Happy Monday,
I am reporting live from San Francisco, where the mood is a bit down, to say the least after yesterday’s 49ers game. Having to use their fourth-string quarterback in an NFC championship game on the road is never a good way to end a season.
The timing was not the best for yesterday’s weekly newsletter, but I am sticking to my 12 pm PT Sunday release — so check out volume 50, if you missed it.
To lighten the mood, I am happy to get out Episode 2 of the Stretch Four Podcast. Check out the first episode.
On this week’s show, I dive into two areas of interest for founders and those that may want to be starting their own companies. First, I talk about the new Sequoia Arc Program.
Second, I do a deep dive into childcare and how it impacts the lives of founders. Inspired by a tweet from Steve Schlafman.
Lastly, I interviewed a fellow founder my friend Laduram Vishnoi who just this week announced his second startup Middleware as a part of Y Combinator’s current Winter 2023 batch.
As always, thanks for subscribing, and please shoot me your feedback when you check out the episode.
Find the show notes below.
Stretch Four Podcast: Episode 002
My Recaps
5:04 - 21:41 — Breaking Down Sequoia’s New Arc Program for Pre-seed and Seed stage founders Sequoia Capital is the most well-known venture capital firm in the world and has now begun to run an accelerator program for pre-seed and seed-stage companies. The program invests up to $1 million into the companies and hosts a seven-week educational program with the founding teams both here in the United States and in Europe. So far over 50 founders have participated based on our researched data and Sequoia is planning to expand the program to three cohorts per year this year.
21:49 - 43:58 - Deep diving into childcare and how it impacts the founder's journey; If you are a subscriber you likely know that I became a father in the past year. It has had a drastic impact on my lifestyle and particularly how it pertains to running my startup. I share my thoughts on how I have handled childcare with my wife and I dive further into the things I have learned as a new parent that I think other founders with children or planning to start families should be aware of. Also, check out a collaborative post I did with my wife on the 10 things we learned about parenting in our first 10 months.
Interview Series
44:05-1:08:30: Laduram Vishnoi Founder and CEO at (Middleware) Laduram have raised over $50 million in his first startup Acquire and managing large international teams of engineers from his home in San Francisco. We spoke about how he balances his lifestyle with running international teams, and now with his second startup what he’s learned as a founder.
Announcements
1:08:35 — the end — ModernTax, February 10th speaking engagement
Thanks to our sponsor Future.
Episode 002: Breaking down Sequoia's New Arc Program, Childcare deep dive with tips for founders, Laduram Vishnoi talks raising $50 million in venture, and doing Y Combinator as a 2X founder