2025-11-13_scott_bt-brainforge_-_vixul_bt-founder_m_ea9c859a

Meeting Title: Scott (BT)-BrainForge - Vixul BT-Founder Matching Date: 2025-11-13 Meeting participants: Uttam Kumaran, scott walker, Robert Tseng

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WEBVTT

1 00:00:16.640 ⇒ 00:00:18.110 Uttam Kumaran: Hey, Scott.

2 00:00:18.110 ⇒ 00:00:19.899 scott walker: Hey, Udam, is it Udam? Odam?

3 00:00:19.900 ⇒ 00:00:20.570 Uttam Kumaran: Tom.

4 00:00:20.570 ⇒ 00:00:21.639 scott walker: Bhutam, thank you.

5 00:00:21.640 ⇒ 00:00:22.240 Uttam Kumaran: Yes.

6 00:00:22.240 ⇒ 00:00:22.900 scott walker: Alright.

7 00:00:24.060 ⇒ 00:00:25.220 Uttam Kumaran: How’s everything going?

8 00:00:25.460 ⇒ 00:00:34.060 scott walker: Great, great. It’s, I’m in Richmond, Virginia, and this is, like, the best time of year here. It’s, it’s, like, fall, so the weather’s nice, it’s cool, it’s beautiful.

9 00:00:34.480 ⇒ 00:00:40.700 Uttam Kumaran: Nice. Yeah, I’m in, I’m in Austin. It’s also, like, really nice, finally. It’s just, like.

10 00:00:40.850 ⇒ 00:00:45.110 Uttam Kumaran: Kinda chilly, but still really sunny, like, nice weather.

11 00:00:45.350 ⇒ 00:00:50.559 scott walker: That’s exactly like it is here. We don’t get quite as hot as Austin, but it gets hot.

12 00:00:50.560 ⇒ 00:00:51.540 Uttam Kumaran: Nice.

13 00:00:52.470 ⇒ 00:00:56.719 Uttam Kumaran: Well, yeah, great to be connected, Robert. Robert’s in New York, and I feel like.

14 00:00:56.720 ⇒ 00:00:57.090 scott walker: I’m not…

15 00:00:57.090 ⇒ 00:00:59.199 Uttam Kumaran: For you, it’s what, it’s snowing at this point?

16 00:00:59.540 ⇒ 00:01:04.220 Robert Tseng: It had the first snow on Tuesday, but that… that didn’t last very long. It’s… it’s just cold.

17 00:01:04.989 ⇒ 00:01:06.769 scott walker: Are you in the city, or…

18 00:01:06.770 ⇒ 00:01:07.819 Robert Tseng: Yeah, I’m in the city.

19 00:01:07.820 ⇒ 00:01:08.639 scott walker: Oh, nice.

20 00:01:08.800 ⇒ 00:01:09.390 Robert Tseng: Yeah.

21 00:01:10.360 ⇒ 00:01:11.769 scott walker: What part of the city?

22 00:01:12.090 ⇒ 00:01:14.030 Robert Tseng: I’m around Columbus Circle.

23 00:01:14.030 ⇒ 00:01:14.690 scott walker: Oh, cool, yep.

24 00:01:14.690 ⇒ 00:01:16.830 Robert Tseng: Columbus Circle at Hell’s Kitchen, so, yeah.

25 00:01:16.830 ⇒ 00:01:17.590 scott walker: Oh, nice.

26 00:01:18.070 ⇒ 00:01:18.670 Robert Tseng: Yeah.

27 00:01:20.640 ⇒ 00:01:26.469 Uttam Kumaran: Cool, well, it’s great to be connected. I’m kind of curious how you first got in touch with, like, Vixel.

28 00:01:26.470 ⇒ 00:01:27.880 Robert Tseng: Yeah. Fucks.

29 00:01:27.880 ⇒ 00:01:44.989 scott walker: Oh, man. I can give you… I’ll give you a little bit of my background, because it kind of works into that. Okay. This is part of… it’d be good as intros anyway, but, I kind of… I was, like, an engineer in undergrad technical, and then got a business degree, and…

30 00:01:44.990 ⇒ 00:01:53.500 scott walker: got into startups, but somehow stumbled into consulting, and mostly around technology, and way back in the day, worked for one of the big guys, KPMG.

31 00:01:53.520 ⇒ 00:02:06.420 scott walker: And then, you know, left there and joined a startup, which we sold to a roll-up, and actually they went public, and, went to all that, then started our own firm.

32 00:02:06.420 ⇒ 00:02:15.130 scott walker: Doing… and all this is just technology consulting, just different technologies as the market changed, essentially. A lot of web stuff in the early days.

33 00:02:15.130 ⇒ 00:02:22.970 scott walker: And we built… we spent about 10 years building that, and sold that for… I think we sold it… well, I know we sold it for a little over $100 million.

34 00:02:22.970 ⇒ 00:02:42.930 scott walker: And that… and it was… that was pretty much all organic, one small acquisition. And then the company I joined, I helped them with acquiring other consulting companies, and then… so I’ve just been through it with a lot, with a lot of firms. And so the last whatever years, I’ve been really more investing in consulting companies.

35 00:02:42.930 ⇒ 00:02:43.480 Uttam Kumaran: Great.

36 00:02:43.480 ⇒ 00:02:48.430 scott walker: And also advising them, and, and, and

37 00:02:49.180 ⇒ 00:02:52.269 scott walker: Probably more investing and less advising lately, but…

38 00:02:53.330 ⇒ 00:02:56.850 scott walker: So, I had gotten connected with Otter, like.

