Bobby Tahir

Truly inspiring to listen to Dax Dasilva tell the story of Lightspeed Commerce on 20VC. With $900M in ARR I was thrilled to learn that Dax bootstrapped the company for 7 years to get to $10M in ARR. I hope it doesn't take us 7 years to get Liquid360 there but it makes me feel better about the 3.5 years we've put in to date. For me these stories are deeply encouraging. When you're building something very big it can take time to get to launch. A couple of weeks ago we met with a global player in the VC world. They were looking to invest $5M - $10M and we said we weren't there yet. We'll get there but it wouldn't be the right move today. They then jumped to another conclusion. The wrong one. I get it. They have a multi-billion dollar fund and capital to deploy. We have a company to grow and too much cash will not help us do it right. We've made good decisions being lean. Our customers are starting at $500K. This is an enterprise/gov't product. We have to satisfy a very discerning customer. No bugs, no glitches. A dependable and reliable product. We are excited by the feedback. We are making the world safer. Harry Stebbings suggested that Lightspeed is one of the most misunderstood companies. It's market cap is $2.6B which seems really low relative to the ARR. Very interesting episode.

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Startup decks vs Business plans. It's accepted that a startup needs a deck. Dax Dasilva of Lightspeed Commerce made an important point on 20VC. Writing a business plan - including financial projections - is an important step. It requires discipline. It provides a rigorous framework for thinking deeply about the problem you're trying to solve. Harry Stebbings countered that he doesn't even want to see a deck since it's all dreams. We spent a lot of time and energy on our business plan with the expectation that we would show it to no one ever. The business plan was part of our roadmap for the company. We researched customers - including having 50+ conversations. We wanted to understand them: their background, their interests, their presence on social media. We also wanted to understand how they were evaluated by leadership and how integrated they were with the business of the company they were protecting. We researched pricing both with potential customers and other products in our industry to find out if OpEx or CapEx was a better fit. How did they buy today? How would they like to buy? We did market research to understand the verticals and map the right entry point - we were wrong but that doesn't reduce the value of the research. We looked at competitors in depth to understand what they were seeing that we weren't. Dax is right. This is an invaluable document that should be updated every year - the company is changing, the market is changing, there's more feedback about price and ICP. It's not for sharing with the outside world. It's a map for driving forward. Decks won't get you investment - VCs invest in people. We make decks but we know they don't tell our story. The deck is a calling card. Dax and Harry are both right. https://lnkd.in/e25M82xY

