00:05:22 · Rafael Vivas
[00:05:22] S1: My brother and Adam had worked together. So I'd known of Adam since, you know, I was 14. I met him at 15. And when I told you I was the water boy, he came to the office. My brother was like, go get Adam in water. But I knew who he was before because there was kind of this leaderboard in my brother's performance marketing company, and, you know, Adam was at the top of the leaderboard at the time, and and I was the guy behind Initially, started building websites, started building ads and then building campaigns. And so I already knew who he was. So that's how I got connected with Adam. And then from there, we didn't really communicate that much in the beginning. Would say when I was around 17, 18 is when we got closer. And that was because you know, my my road was very... Was not was not linear at all. I didn't wait to be given opportunities. Right? For example, like, when I started building websites, that was one thing. But I was curious about, okay, like, how are ads made? So I just... I was starting getting on Photoshop and making ads. And then at the time somebody showed me how to put up a... It was like a Myspace campaign and I did that. And then from there, it was like, okay, I want more traffic. And I just started reaching out to brands on my own, right? And nobody gave me the permission to do it. I just started doing it. Fast forward, I was like, hey, we started our own ad platform, right? Why are we buying from all these other ad platforms when we can just go and reach out to the publishers ourselves and we have demand?
00:06:41 · David Senra, Rafael Vivas
[00:06:41] S0: Wait, wait. So when you have this idea, we're going start our own ad platform, you're how old? [00:06:45] S1: That time I was about 17 years old. [00:06:47] S0: Okay. That's a very unusual idea for a 17 year old. [00:06:49] S1: Yeah. It was... The reason we started the ad platform was at the time, this advertising platform that we were working with, they had their own advertisements, their own offers, and they banned us off of it because we were competitive. And I got so angry that night that I was like... I remember I went home, like, pretty much cried, and I was like, we're gonna bury these guys. And I went to my brother, I was like, hey. I'm gonna leave your company to go stroll my own app platform. I wanna go head to head with this company. And he started laughing so hard, and he was like, you're not going anywhere. I'll give you a few engineers. Go build what you want. And that was the idea at the time of AppLovin. AppLovin was a mobile ad platform. Around this time, Adam had already left my brother's company and he was actually done with ads and wanted to start building consumer products. And so the beginning of AppLovin actually was... At first, it was a dating app, and then there was a fashion app, and then there was all these other products that they kind of built. Adam was buying traffic from me. [00:07:51] S0: Adam was buying traffic from your ad network for his apps that he was developing? Exactly. Okay.
00:07:51 · David Senra, Rafael Vivas
[00:07:51] S0: Adam was buying traffic from your ad network for his apps that he was developing? Exactly. Okay. [00:07:55] S1: Exactly. So at... During this time, you know, Adam and I would talk a lot over AIM because I was effectively his account manager, but I would screw with him a lot. You know? I'd be like, hey. I'll teach you a lot about making money online. You know? I'll teach you how to run real business. [00:08:10] S0: Which is also another crazy thing because he's like ten or twelve years older than you. [00:08:13] S1: Twelve years older than me. Way smarter than me. The guy's a walking calculator. But ignorance is bliss. And I just had this ship on my shoulder, right, that I feel like I I could take on the world. And as we spend more time, you know, talking, what ended up happening very intelligently, Adam was like, okay. This kid who works around the clock but isn't that intelligent has built this ad platform in kind of this this wide open blue space that's seeing success. I'm gonna go build a mobile ad platform.
00:08:41 · David Senra
[00:08:41] S0: So he's going to compete with you? Yes. This is where he, like, pulls you in the room. He's like, don't get... He came on the show. Let me let me back up before we get to this because some people are listening. They haven't seen an episode. And the Adam Foroughi episode, when people are like, I I think that is one of the episodes I'm most proud of because I think I titled it, like, the best entrepreneur you've never heard of. And, you know, it's the fact that, like, at the time, it was like, whatever, AppLovin was a $150,000,000,000 market cap company. They're gonna print 6,000,000,000 in cash this this year, and they're doing it with, like, 400 employees. And the reason I'm proud of that episode is because it goes out and all of the, like, almost like, I think the next, like, five or six guests that we had on the show that came on, this happened over and over again. We we did the show... This episode, they'll be out in December with MrBeast. Right? And I've known MrBeast for a while. He listens to my other podcast founders. Like, he'll send me his Spotify rap every year, it's like founders to the top. As soon as we stop recording, he leaned forward. He goes, hey, can you just meet Adam? Mickey Malko. Over and over again, who is this guy? And can you introduce me to him? He was like such an unusual, like unfiltered, like hardcore person. So this is the person that we're talking about. This is the person you've been working with for like half your life. Yeah. So now this guy is like, this fucking kid is making all this money with this ad network. Don't... I think he told a story. He's like, you in room. He's like, don't be mad, but I'm gonna compete with you.
00:09:58 · Rafael Vivas, David Senra
[00:09:58] S1: Yeah. You know, it's funny. Was in the office, and he had this shit eating grin, like, on his face. Like like somebody who had just, like, eaten your food. And and it was actually... Now that he pulled me away, I pushed him into a room because I saw this smile on him. I was like, what the hell? Like, why are you so happy? What are you smiling about? And that's when he goes, hey. Don't be mad. I'm building a competing ad platform. And at the time, I didn't care because I was... You know, like I... You mentioned me earlier, I'm a massive gamer. I love playing video games. I was actually gonna go join my friend's company in Y Combinator that built mobile games. And then Adam reverse uno'd me, and he said, woah. Woah. Wait. Do you mean you're gonna go join somebody else's company? You should come work for me. You know? You you know how to work your ass off. You know everyone in the space here in mobile gaming, but you know nothing about building a real business. Out of respect for Adam because even though I talked a lot of shit to him online and, you know, I always knew he was a really intelligent guy. I decided to come down to Palo Alto and meet the rest of the team. [00:10:51] S0: Is this when you move into the office? Yes. So a lot people are like, oh, I'm here 20 or, you know, I work nine ninety six. Like, moved into the office and then it speaks to the unique culture that you guys have. Adam built the bed.
00:11:06 · Rafael Vivas
[00:11:06] S1: He did. He did. Him and another engineer. So so double click into it. So what happened was this. So interviews went great. I was like, these are the smartest guys I've ever, you know, really spoken to in my life. It's a no brainer. I'm gonna join. You know, we negotiate. I'm like, I want half the company. He's like, oh, somebody in your role gets a quarter of a percent, typically. You know, I I got a little bit more than that. I didn't get half the company though, obviously. And so I was like under... But there's one circumstance I have. And he was like, what is it? And I was like, I have to live inside of the office. And he was like like, sure. But why? And I was like, think of this as, like, the Vietnam War. Right? Like, have this goofy name called AppLovin. We have no VC funding. Right? You're gonna have some five foot eight chubby kid go out there and go sell, to game developers and advertisers. The only way that we're going to win is we're going to have to out hustle everybody else, which means I have to live here. This is the only way this will work. And obviously, was very happy. It's like your first business hire, the guy's going to fucking live in the You couldn't ask more out of an employee. Yeah, him and this guy called Furcon at the time, they went to IKEA, and they built my... Built me and this other guy who's... I brought over another engineer to come live inside the office, our bunk beds. I can tell you the other engineer, the second he saw the bunk beds, he was like, Screw that. I'm definitely not living here. When I saw it, I was like, Home, sweet home. Time to get started.