39 00:02:56.880 ⇒ 00:03:14.539 scott walker: years ago, an investment banker that we know had introduced us to him, and suggested that he hire us to do some consulting for him. And he didn’t want… he decided not to, but we kept in touch, because he’s, you know, he’s one of those people that just keeps in touch with everyone. So we kept in touch over the years, and they sold the company, and

40 00:03:14.540 ⇒ 00:03:20.799 scott walker: And he used to laugh, he said, man, we probably should have hired you guys. It would have saved us a lot of pain, but…

41 00:03:20.800 ⇒ 00:03:37.500 scott walker: But, so when he started Bixel, it just seemed like a cool idea, so, I jumped on board to just help as a Brain Trust member, and, and so it’s been cool to see. I think he’s… he’s, he’s building something really cool, and I like… I like, like, he and Ali, they, they like…

42 00:03:37.940 ⇒ 00:03:47.859 scott walker: They just are constantly improving. If you look at what Vixel is now compared to what it was a couple years ago, they’re just… they’re the kind of people that if something… like, if you say, hey, this isn’t working for me.

43 00:03:48.260 ⇒ 00:04:00.940 scott walker: they’re gonna go fix it. So the next, you know, companies that come on board, getting a better and better experience every time, and a more focused experience, so, so I enjoy working with them. They’re good guys.

44 00:04:01.550 ⇒ 00:04:02.719 scott walker: How about y’all?

45 00:04:03.400 ⇒ 00:04:13.280 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, when I… I get… I mean, Robert is the one that introduced me originally to Vixel, but I think maybe I’ll give a little bit of an intro. So, yeah, I…

46 00:04:13.480 ⇒ 00:04:30.600 Uttam Kumaran: sort of, Robert and I both started sort of separate consultancies, and over the last year have sort of, like, merged forces. My background is also in engineering, worked as a data engineer, and then sort of led data teams and led product at a data startup.

47 00:04:30.620 ⇒ 00:04:37.069 Uttam Kumaran: Before this, I was in New York as well, and then moved here to Austin, like, 3 years ago.

48 00:04:37.150 ⇒ 00:04:42.729 Uttam Kumaran: And so, yeah, my… all my background is in sort of standing up data infrastructure, building data teams,

49 00:04:43.080 ⇒ 00:04:57.510 Uttam Kumaran: And then, sort of, Robert and I got put in touch by a mutual friend, and he was running a very similar consultancy, just kind of different parts of the stack. Like, more of my background is in data modeling, data engineering. His background is more on analytics and, like,

50 00:04:57.510 ⇒ 00:05:06.390 Uttam Kumaran: analysis, and we started working on a client together, and I think both of us sort of had very similar ambition, but sort of similar demeanor about how we want to do this, and I think.

51 00:05:06.390 ⇒ 00:05:06.810 scott walker: Yep.

52 00:05:06.810 ⇒ 00:05:15.099 Uttam Kumaran: sort of been at the hip ever since, just, like, growing Brainforge. So I think it’s… it’s… it couldn’t be better timing, I feel like. We’re kind of in this,

53 00:05:15.790 ⇒ 00:05:35.010 Uttam Kumaran: I mean, I think every… all the time, there’s always, like, pivots to be made, but we’re sort of in a… in an area where we just need some guidance on, like, how to scale from, you know, now where we’re at, maybe around a million… between 1 to 2 million in annual rev… in annual revenue, and, like, how do we scale that up? And as I’m sure you know, like, a lot of

54 00:05:35.150 ⇒ 00:05:45.350 Uttam Kumaran: things start to break, and I feel like a lot of, like, our assumptions have to change, and that’s kind of, like, where we are. I feel like, thankfully, we’ve done a lot of the legwork in, like, getting there.

55 00:05:45.490 ⇒ 00:05:50.490 scott walker: I don’t know if that’s just the start, or it gets even harder after this, but…

56 00:05:50.540 ⇒ 00:06:04.620 Uttam Kumaran: I don’t know, I just think it’s been a lot… it’s been a lot of fun. We’ve got to work with a lot of amazing people, like, our team is really, really good. And I don’t know, we’re finding, like, the market is really receptive to, like, what we’re going to mark… what we’re going to market with.

57 00:06:05.450 ⇒ 00:06:07.099 scott walker: How big’s your team now, then?

58 00:06:07.490 ⇒ 00:06:10.940 scott walker: I think we have around 15 people, mix of part-time and full-time.

59 00:06:11.140 ⇒ 00:06:12.200 Uttam Kumaran: Cool.

60 00:06:12.200 ⇒ 00:06:16.779 scott walker: Is that, is that mix of onshore and offshore, or is it… Mix, yeah. Mix.

61 00:06:17.000 ⇒ 00:06:20.029 scott walker: And are the offshore… are the offshore people employees, or contractors?

62 00:06:20.030 ⇒ 00:06:22.119 Uttam Kumaran: No, everybody’s contractors.

63 00:06:22.120 ⇒ 00:06:24.549 scott walker: Oh, everybody’s contractors. Oh, interesting. Correct.

64 00:06:25.280 ⇒ 00:06:25.960 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.

65 00:06:25.960 ⇒ 00:06:27.680 scott walker: And is that part of your business model?

66 00:06:29.170 ⇒ 00:06:32.890 Uttam Kumaran: I wouldn’t say necessarily, more just, like.

67 00:06:33.220 ⇒ 00:06:42.880 Uttam Kumaran: risk tolerance, and, like, I think now in engineering also, I think the market is really favorable towards employers, just because I think it’s really tough

68 00:06:43.060 ⇒ 00:06:55.450 Uttam Kumaran: for talent right now, and so I think we’ve been able to get away with that. I think, of course, like, if we’re gonna need to get more senior folks or people committed, like, we’ll have to start to look into that, but again, just another area.

69 00:06:55.850 ⇒ 00:06:56.500 scott walker: Yelp.

70 00:06:56.500 ⇒ 00:07:02.330 Uttam Kumaran: It’s sort of on the, sort of, to-do list to think about, so… Yeah. Awesome.

71 00:07:02.330 ⇒ 00:07:02.790 scott walker: Awesome.