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𝗗𝗮𝘆 𝟴 𝗣𝗿𝗶𝗼𝗿𝗶𝘁𝗶𝘇𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗗𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗹𝗼𝗽𝗲𝗿 𝗘𝘅𝗽𝗲𝗿𝗶𝗲𝗻𝗰𝗲 (𝗗𝗫) 𝗳𝗼𝗿 𝗔𝗣𝗜 𝗣𝗿𝗼𝗱𝘂𝗰𝘁𝘀 Developer experience is not just a buzzword; it's a philosophy that places the developer at the very heart of software development. Understanding and evaluating DX is crucial because it allows organizations to identify and address issues affecting developers’ productivity, satisfaction, and success. I love the perspective of James Higginbotham comparing UX and DX in his book Principles of Web API Design. 𝘜𝘴𝘦𝘳 𝘦𝘹𝘱𝘦𝘳𝘪𝘦𝘯𝘤𝘦 (𝘜𝘟) 𝘪𝘴 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘥𝘪𝘴𝘤𝘪𝘱𝘭𝘪𝘯𝘦 𝘰𝘧 𝘮𝘦𝘦𝘵𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘦𝘹𝘢𝘤𝘵 𝘯𝘦𝘦𝘥𝘴 𝘰𝘧 𝘶𝘴𝘦𝘳𝘴, 𝘧𝘳𝘰𝘮 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘪𝘳 𝘪𝘯𝘵𝘦𝘳𝘢𝘤𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯𝘴 𝘸𝘪𝘵𝘩 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘤𝘰𝘮𝘱𝘢𝘯𝘺 𝘵𝘰 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘪𝘳 𝘪𝘯𝘵𝘦𝘳𝘢𝘤𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯𝘴 𝘸𝘪𝘵𝘩 𝘪𝘵𝘴 𝘴𝘦𝘳𝘷𝘪𝘤𝘦𝘴 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘸𝘪𝘵𝘩 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘱𝘳𝘰𝘥𝘶𝘤𝘵 𝘪𝘵𝘴𝘦𝘭𝘧. 𝘋𝘦𝘷𝘦𝘭𝘰𝘱𝘦𝘳 𝘦𝘹𝘱𝘦𝘳𝘪𝘦𝘯𝘤𝘦 (𝘋𝘟) 𝘪𝘴 𝘫𝘶𝘴𝘵 𝘢𝘴 𝘪𝘮𝘱𝘰𝘳𝘵𝘢𝘯𝘵 𝘧𝘰𝘳 𝘈𝘗𝘐𝘴 𝘢𝘴 𝘜𝘟 𝘪𝘴 𝘧𝘰𝘳 𝘱𝘳𝘰𝘥𝘶𝘤𝘵𝘴 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘴𝘦𝘳𝘷𝘪𝘤𝘦𝘴. 𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘋𝘟 𝘧𝘰𝘤𝘶𝘴𝘦𝘴 𝘰𝘯 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘷𝘢𝘳𝘪𝘰𝘶𝘴 𝘢𝘴𝘱𝘦𝘤𝘵𝘴 𝘰𝘧 𝘦𝘯𝘨𝘢𝘨𝘦𝘮𝘦𝘯𝘵 𝘸𝘪𝘵𝘩 𝘥𝘦𝘷𝘦𝘭𝘰𝘱𝘦𝘳𝘴 𝘧𝘰𝘳 𝘢𝘯 𝘈𝘗𝘐 𝘱𝘳𝘰𝘥𝘶𝘤𝘵. 𝘐𝘵 𝘦𝘹𝘵𝘦𝘯𝘥𝘴 𝘣𝘦𝘺𝘰𝘯𝘥 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘰𝘱𝘦𝘳𝘢𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯𝘢𝘭 𝘥𝘦𝘵𝘢𝘪𝘭𝘴 𝘰𝘧 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘈𝘗𝘐. 𝘐𝘵 𝘢𝘭𝘴𝘰 𝘪𝘯𝘤𝘭𝘶𝘥𝘦𝘴 𝘢𝘭𝘭 𝘢𝘴𝘱𝘦𝘤𝘵𝘴 𝘰𝘧 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘈𝘗𝘐 𝘱𝘳𝘰𝘥𝘶𝘤𝘵, 𝘧𝘳𝘰𝘮 𝘧𝘪𝘳𝘴𝘵 𝘪𝘮𝘱𝘳𝘦𝘴𝘴𝘪𝘰𝘯𝘴 𝘵𝘰 𝘥𝘢𝘺-𝘵𝘰-𝘥𝘢𝘺 𝘶𝘴𝘢𝘨𝘦 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘴𝘶𝘱𝘱𝘰𝘳𝘵. 𝗪𝗵𝗮𝘁 𝗜𝘀 𝗗𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗹𝗼𝗽𝗲𝗿 𝗘𝘅𝗽𝗲𝗿𝗶𝗲𝗻𝗰𝗲? Developer Experience (DX) is the overall feeling, perception, experience or impression formed by a developer while engaging or interacting with your API as a Product. Whether the developer is interacting with your API or SDK, you are dealing with developer experience. 𝗖𝗼𝗺𝗽𝗼𝗻𝗲𝗻𝘁𝘀 𝗼𝗳 𝗮 𝗚𝗼𝗼𝗱 𝗗𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗹𝗼𝗽𝗲𝗿 𝗘𝘅𝗽𝗲𝗿𝗶𝗲𝗻𝗰𝗲 • Robust Developer Portal • Clear and Comprehensive Documentation • Tools and Infrastructure: This includes Dev. environments, version control systems, testing frameworks, and Live environments. • Developer Community 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗜𝗺𝗽𝗼𝗿𝘁𝗮𝗻𝗰𝗲 𝗼𝗳 𝗛𝗮𝘃𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗮 𝗣𝗼𝘀𝗶𝘁𝗶𝘃𝗲 𝗗𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗹𝗼𝗽𝗲𝗿 𝗘𝘅𝗽𝗲𝗿𝗶𝗲𝗻𝗰𝗲 • Enhanced Productivity: When developers have a positive experience, it translates into improved productivity. • Improved Collaboration: A positive developer experience fosters collaboration within engineering teams, leading to better communication, knowledge sharing, and teamwork. 𝗞𝗲𝘆 𝗙𝗮𝗰𝘁𝗼𝗿𝘀 𝗧𝗵𝗮𝘁 𝗖𝗼𝗻𝘁𝗿𝗶𝗯𝘂𝘁𝗲 𝗧𝗼 𝗔 𝗚𝗼𝗼𝗱 𝗗𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗹𝗼𝗽𝗲𝗿 𝗘𝘅𝗽𝗲𝗿𝗶𝗲𝗻𝗰𝗲 • Effective Documentation • Seamless Onboarding • Developer-Friendly APIs • Accessible Support Channels • Regular Updates and Innovation • Developer Community Engagement Feel Free to Share #200 OK #If It’s not 200, then it’s not OK.  #WeLearnTogether

