The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch
00:07:06 · Harry Stebbings, Adarsh Hiremath
[00:07:06] S1: Okay. So the marketplace is born. We've automated both sides of the platform. How exciting. Except you're at Harvard at the time, I think, and now you have this very vibrant and working platform. Take me to that moment and the decision between whether you drop out or whether you stick to the traditional course. [00:07:24] S0: Well, it's funny that you say I was at Harvard. I was definitely there physically, not sure about mentally. I was pretty much doing everything I could to avoid going to classes. And I actually have a pretty funny story about this. So Brendan would visit me pretty frequently at Harvard. And my roommate at the time, Artemis, had this, like, really, really weird sleep schedule. He would just, like, go to the Engineering Building and pretty much be nocturnal. So the routine that we would typically follow is Brendan would visit me. He would just crash in Artemis' bed because he'd be in the Engineering Building just working on problem sets. And then he'd come back, wake Brendan up, and then we'd get to work together, and then he would go to sleep during the day. And then, you know, fast forward today, Artemis has joined the the MERCOR team. So it it really was the typical dorm room story. [00:08:07] S1: When you're then deciding, shit. Am I actually gonna leave Harvard? It's one thing to say. It's another thing to do. Can you just take me to that moment?
00:08:07 · Harry Stebbings, Adarsh Hiremath
[00:08:07] S1: When you're then deciding, shit. Am I actually gonna leave Harvard? It's one thing to say. It's another thing to do. Can you just take me to that moment? [00:08:16] S0: At the time, it wasn't obvious at all that we should drop out. And I really, really sympathized with my parents at the time for, not approving because here I was, we hadn't raised our seed round, we hadn't raised the series A, there was no Thiel fellowship, there was one side of the marketplace that had a little bit of revenue, and I was telling them that I wanted to abandon my degree program. So it wasn't an obvious decision at all, but I think, like most of these decisions, you just make them completely emotionally, and I just knew I wanted to work with my best friends. [00:08:44] S1: Can I ask, for a lot of students who are wanting to start a business, who have a business already, how do you advise them on whether to drop out or whether to stick to the traditional path?
00:08:44 · Harry Stebbings, Adarsh Hiremath
[00:08:44] S1: Can I ask, for a lot of students who are wanting to start a business, who have a business already, how do you advise them on whether to drop out or whether to stick to the traditional path? [00:08:54] S0: It's an emotional decision. Like, you can try to rationalize dropping out or starting a company or try to figure out the exact set of prerequisites that you have to do. But for me, for example, the moment I knew that I wanted to drop out was actually back when we had an office in Palo Alto. And the office had exactly three desks, one for Brendan, one for Surya, one for me. I was like, Surya, man, should we should we drop out? And then he just looked at me, he was just like, dude, how hard could this be? Wasn't a logical argument at all, but in that moment, I was just like, let's do this. Let's let's drop out of school. [00:09:32] S1: Where was the business at at this point, just to frame it? [00:09:34] S0: No seed round, a little bit of revenue, no Till fellowship, nothing. We were just three friends working in a small office in Palo Alto with with our amazing team in India. [00:09:45] S1: Take me to the take me to the seed round, dude. How did it go? Do you remember getting the term sheet? Just take me to that. Because you're 18, 19 at the time?
00:09:45 · Harry Stebbings, Adarsh Hiremath
[00:09:45] S1: Take me to the take me to the seed round, dude. How did it go? Do you remember getting the term sheet? Just take me to that. Because you're 18, 19 at the time? [00:09:53] S0: We were 19 at the time. So that was that was just surreal. So what ended up happening is, initially, we thought we wanted to base the company in New York. So I'll take credit for making the the wrong call there. I very, very quickly realized that it was the wrong decision. But what ended up happening is we had moved to New York before raising the seed round. For me, actually, the more surreal moment wasn't actually when the money hit for for the seed round. It was actually when we changed our, like, salaries in Gusto to $500 a month. I felt like we made it at that time. I was like, amazing. You know, we just moved to New York. We changed our salaries to $500 a month. And then afterwards, we closed our seed round. And then when the money was wired, we were just looking at the account, like, you know. [00:10:39] S1: How was that process? Like, did you pitch many venture investors? Did the round come quickly? How much did you raise? Just take me to it. It's a special moment. [00:10:48] S0: So so we raised over 3,000,000, and it came very, very quickly. So General Catalyst led the round and really, really enjoy working with Max and Nico. So
00:10:48 · Adarsh Hiremath, Harry Stebbings
[00:10:48] S0: So so we raised over 3,000,000, and it came very, very quickly. So General Catalyst led the round and really, really enjoy working with Max and Nico. So [00:10:57] S1: You are one of the fastest scaling companies in Silicon Valley in The US in startups in general. It was 50,000,000, I think, of ARR in November. I quoted it wrongly. It's you may be able to correct me, but it's much more now. With 30 people at the time of the 50,000,000, and I've heard a little rumor on the grapevine that you do nine nine six, so 9AM to 9PM, six days a week. Can you unpack if that's true, why you do it, and how that works in reality? [00:11:26] S0: It's really funny. A lot of people ask me this question about the nine nine six thing. The only reason we actually just floated those numbers out is because we didn't want our team working on Sundays. So I like to think of the nine nine six stuff as more of, a side effect than an objective. We've just really, really carefully selected for working with people who care deeply about the mission. The side effect about that is they don't wanna wait until Monday to to move the company forward. So people really do it just because they enjoy being in each other's presence. They enjoy what they're working on. [00:11:56] S1: Do you worry about creating a hustle culture with nine nine six?
00:11:56 · Harry Stebbings, Adarsh Hiremath
[00:11:56] S1: Do you worry about creating a hustle culture with nine nine six? [00:12:00] S0: This is not something unique to Merkur. It's like all the successful companies have had pretty intense cultures historically, and it's just a function of a startup. Right? You gotta work harder than everyone else. The one thing I will say about that is that momentum is very, very energizing. I think when we select for people to work at Merkor, one realization that we've come to is that you can teach people a lot of things, whether it be, you know, technically or going to market or whatever. But the one thing that you can't quite teach people is to care. And that's one thing that we index on pretty heavily in our hiring process and something that we really look for. [00:12:36] S1: I heard that you've been growing 50% month on month continuously for quite a while now. That growth to keep up is is insane. How does that feel internally? And what's the first thing or two to break? [00:12:50] S0: The way I like to think about that level of growth is, it's basically a perpetual stress test on the business. Things are constantly breaking, whether it be process, or, you know, you might need to hire people to fill in gaps quicker than you might ordinarily need to do or whatever. But I think the main thing is everyone in the company needs to keep outgrowing themselves. Right? Redefining what's possible for for them, taking on new roles. [00:13:13] S1: What does no one tell you about scaling that you wish they had told you?