72 00:07:02.790 ⇒ 00:07:06.439 Uttam Kumaran: Oh, yeah, maybe Robert, I’ll let you give her an intro. Sorry, I’m hogging the airways.

73 00:07:06.440 ⇒ 00:07:20.219 Robert Tseng: No, no, I think, I think that was pretty much a good summary of everything. Yeah, I guess, like, just to add more color, so I, I guess, we joined Vixels, we went through the accelerator, Q1 of this year. Yeah, I guess when I had

74 00:07:20.220 ⇒ 00:07:39.169 Robert Tseng: first… I had first met Otter, at a previous VixelCon before I even applied, to a cohort. And then, yeah, it was, like, kind of a six-month kind of monthly… monthly call, and just, yeah, I think was really, you know, appreciated just how generous they are with advice, with their time, and,

75 00:07:39.170 ⇒ 00:07:49.299 Robert Tseng: yeah, I guess, like, it kind of just coincided well that, like, I kind of made… we made a decision to… to bring Utom into the picture, and we kind of merged under one house, and so…

76 00:07:49.300 ⇒ 00:08:02.010 Robert Tseng: yeah, I guess that it’s, you know, pretty much since January till now, it’s just kind of getting better and better and better. So, yeah, I guess we’re… we’re excited for… to, you know, to have… to meet with you and

77 00:08:02.050 ⇒ 00:08:18.050 Robert Tseng: Yeah, just to… we don’t have, like, a set board, or, like, not really any formal advisory outside of… out of… outside of Vixel, so, yeah, I think this is, you know, all pretty kind of greenfield to us, like, kind of what this… what this relationship could… could be.

78 00:08:18.050 ⇒ 00:08:28.609 Robert Tseng: And yeah, so, you know, would definitely appreciate you kind of, you know, steering the conversation however you feel, because we didn’t really come too much with an agenda, yeah.

79 00:08:28.610 ⇒ 00:08:34.969 scott walker: Cool, yeah, yeah, and I’d like to hear more about the company, but I think in terms of the, the relationship, I mean.

80 00:08:35.110 ⇒ 00:08:42.600 scott walker: honestly, I guess… I guess I’ve done two of these now, and and it’s a little bit driven by…

81 00:08:42.730 ⇒ 00:08:58.290 scott walker: the exact situation. So, what we’ve tended to do is get, like, a monthly cadence of just having a set meeting every month, and then, if there’s a specific problem that’s, like.

82 00:08:58.410 ⇒ 00:09:09.840 scott walker: needs some deeper work in between that, we’ll… we’ll jump in on that and help with that. And so, and I think that’s… that’s worked out pretty well for people.

83 00:09:09.880 ⇒ 00:09:21.449 scott walker: it’s, it gives enough to keep in the business and understanding what’s going on. From my perspective, you know, I think I can help,

84 00:09:21.770 ⇒ 00:09:40.240 scott walker: just when it comes to services, I’ve just been through it so many times now. So, and as a, you know, as you guys, the CEOs, you know, I spend a lot of time as a CEO, and just so I think I have a good understanding of the pains that come along with that, and a lot of decisions you’re going to make. I mean, I think

85 00:09:40.240 ⇒ 00:09:43.120 scott walker: I think what I’ve seen is,

86 00:09:43.200 ⇒ 00:10:05.949 scott walker: is companies, like, services companies especially, because they’re so body-dependent, there’s just certain sizes where they… you have to constantly change how you do business and what you do to get size, so… so you guys are kind of in that first phase, and then to break through somewhere around, you know, to get to, like, 3 million is… is sort of a certain business, and then once you get past about 3 million, somewhere around…

87 00:10:06.090 ⇒ 00:10:15.369 scott walker: you know, 8 or 10 million is another… you have to transform the way you do business. A lot of people get stuck there, and then… and then there’s, you know, there’s another jump at about 100 people… well…

88 00:10:15.510 ⇒ 00:10:23.689 scott walker: if you’re doing more onshore, it’s… it’s… but it’s… if you get, you know, you may be starting to get that 20 million, so… so it’s almost like these step functions.

89 00:10:23.780 ⇒ 00:10:29.280 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah. …company has to go through, and I think… I always think about it like you’re kind of, like, it’s like phase change.

90 00:10:29.280 ⇒ 00:10:29.790 scott walker: They’re like…

91 00:10:29.790 ⇒ 00:10:35.519 Uttam Kumaran: It is. Where, like, the thing doesn’t start boiling until the whole thing gets to that point. I was kind of thinking about that earlier.

92 00:10:35.520 ⇒ 00:10:36.459 scott walker: Yeah, I was like this.

93 00:10:36.460 ⇒ 00:10:46.560 Uttam Kumaran: It’s just, like, so we… it just feels so weird, because we’re in, sort of, I feel like we’re in something like that, where we’re, like, dragging a bunch of habits along, and then we have to, like.

94 00:10:46.800 ⇒ 00:10:52.740 Uttam Kumaran: We have to make some very, kind of, like, seemingly scary decisions on people, and, like, how we structure.

95 00:10:52.740 ⇒ 00:10:56.689 scott walker: But it’s like, all of that has to happen to go to the next beat. It’s like… Yeah.

96 00:10:56.690 ⇒ 00:10:57.060 Uttam Kumaran: I don’t know.

97 00:10:57.390 ⇒ 00:10:59.469 Uttam Kumaran: Oh, I’ve been ruminating on that this week.

98 00:10:59.690 ⇒ 00:11:13.630 scott walker: Yeah, and it’s step functions. I mean, people, you know, you always see the growth charts, and it looks like this, right? The reality is, behind the scenes, it’s going like this, and every one of those steps is a pain. You know, this tends to be painful.

99 00:11:13.630 ⇒ 00:11:20.709 scott walker: It tends to be scary, and I do think, you know, my personal belief is that ability to get through those steps is what

100 00:11:20.880 ⇒ 00:11:23.190 scott walker: A lot of people kind of get stuck.