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Tally , A fintech which was believed to be a true innovator and one of market disruptors in paying off credit card debt is now seen as a case study for not having a product market fit (PMF). I wouldn’t agree though. They didn’t close for not finding the PMF after 9 years but because they created more debt to the Customers when they were trying to combine all the credit cards together in one single line of credit and raising the interest rates and they denied service to customers credit card payments. One such complaint against Tally seems horrendous “I have been a Tally app user for over a year. I continually made payments toward my Tally account, which then also paid my credit card bills. About a month ago, Tally stopped paying my credit card bills. They said their financing for my revolving credit loan fell through and they gave me no other option than to pay $584/month toward my Tally account while now simultaneously paying my credit card bill. The terms of this loan unilaterally changed and now I’m left at the holidays wondering how I’m going to keep the lights on. If this isn’t a breach of contract, I really don’t know what is. “ Source: https://lnkd.in/gah-cwFN #tally #debtconsolidation #debtsettlement #lending

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Authoring (writing) and versioning are integral to Support and Product Management. With browser advances in rendering, local storage, and ReactJS components, the world of KBs has come a long way. You don’t need stodgy KB Management tools, which were the Thomas Guide (or Rand McNally?) of maps. You need a touchscreen interface!

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As software development grew in the 70s & 80s, it adopted management styles from manufacturing with little change. This gave rise to the Waterfall development model, emphasizing linear processes, extensive planning, and rigid workflows. These practices left a lasting legacy, particularly the focus on outputs over outcomes. In manufacturing, it’s easy to measure how many widgets are produced but harder to assess their impact on customers. Applying this output-focused mindset to product development is a critical flaw. This week’s article examines the pitfalls of prioritizing outputs over outcomes and the lessons for modern teams. https://lnkd.in/ePq6cVbC

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I write a lot about chargeback fighting but in full honesty, some chargebacks are not worth fighting. Let’s say it costs a merchant $20 in staff costs to manually fight a chargeback. If they’re disputing a $30 transaction, the ROI isn’t as good anymore, compared to fighting a $200 chargeback, for example. The solution is to have chargeback fighting fully automated. Better yet, to only pay a percentage of recovered revenue, so there’s no risk for you as a merchant. Sounds a lot like Disputifier, haha. DM me if you want to discuss a potential partnership!

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One unintended consequence of 'software as a service' is that selling software is becoming more and more like selling services. Historically, software: 1. Has relatively few competitors per category, because creating a product was expensive. 2. Differentiation has been in the product features and capabilities 3. Product differentiation was sustainable for a reasonable period of time 4. Buyers often bought based on one competitor being able to better meet specific technical requirements 5. Pricing was relatively opaque Historically, services: 1. Have an endless number of competitors, from gigantic companies to one person in their basement 2. Differentiation is in the brand, people, process and experience 3. Technical parity is the norm 4. Buyers buy based off their purchasing experience 5. Pricing is relatively transparent (i.e. if you have 3 big agencies bid or the big 3 consulting firms.....they will all cost about the same) More and more, the two are converging. How does this align with your experiences?

