful founders, wonderful startups that we see, the more we trust our instinct, the more we understand the spaces that we like, the products that we like, and that allows us to go earlier and earlier stage. So yes, absolutely.”
2022-03-21 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC Exclusive: Sequoia's Luciana Lixandru Unveils Sequoia's New 8 Week Accelerator, Arc | Biggest Takeaways from Working with Doug Leone and Roelof Botha | The Journey From a Small Town In Romania to Partner @ Sequoia · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“He had an autoimmune disease and he didn't leave his home for a while. That's how he started the company. And then just the ambition and the boldness. He was sitting across the table from me and he looked at me and he said, Luciana, next year Hoppin is going to be the fastest growing company in the world. And I just love that level of ambition. And this was pre COVID. And I believe Hoppin was probably the fastest growing company that year. So I definitely think it's personal experiences that shape us.”
2022-03-21 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC Exclusive: Sequoia's Luciana Lixandru Unveils Sequoia's New 8 Week Accelerator, Arc | Biggest Takeaways from Working with Doug Leone and Roelof Botha | The Journey From a Small Town In Romania to Partner @ Sequoia · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Yeah, I think we all evolve and mature. Looking back, I definitely think that I was more of a business model and market investor. I mentioned I like numbers. So I really was attracted to companies that already had a product, maybe even some go-to-market in place already. And I would say over time I reached the same conclusion that many people do that it is really all about a founder and the right founder will find the right market and the right business model. So I started by being attracted by companies slightly later stage and I went earlier and earlier over time. Today I get so excited when I meet a founder at Idea Stage and brainstorm with a founder about what this might become. The second part to your question, what changed this, I think personal experiences shape us so much, right? At the end of 2019, when I met Johnny from Hopin, it was a two-people company at the time and it was such an authentic founding story.”
2022-03-21 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC Exclusive: Sequoia's Luciana Lixandru Unveils Sequoia's New 8 Week Accelerator, Arc | Biggest Takeaways from Working with Doug Leone and Roelof Botha | The Journey From a Small Town In Romania to Partner @ Sequoia · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Definitely joining venture. People ask me all the time if I would do something else, if I would start a company. And I just feel very fortunate because I really feel that I found my calling really early on. I really can't imagine doing something else. You know, you were saying before how much you love doing your show and how much you love investing as well. I feel the same way about working with founders. So that was definitely another crucible moment and joining Sequoia, of course, joining Sequoia a year and a half ago and partnering with some of the people that in my opinion really shaped venture capital in thinking through Europe and how we partner between the US and Europe and European founders and the strategy here that was also a crucible moment.”
2022-03-21 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC Exclusive: Sequoia's Luciana Lixandru Unveils Sequoia's New 8 Week Accelerator, Arc | Biggest Takeaways from Working with Doug Leone and Roelof Botha | The Journey From a Small Town In Romania to Partner @ Sequoia · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Path and then I got to know Doug and the rest of the team. And you know, Sequo is so thoughtful when they enter a new geography that, combined with the fact that I thought it was really a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to help them enter this new geography was pretty convincing proposition. So here we are. I started a year and a half ago now.”
2022-03-21 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC Exclusive: Sequoia's Luciana Lixandru Unveils Sequoia's New 8 Week Accelerator, Arc | Biggest Takeaways from Working with Doug Leone and Roelof Botha | The Journey From a Small Town In Romania to Partner @ Sequoia · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I'm pretty sore for the better. And that was great. I was there for four years, and I was not one of these people who knew what they wanted to do. I didn't think I was going to be a lawyer or a doctor. I liked numbers, I knew that. So I went into investment banking like a lot of people did back in 2007. And I would say the rest is history, and that's how I got into technology, serendipity. The bank I was with Morgan Stanley moved me to London. This was back in 2008, and I was in their technology team. And I moved into investing quite early on. And then I've been in venture since the end of 2011, so over a decade. I joined Excel end of 2011. I was there for over eight years. I was very fortunate to work with some incredible founders who really shaped the venture industry in Europe. And then I got to know Sequoia. I got to know Sequoia through a couple of boards. Through the Board of UI.”
2022-03-21 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC Exclusive: Sequoia's Luciana Lixandru Unveils Sequoia's New 8 Week Accelerator, Arc | Biggest Takeaways from Working with Doug Leone and Roelof Botha | The Journey From a Small Town In Romania to Partner @ Sequoia · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“It was terrifying. I still remember when I boarded that flight in Bucharest with two suitcases in my entire life in two suitcases by myself with a connection through Amsterdam, and I remember lending in DC, I get there and there were all these signs saying welcome home and everyone seemed to be waiting for some passenger on the plane and there was no one waiting for me and I asked myself now what how do I even get to Georgetown? What do I do from here? It was terrifying and it was definitely a culture shock at the beginning. My English was okay but not perfect. I had to take the SATs I could read and write but I wasn't as fluent in speaking but then it quickly became so much fun. You know what Sequa we talk often about crucible moments these decisions in a company's life or in a person's life that really change the future and for me this was the one decision that changed the course of my life for the better”
2022-03-21 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC Exclusive: Sequoia's Luciana Lixandru Unveils Sequoia's New 8 Week Accelerator, Arc | Biggest Takeaways from Working with Doug Leone and Roelof Botha | The Journey From a Small Town In Romania to Partner @ Sequoia · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I wish I had a really good story, Harry. I think it was my way of being rebellious as a teenager. My information on the US was based on TV. Everything I saw on TV told me this was a land full of opportunity and if you worked really hard, good stuff will happen. And to be candid, at that point in time at least, I did not feel that I had those opportunities in Romania. So I wish I had better answer. I had never been to the US before. I had not traveled much. I had not been on a plane by that point in my life. So crazy idea, let's call it. Crazy idea and lock because I needed a scholarship and I applied to a few universities in Georgetown changed my life forever. They gave me a full scholarship and my family supported me and I went and I joke that it was the best four years of my life.”
2022-03-21 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC Exclusive: Sequoia's Luciana Lixandru Unveils Sequoia's New 8 Week Accelerator, Arc | Biggest Takeaways from Working with Doug Leone and Roelof Botha | The Journey From a Small Town In Romania to Partner @ Sequoia · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“That's a long story, and I will try to keep it relatively short. I was born and raised in a small town in Romania. A hundred thousand people, I joke, I think it's the 18th largest city in Romania. And when I was sixteen, I had this idea, which at the time seemed crazy, and the idea was that I wanted to go to the US. And it seemed crazy because this was 20 years ago in Romania, people did not study abroad very often. And I just went for it. And I got very fortunate. I applied to a few universities.”
2022-03-21 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC Exclusive: Sequoia's Luciana Lixandru Unveils Sequoia's New 8 Week Accelerator, Arc | Biggest Takeaways from Working with Doug Leone and Roelof Botha | The Journey From a Small Town In Romania to Partner @ Sequoia · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source