101 00:11:23.210 ⇒ 00:11:36.619 scott walker: Like, they have to make a bunch of changes, and they’re not comfortable doing that, and so they sort of just, you know… they have a nice little business, and they keep it going, but they have trouble getting to that next stage. And sometimes they’re the problem, and…

102 00:11:36.620 ⇒ 00:11:44.750 scott walker: I guess usually they’re the problem, because they’re kind of not… but, you know, not that they’re not capable of doing it, they just…

103 00:11:44.750 ⇒ 00:11:45.290 Uttam Kumaran: Fair.

104 00:11:45.290 ⇒ 00:11:48.860 scott walker: willing to make the changes necessary to get to that next level.

105 00:11:49.100 ⇒ 00:11:58.509 scott walker: So, yeah, so, so that’s the way we’ve been working, and, and, you know, first we had really rigid,

106 00:11:58.630 ⇒ 00:12:03.619 scott walker: meetings, and we found that those tend to be a lot of time spending

107 00:12:04.050 ⇒ 00:12:06.220 scott walker: Just repeating the same thing every month.

108 00:12:06.420 ⇒ 00:12:21.989 scott walker: And so most of them have turned… the ones that… I think the ones that are working well is we spend time at the beginning just going over, alright, what happened last month, and then we dig in on a problem, and so we actually make some progress and not, you know, not spend…

109 00:12:21.990 ⇒ 00:12:27.570 scott walker: all this time wading through a deck, and every time, and so…

110 00:12:27.570 ⇒ 00:12:31.140 Uttam Kumaran: I think usually each month there is something that is… At least one person.

111 00:12:31.140 ⇒ 00:12:31.730 Robert Tseng: There’s a theme.

112 00:12:31.730 ⇒ 00:12:32.060 Uttam Kumaran: into the.

113 00:12:32.060 ⇒ 00:12:32.819 Robert Tseng: A month, yeah.

114 00:12:32.820 ⇒ 00:12:33.550 Uttam Kumaran: Top of mind?

115 00:12:34.050 ⇒ 00:12:41.480 Uttam Kumaran: I mean, I think both of us, like, I feel like, and I don’t know, this is just, like, anecdotally, I mean, we’ve moved…

116 00:12:41.570 ⇒ 00:13:01.259 Uttam Kumaran: pretty fast, like, in this business, and I feel like we’ve done that a lot by just a lot of self-reflection and trying on a weekly basis to improve. So, I think we have no fear over that. I think it’s just a lot of unknown sometimes, like, even how we got here was a lot of unknown, let alone the next phase.

117 00:13:01.680 ⇒ 00:13:02.200 scott walker: Yup.

118 00:13:02.200 ⇒ 00:13:05.860 Uttam Kumaran: And so, I think that’s, like, what we’re really looking for is, like.

119 00:13:06.260 ⇒ 00:13:18.110 Uttam Kumaran: okay, what are kind of rules we should break, or what are rules that we should actually just do the right thing on? And I think we both, you know, we do a lot of research and understanding, like, how these businesses are run.

120 00:13:18.110 ⇒ 00:13:32.459 Uttam Kumaran: But certainly, you’re right, like, there is both, like, an emotional aspect to making some of these decisions, but also there’s just, like, do we have the right person? Okay, like, did we spend enough time? Like, we have a couple people, but, like, they’re not perfect, what should we do? So, even for us, help evaluating

121 00:13:32.460 ⇒ 00:13:42.880 Uttam Kumaran: like, what are our expectations if we need to plug someone into something? Like, setting that really straight, versus we come up with it based on what we know now. Yeah.

122 00:13:42.880 ⇒ 00:13:52.789 scott walker: I think, yeah, the people issues are obviously the hardest, and I think along the lines of what you’re talking about, that, you know, a lot of consulting is…

123 00:13:53.430 ⇒ 00:14:04.820 scott walker: I mean, it’s a business that people know. I mean, it’s not… you’re not inventing something new, and I think a lot of people think, you know, try to completely reinvent consulting, and that’s… you know, you can…

124 00:14:05.160 ⇒ 00:14:14.080 scott walker: You can modify it and tweak and tune it around the edges, but the core of, you know, you’re billing hours for work, and maybe you can do it more efficiently, and maybe you can include some.

125 00:14:14.080 ⇒ 00:14:14.650 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.

126 00:14:14.650 ⇒ 00:14:17.970 scott walker: IP is part of that, but that business is…

127 00:14:18.450 ⇒ 00:14:37.140 scott walker: it’s the same as it’s always been. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So it’s… the key is kind of battening down the hatches and running the core business tight, and knowing what you’re doing, and then figuring out the things around the edge that… that make it different, and make you unique, and… and… and, you know, enable you to do something a little different and better.

128 00:14:37.140 ⇒ 00:14:53.629 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, I think that’s the thing, too, is, like, what points actually help our differentiation, whether that’s on the sales or recruiting or on the delivery side. But there’s also points where it’s, like, I think early on, we tried to really lean in heavily on, like, running everything agile and heavy on the project management, but then it was, like.

129 00:14:53.740 ⇒ 00:14:57.969 Uttam Kumaran: It’s not worth it for a lot of our smaller clients, and so we kind of scrapped a lot of, like.

130 00:14:58.200 ⇒ 00:15:05.270 Uttam Kumaran: how we were headed there, but I don’t blame the people that wanted that, because they’re project managers, so of course all they care about is project management.

131 00:15:05.270 ⇒ 00:15:05.700 scott walker: Right.

132 00:15:05.700 ⇒ 00:15:15.090 Uttam Kumaran: I’m like, hey, I don’t care about tickets if we’re not doing any… if the work isn’t getting to the client on a weekly basis. I don’t care… I don’t really care how it’s done.