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Coding an IOS weather app in 10 mins. https://lnkd.in/gfitZKqZ Where is this headed? 1. Focus on 1 thing that will get simpler to build overtime may be a bad strategy. 2. We will see companies either go after SAAS and reduce cost. 3. We will see companies whose tech MOAT is weak becoming multi product business. Either way, more code, more value will get created.

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Vaibhav Domkundwar has an awesome post on how SaaS is going to be beaten by Outcome-as-a-Service.. Key takeaways - Humans did work to achieve outcomes. Then (desktop, server) software came along to make some of the work easier.. But managing that for each company got too hard and expensive, so "No Software" was born - "Software-as-a-service".. Now there are too many SaaS tools clinging onto the Enterprise credit-card, and people are tired of it... AI can not just "help humans" do the work, but it might soon be able to do the work itself. So will founders build products that help "humans work"? AI as a copilot? Or can they build a new type of firm that will do "Outcome-as-a-service"? How will that change packaging, pricing, positioning of software businesses going from India to Global?

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Proxies often pretend to be your customer. Why? Because you have a policy of only speaking with customers. But, in this case, your customer delegated the task to a proxy. That’s why a proxy is calling on the customer's behalf. The proxy tried being forthright but was rejected. So now they're resorting to deceit. My goal in life right now is to bridge peace between customer proxies and contact centers. Because it unlocks magical customer experiences when the two collaborate. Proxy friends, you can be transparent when contacting a company. ProxyLink verifies you are legitimate and acting with the customer's consent. Contact center friends, your customers want to delegate tasks to proxies. You should allow them to. ProxyLink gives you peace of mind that the proxy is acting on behalf of your customer. It's free to verify proxies and takes less than five minutes to set up.

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🥞 Signal stack: ToS or security page view + product activity What are these signals signaling? Your product is likely being verified for compliance. A strong buying signal 💪 ToS page view = likely a compliance or security person checking to confirm terms are within the bounds of vendor criteria. Product usage = Some level of utility is being derived from your product. +++ Why stack the two? We’re inferring two things: 1) product utility and 2) stakeholder verification to continue usage. When these two signals show within a short period (call it a week or so), it’s a sign that your product is being strongly considered for future use. It’s more than just double the buying propensity of one of the signals on it’s own—more like 3-5x in fact! +++ Common Room filters used in demo video: - Product activity occurred in the last 7 days (calibrate this to your liking) - Page viewed from a contact or account contains “terms” or “privacy” +++ 📓 Playbook STEP 1: Identify high-fit accounts by applying page view and product filters STEP 2: Identify or prospect a contact with a title that contains “security” STEP 3: Send a check-in message using context from the signals

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Shoutout to all those PE and Venture backed SaaS founders out there. Managing both retention to ensure key stakeholders remain happy is no small feat. #saas #churn #retention #founder #tech #b2b #customersuccess #cs #privateequity #vc #venturecapital

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Zepto raises $665 million at a $3.6 billion valuation. Here's why this raise is exciting for the Qcommerce space and startup ecosystem: Zepto's repeated fundraising success is impressive. > Pioneered the 10-minute commerce game. > Reached $1 billion GMV in under 2 years. > Founders are among the youngest in the startup world. > Built an exceptional team quickly. > Raised significant funds despite strong competition from Swiggy, Blinkit, BBNow, and others. > India is leading in aggressive Qcommerce growth. Reflecting on my TinyOwl days in the early FoodTech space, competition was fierce, and investors were cautious. However, things are different now: > Markets have scaled, unlocking multi-billion dollar opportunities. > IPOs are now viable, even for third or fourth ranked players with strong financials. Investors may feel relieved, but the Qcommerce space will remain highly competitive for the next few years. Consumers, meanwhile, are spoiled for choice. Interesting times ahead.

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My latest for TechCrunch: Another Black Exit! Open source compliance and security platform FOSSA has acquired developer community platform StackShare, the company confirmed to TechCrunch. Founded by Yonas Beshawred, StackShare is one of the more popular platforms for developers to discuss, track, and share the tools they use to build applications. This encompasses everything from which front-end JavaScript framework to use to which cloud provider to use for specific tasks. Read more to learn about the company and its acquisition!

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The 3 ways investment systems integrate with other systems and service providers (custodians, admins, etc) are crap. They're built to be good for vendors, not you. Here are the 3 models and why they're all bad: 1. 𝗠𝗮𝗻𝗮𝗴𝗲𝗱 𝗶𝗻𝘁𝗲𝗴𝗿𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻𝘀 When the vendor takes responsibility for the integration - building and maintaining. 𝗚𝗼𝗼𝗱 𝗳𝗼𝗿: Trading integrations (to and from: EMS, brokers and outsourced trading firms) Why: Many clients will use the same integration. Tolerance for errors is zero. 𝗕𝗮𝗱 𝗳𝗼𝗿: Everything else Why: Costly for you (usually a component of pricing). You're dependent on vendor when format change or you trigger a change (expand scope, adding a new custodian, etc). Leads time can be weeks, months or even quarters. 2. "𝗗𝗼 𝗜𝘁 𝗬𝗼𝘂𝗿𝘀𝗲𝗹𝗳" (𝗗𝗜𝗬) 𝘃𝗶𝗮 𝗔𝗣𝗜, 𝗦𝗤𝗟 𝗼𝗿 𝗳𝗹𝗮𝘁 𝗳𝗶𝗹𝗲𝘀 𝗚𝗼𝗼𝗱 𝗳𝗼𝗿: never Why: Very costly for you (development time) both to build and to maintain. These integrations also tend to be unstable, breaking when systems upgrade. Unfortunately, sometimes this is the only option offered by vendors to solve some integrations. 3. 𝗗𝗜𝗬 𝘃𝗶𝗮 𝗴𝗲𝗻𝗲𝗿𝗶𝗰 𝗘𝘅𝘁𝗿𝗮𝗰𝘁, 𝗧𝗿𝗮𝗻𝘀𝗳𝗼𝗿𝗺, 𝗟𝗼𝗮𝗱 (𝗘𝗧𝗟) 𝘁𝗼𝗼𝗹𝘀 𝗚𝗼𝗼𝗱 𝗳𝗼𝗿: most integrations except trading, but has a lot of challenges. The problem with these is that the logic is in a standalone application. This in turn means: - cost overhead - it doesn't solve the instability issue of approach 2, since the ETL tool is separate from your investment system(s) - it's dependent on your investment system(s) being able to export/import any data #investmentmanagement #assetmanagement #financialservices

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This has been an extremely gratifying journey over the last - almost 30 years (WTH!) and to have seen the evolution of Enterprise Software from a development, implementation, and then a GTM perspective. The adoption of SaaS/Cloud was a major inflection point in that journey (like the Juan Soto signing) but the move to Generative AI/AI Platforms will be even bigger.

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A software firm was spending almost $50M p.a. on cloud. And the business was on a steep growth trajectory. Their optimization plan was worth ~$6M. The problem was that 90% of the plan was based on discounts & cheaper cloud technology, and only 10% was associated with removing excess capacity. That split wouldn’t sustain savings, because the excess capacity was compensating for unresolved performance and scalability issues. As the firm was growing rapidly, that excess capacity would need to increase non-linearly with increasing demand. This would lead to cloud costs growing faster than business growth, leading to erosion of gross margin over the long-term (even with the $6M saving plan) If you are on a rapid scaling journey to the cloud it is worth targeting the *small* number of workload optimisations that will make the difference to your cost scalability. Capacitas

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Comprehensive #Seed VC Contact Database. Access a list of over 1,250 venture capital firms, 7,400+ VC professionals (including partners and principals), and 6,400 email addresses. https://payhip.com/b/cs7UQ #startup #startups #vc #venturecapital #investmentbanking #privateequity #managementconsulting #b2b #founders #entrepreneurs

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