133 00:15:15.390 ⇒ 00:15:15.760 scott walker: There’s even…

134 00:15:15.760 ⇒ 00:15:33.790 Uttam Kumaran: And, like, things about that, and I feel like, ultimately, like, I think of this business as, like, yeah, there’s all this demand, like, grabbing the demand. There is, like, the true execution and delivery side, and then there is, okay, like, what gets… how do we find the right people to pair with those problems at the right time?

135 00:15:33.790 ⇒ 00:15:37.830 scott walker: But then, of course, like, they’re supporting all… there is, like, the actual business.

136 00:15:37.970 ⇒ 00:15:42.919 Uttam Kumaran: supporting all that, and I think that’s also where we’re at right now, is we’re, like, deciding on

137 00:15:43.160 ⇒ 00:15:46.380 Uttam Kumaran: Okay, establishing a core group of, like, operators.

138 00:15:46.380 ⇒ 00:16:07.150 Uttam Kumaran: Currently, we’re the only true operators. We have people that are helping us, like, in various different ways. Some people that are almost, like… we have some people on marketing and sales that are 100%, like, supporting the business. We have some people on delivery that are also 30% maybe helping the business here and there, but we want to sort of define that, like, core group of operators, give them core KPIs, and, like, hand off

139 00:16:07.270 ⇒ 00:16:12.130 Uttam Kumaran: a lot of the decision-making. And, like, that is something that we could totally use some help on, like.

140 00:16:12.650 ⇒ 00:16:22.340 Uttam Kumaran: like, breaking down and understanding if we’re heading… if that’s the right direction ahead at this juncture. Are we… the roles that we decide to make open.

141 00:16:22.460 ⇒ 00:16:33.020 Uttam Kumaran: like, are we defining them clearly? And then, like, should we find those people inside? Is there an obvious, like, you need this type of head person to go outside? Like, those are, I think, that’s the place we’re at.

142 00:16:33.170 ⇒ 00:16:34.210 scott walker: Yeah.

143 00:16:34.210 ⇒ 00:16:46.419 Uttam Kumaran: I feel like one thing that we’ve done really well at, and again, this is maybe one point of differentiation, is we just use AI, like, quite significantly, and we are using it, in every

144 00:16:46.780 ⇒ 00:16:56.720 Uttam Kumaran: like, part of the business, from sales, also in recruiting, in internal operations, project management, and delivery. And so, I feel like…

145 00:16:57.010 ⇒ 00:17:01.370 Uttam Kumaran: out of every area, like, that is something that… it doesn’t… I don’t think it… we really, like.

146 00:17:01.610 ⇒ 00:17:05.189 Uttam Kumaran: changed, like, the what. We just are able to do that faster.

147 00:17:05.190 ⇒ 00:17:05.589 scott walker: Yeah.

148 00:17:05.599 ⇒ 00:17:24.199 Uttam Kumaran: And that is, like, I think been a really big differentiator for us, and not only us two, but everybody in the company, we’ve really pushed to be very AI-enabled, and then, of course, that is now something that we are selling. Like, we’re selling those services out. So, for me, that is, like, being very, like.

149 00:17:24.779 ⇒ 00:17:29.299 Uttam Kumaran: honest, I feel like that is truly the one differentiator. Everything else, I think we’re…

150 00:17:29.449 ⇒ 00:17:42.309 Uttam Kumaran: we’re using the latest in, like, how to sell, the latest in how to deliver, like, but again, as you mentioned, I feel like those are just rounding out the edges, but the AI piece, I don’t know, I just… I’ve never been part of a company where it’s been this…

151 00:17:42.429 ⇒ 00:17:44.929 Uttam Kumaran: impactful, yeah.

152 00:17:45.320 ⇒ 00:17:45.730 scott walker: Fantastic.

153 00:17:45.730 ⇒ 00:17:50.730 Uttam Kumaran: we’re just proving, I think… we’re not only proving the services we’re offering, but I think we’re proving.

154 00:17:50.920 ⇒ 00:17:54.070 scott walker: like, a lot of the hypothesis on how AI can, like, help.

155 00:17:54.100 ⇒ 00:18:03.010 Uttam Kumaran: Transformer business, but again, it’s not like we’re inventing a new process, just what took, like, 3 weeks, and multiple people can now just get shrunk by one person.

156 00:18:03.010 ⇒ 00:18:03.490 scott walker: Yeah.

157 00:18:03.490 ⇒ 00:18:15.619 Uttam Kumaran: and we just do that over and over and over, and then a lot of those things go from a ChatGPT prompt to, like, a workflow that we’re now able to build, and like, I don’t know, there’s… I think there’s, like, something there in our business, for sure.

158 00:18:15.760 ⇒ 00:18:31.800 scott walker: I think so, too, and I think… I think because everyone… I think you guys have a big advantage being relatively new and starting that way, because I think what a lot of companies are struggling with, and the big ones are struggling with the most, but is, like, it’s really hard to retrofit that into a business.

159 00:18:31.800 ⇒ 00:18:32.240 Uttam Kumaran: Totally.

160 00:18:32.240 ⇒ 00:18:40.139 scott walker: And so, they’re really struggling, because they’re all saying we’ve got to become AI-native internally in the way we run our business and deliver.

161 00:18:40.140 ⇒ 00:18:45.520 Uttam Kumaran: This business just has no other, like, there’s no other… there was no before AI.

162 00:18:45.520 ⇒ 00:18:49.099 scott walker: Yeah, I think that’s super cool, because that’s… you,

163 00:18:49.270 ⇒ 00:19:06.959 scott walker: you know, it’s funny, everyone I talk to right now is struggling with this, and so they’re all trying to find some processes internally that they can add an AI layer to, and there’s just so much resistance to it in these organizations, and so, yeah, so I think that’s cool, and I think the area you’re in, too, just…

164 00:19:06.960 ⇒ 00:19:09.330 scott walker: To me, the whole data space is…

165 00:19:09.910 ⇒ 00:19:17.380 scott walker: is the… probably the best… to me, is the best way to make money in AI right now, because people are struggling

166 00:19:17.480 ⇒ 00:19:32.859 scott walker: And I know you see it, I mean, I assume this is… I don’t know exactly where your business is, but… Sure. But, you know, everyone gets into this right now, oh, we’re gonna do all this AI stuff, and then it’s like, oh, our data’s crap, and, you know, blah blah blah, and then we spend all this money to fix your data, well, we don’t spend.

167 00:19:32.860 ⇒ 00:19:35.039 Uttam Kumaran: It’s mostly a data engineering problem.

168 00:19:35.040 ⇒ 00:19:45.880 scott walker: Yeah, yeah, and so, and so a lot of people are wrestling with that right now, and, like, we’ve… I was working with these guys that were doing this startup, and… and they’re just, like.

169 00:19:45.980 ⇒ 00:19:56.990 scott walker: they were doing AI for knowledge management, and they were doing it for, like, 3 months, and they realized, holy crap, everyone’s knowledge is just basically horrible data right now. And so they’ve completely pivoted to

170 00:19:57.120 ⇒ 00:20:00.879 scott walker: Creating a tool to help you clean up your knowledge.

171 00:20:01.560 ⇒ 00:20:07.789 scott walker: using AI, so that you can actually use that knowledge to feed AI.

172 00:20:08.140 ⇒ 00:20:09.680 scott walker: And they’re having a lot more luggage.

173 00:20:09.680 ⇒ 00:20:16.779 Uttam Kumaran: That’s exactly one of our clients, that’s exactly what we did. When we walked in, most of the challenge actually wasn’t the AI

174 00:20:16.970 ⇒ 00:20:30.869 Uttam Kumaran: workflow that we built, it actually was like, oh my gosh, there’s… everything’s in documents, spreadsheets. We had to create databases for some stuff that was just living in spreadsheets. And of course, like, people are opening a spreadsheet and doing a lookup.

175 00:20:30.920 ⇒ 00:20:39.819 Uttam Kumaran: But, like, how can you… AI can’t, like… so we have to basically structure a lot of data, but it’s very convenient that that’s, like, actually our MO.

176 00:20:39.820 ⇒ 00:20:40.349 scott walker: That is what we.

177 00:20:40.350 ⇒ 00:20:47.389 Uttam Kumaran: really are really good at. The AI stuff, we are, I would say, as good as anyone in, like, workflows, because we’ve just been

178 00:20:47.510 ⇒ 00:20:53.279 Uttam Kumaran: we are… we’ve been doing that for 2 years, and so I’d be surprised to find someone that’s

179 00:20:53.340 ⇒ 00:21:11.099 Uttam Kumaran: either been doing in their business and also doing it externally, but so… but most of the problem in AI and adopting workflows, I would say, like, if we take out foundational models and, like, fine-tuning and some of the more cutting-edge stuff, it is, like, mostly a data engineering problem. Like, it’s having the right context.

180 00:21:11.100 ⇒ 00:21:13.399 Uttam Kumaran: From the right source, summarized in the right way.

181 00:21:13.570 ⇒ 00:21:20.009 Uttam Kumaran: And then getting it out somewhere. But those are all just… that’s just, like, a lot of… just rhymes with all the data work that we do.

182 00:21:20.620 ⇒ 00:21:28.170 scott walker: Yeah. Yeah, no, and that’s, so, just some other quick questions, just from looking at your website. So, are you guys a Snowflake partner?

183 00:21:28.960 ⇒ 00:21:47.040 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, we are a Snowflake partner, very small, like, they won’t pick up my call, but I have a lot of ex-friends from Snowflake, and I’ve… I’ve worked with Snowflake my whole career. Oh, cool. So, yeah, and then we have a… we have partners with a few other great vendors. A lot of the folks that partner with us, of course, it’s like.

184 00:21:47.320 ⇒ 00:21:58.649 Uttam Kumaran: I would say that we actually get a lot of benefit from the folks that are also trying to really grow in the areas that we excel at. So we have some BI partners, we have some ETL tool partners.

185 00:21:58.650 ⇒ 00:21:59.020 scott walker: So…

186 00:21:59.020 ⇒ 00:22:03.160 Uttam Kumaran: And of course, like, the warehouses are a big part of what we do.

187 00:22:03.160 ⇒ 00:22:04.140 scott walker: Yeah, yeah.

188 00:22:04.140 ⇒ 00:22:05.060 Uttam Kumaran: So, yeah.

189 00:22:05.060 ⇒ 00:22:23.950 scott walker: Cool. Yeah, because I’m a big believer in… in… I used to not be a big believer in channel partnerships, and over the last 5 years or so, I’ve just… like, I’ve gotten big into the, well, not… we… a little bit with the Snowflake, but, more service now, so…

190 00:22:23.950 ⇒ 00:22:25.089 Uttam Kumaran: What, what changed?

191 00:22:25.880 ⇒ 00:22:26.480 Uttam Kumaran: in your mindset.

192 00:22:26.480 ⇒ 00:22:29.620 scott walker: I just… I think… I think the…

193 00:22:29.850 ⇒ 00:22:45.569 scott walker: I think there’s two things, because, like, our company, we were partners. The biggest company I was… I ran and sold, we were, like, anti-partners, right? We were, like, you know, you got to sell your own stuff, don’t use excuses, and so we had a bunch of partners.

194 00:22:45.570 ⇒ 00:22:59.340 scott walker: But we never wanted to rely on them, and we were good at it, so that we could go in and find clients, and… but then I got involved with the ServiceNow company. I invested in them that was very channel intelligent, and watching them work a channel

195 00:22:59.340 ⇒ 00:23:07.589 scott walker: and use it to drive leads and get indoors, and I really finally learned, oh, wow, if you do it right.

196 00:23:07.930 ⇒ 00:23:18.950 scott walker: it’s, it’s just such a good revenue producer, and so, so I think… and after having sold a couple of companies,

197 00:23:19.160 ⇒ 00:23:21.980 scott walker: Buyers love a strong channel.

198 00:23:22.530 ⇒ 00:23:23.140 Uttam Kumaran: Okay.

199 00:23:23.140 ⇒ 00:23:30.619 scott walker: So, like, what happens is, like… and it’s funny, but they’ll basically go to the investment bankers and say, find me a snowflake consultancy. They won’t say.

200 00:23:30.620 ⇒ 00:23:31.130 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.

201 00:23:31.130 ⇒ 00:23:33.829 scott walker: Find me a $10 million data consultancy to do

202 00:23:34.170 ⇒ 00:23:46.249 scott walker: these 14 things. They’ll say, find me a snowflake consultancy, we want one. Find me a ServiceNow consultancy. And so, from a buyer standpoint, it gives them a very,

203 00:23:46.610 ⇒ 00:23:51.189 scott walker: It makes it easy for them to picture what you’re going to bring to the table for them, and it’s usually.

204 00:23:51.190 ⇒ 00:23:51.639 Uttam Kumaran: Thank you for joining me.

205 00:23:51.640 ⇒ 00:23:53.720 scott walker: gap they have.

206 00:23:53.720 ⇒ 00:23:54.260 Uttam Kumaran: Makes sense.

207 00:23:54.260 ⇒ 00:23:59.530 scott walker: From an exit standpoint, it helps a lot, too, to have a, you know, partnership in a hot area.

208 00:23:59.920 ⇒ 00:24:02.250 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, I feel like as we get into…

209 00:24:02.420 ⇒ 00:24:13.209 Uttam Kumaran: larger companies, and, like, we’re starting to do that, we can totally narrow. I feel like right now, we have a broad set of partners, mainly just to get as much sales in the door as possible.

210 00:24:13.210 ⇒ 00:24:14.109 scott walker: Yeah, yeah.

211 00:24:14.110 ⇒ 00:24:17.859 Uttam Kumaran: And we’ve played really well with a lot of other companies that are, like.

212 00:24:18.240 ⇒ 00:24:32.339 Uttam Kumaran: growing startups, but, like, are… have raised a lot of money in, like, BI or different AI platforms that, like, want… they don’t have great SI partners like us that not only can implement their tool, but are also good at marketing and talking about it in a solution and, like.

213 00:24:32.340 ⇒ 00:24:32.710 scott walker: Yeah.

214 00:24:32.710 ⇒ 00:24:43.409 Uttam Kumaran: So that’s where… but I feel like we’re getting close to, like, we can totally re-engage with a snowflake, and I think, again, that to make a decision on a hyperscaler and, like, focus just on that, those are all, I think, probably upcoming

215 00:24:43.610 ⇒ 00:24:47.350 Uttam Kumaran: Decisions we’ll have to make, yeah, you know.

216 00:24:47.350 ⇒ 00:24:51.629 scott walker: But for a company your size to even have a toe in those is… is… is.

217 00:24:51.630 ⇒ 00:25:03.979 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, and that’s mainly just because, like, time… like, I’ve just been in data, and so I’ve had other companies where I was leading, sort of, our engagement with Snowflake, and I just… the data world is very small, so, like.

218 00:25:04.180 ⇒ 00:25:13.570 Uttam Kumaran: people that used to be at Snowflake are now at other companies, and everybody kind of knows each other, and all those people who I was working with in 2020, 2018 are now, like.

219 00:25:13.760 ⇒ 00:25:22.139 Uttam Kumaran: super high up, but, like, we bought from them before, so… I feel like we have… we can knock on those doors, like, when we need it, so I’m just, like, waiting.

220 00:25:22.170 ⇒ 00:25:38.849 Uttam Kumaran: like, on what… because, of course, what do those guys want? They’re like, bring me the deal, you know, or like… So, and they’re a lot less, like, some of the other partners we have, like, they’ll take phone calls with me, even if there’s, like, not much money on the line. Yeah. So I know that for those bigger folks, like…

221 00:25:39.030 ⇒ 00:25:41.360 Uttam Kumaran: They won’t talk unless there’s, like, a pretty big annual deal.

222 00:25:41.360 ⇒ 00:25:45.830 scott walker: Yeah, whatever their market or industry. They want enterprise clients, enterprise deals, yeah.

223 00:25:45.830 ⇒ 00:25:47.330 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, yeah.

224 00:25:47.330 ⇒ 00:25:50.900 scott walker: And then, so what, what, what,

225 00:25:51.510 ⇒ 00:25:53.490 scott walker: What kind of bill rates are you getting now?

226 00:25:54.880 ⇒ 00:25:57.719 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, maybe, Robert, if you want to go ahead, I can share a.

227 00:25:57.720 ⇒ 00:26:14.849 Robert Tseng: Yeah, yeah, so I guess, like, we… hourly, we’re, like, we’re billing 250. I mean, I would say, like, across our portfolio, it’s $150to$250. It kind of goes down when we have, like, either legacy contracts that we haven’t bumped up yet, or, like, longer, you know…

228 00:26:14.850 ⇒ 00:26:19.850 Robert Tseng: I guess just, like, bigger, bigger projects where… where we’ve built many more hours.

229 00:26:20.870 ⇒ 00:26:44.930 Robert Tseng: Yeah, I guess, like, our billing play has been… typically, we have… we have fixed discovery… we have fixed price discovery scopes that are typically $5to$10K, to start, and that kind of gets us an answer and a… and a roadmap within two, two weeks on, like, how we want to continue to move forward, or to just run away from that client. Yeah. Yeah, and I think we’ve… we’ve recently, as in the

230 00:26:44.930 ⇒ 00:26:58.639 Robert Tseng: this quarter, we’ve been… we’ve been selling into our next tier directly with Skipping the Discovery. It’s been a longer process. A lot of it is, like, having the partners that have made the warm intro that allows us to skip the discovery, and we can just…

231 00:26:58.730 ⇒ 00:27:15.520 Robert Tseng: we kind of spend more time, and we’re kind of in that 15K to $25K a month range. That’s, like, a 3-month contract. So, yeah, I guess that’s somewhere between 50 and 100K total contract value. Yeah, and then, like, I guess we’ve… we’ve also, yeah, and, like, I guess our…

232 00:27:15.620 ⇒ 00:27:22.350 Robert Tseng: After that, it’s kind of just, like, on us to keep the relationship going, and we do have a couple clients we’ve worked with for over a year, almost.

233 00:27:22.350 ⇒ 00:27:26.990 scott walker: Okay, I was gonna ask, how sticky are you in staying in a client?

234 00:27:26.990 ⇒ 00:27:45.040 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, I would say, like, our business is only a couple years old, two years or so, but most of our clients will now eclipse a year, and I think, like, the AI piece after the data, and like, this is, again, just because we haven’t had a lot of clients get to that point where we worked for them for so long that

235 00:27:45.130 ⇒ 00:27:59.500 Uttam Kumaran: one of our clients that we… they have a very mature data stack now, and, like, they have everything, and so what is the opportunity next? We’re pitching them on is continuing to do a lot of analysis, but is now AI on top of a lot of that data. But those are, like, sort of,

236 00:27:59.580 ⇒ 00:28:16.710 Uttam Kumaran: like, scope or, like, delivery conversations that, like, we’ve only recently been able to have with some of these more mature clients, but I guess it shows that, yeah, I think our work is pretty sticky. Like, data… you can support the entire business, and many companies are still today, like, very under…

237 00:28:16.710 ⇒ 00:28:27.019 Uttam Kumaran: driven by data. Like, I think everybody’s familiar, at least with, like, setting KPIs and OKRs, but they’re, for the most part, a lot of our clients are still doing that in Google Sheet, and they’re running

238 00:28:27.230 ⇒ 00:28:29.460 Uttam Kumaran: pretty big businesses.

239 00:28:29.460 ⇒ 00:28:29.990 scott walker: Yeah.

240 00:28:30.240 ⇒ 00:28:36.799 Uttam Kumaran: And so, like, I don’t… I think the AI piece just pulled a lot of the demand forward for the data work, but…

241 00:28:37.130 ⇒ 00:28:37.470 scott walker: Yeah.

242 00:28:37.470 ⇒ 00:28:42.450 Uttam Kumaran: I think… I would say our stuff is… is pretty sticky, like, I don’t… yeah.

243 00:28:42.460 ⇒ 00:28:50.880 scott walker: And you guys’ personal backgrounds, like, if you start breaking into, you know, what I would call an enterprise customer, you know, like a…

244 00:28:51.740 ⇒ 00:28:58.360 scott walker: I don’t know, Fortune, couple thousand. Are you comfortable delivering those scale projects, or…

245 00:28:59.480 ⇒ 00:29:04.839 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, I mean, I think it’s sort of gonna depend on, like, the scope.

246 00:29:04.840 ⇒ 00:29:05.280 Robert Tseng: Yeah.

247 00:29:05.280 ⇒ 00:29:06.710 Uttam Kumaran: I, I would say…

248 00:29:07.180 ⇒ 00:29:14.400 Uttam Kumaran: I have, I mean, I don’t think there’s a scope in data that we’ve been nervous about, like, at all. I think, for the most part.

249 00:29:14.400 ⇒ 00:29:15.639 Robert Tseng: Nothing so far that we’ve run into.

250 00:29:15.640 ⇒ 00:29:17.019 Uttam Kumaran: This is all work that we’ve done.

251 00:29:17.020 ⇒ 00:29:17.480 Robert Tseng: out of it.

252 00:29:17.480 ⇒ 00:29:20.130 Uttam Kumaran: this… yeah, this is all work that I’ve done, like.

253 00:29:20.680 ⇒ 00:29:23.200 Uttam Kumaran: like, 7, 8 years ago, it’s the same stuff over and

254 00:29:23.320 ⇒ 00:29:41.859 Uttam Kumaran: So I think… I’m actually, like, welcoming that challenge, because then we can get… and most of that, again, is actually… the work and data that’s really hard is, like, data engineering, data modeling, like, so that work is actually very high billable and slower. So I actually want there to be, like, big… I want to go after bigger migrations.

255 00:29:41.860 ⇒ 00:29:44.179 scott walker: Bigger platform establishments.

256 00:29:44.180 ⇒ 00:29:52.350 Uttam Kumaran: Of which we’re now talking to a couple. And, like, that’s actually… I would love to play in there, because that work is slower and more predictable than, like.

257 00:29:52.490 ⇒ 00:29:56.010 Uttam Kumaran: 5 to 10K for, like, some small product analytics stuff.

258 00:29:56.230 ⇒ 00:29:57.140 scott walker: Yeah.

259 00:29:57.140 ⇒ 00:30:12.850 Uttam Kumaran: that’s… that’s gone, that’s the money to get to this point, but I actually… those deals also have a longer 10-year length, a lot more commitment, but again, it’s still built on the back of, like, you need to establish Snowflake, you need to establish DBT, establish a BI tool, like.

260 00:30:12.980 ⇒ 00:30:16.149 Uttam Kumaran: Those we could totally eat up of no problem, and, like.

261 00:30:16.540 ⇒ 00:30:26.710 Uttam Kumaran: it’s also just gotten easier to do a lot of data engineering work, so yeah, I don’t have any worry over that. I feel like we haven’t been asked to do anything too crazy.

262 00:30:26.910 ⇒ 00:30:28.320 scott walker: Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Cool.

263 00:30:28.320 ⇒ 00:30:37.730 Robert Tseng: Sorry, Scott, I’m gonna let you keep talking to Uten, but I’m gonna jump off. I’ve been trying to… there’s a sales call that I rescheduled a couple times, so I’m just gonna go and take that. Alright.

264 00:30:38.130 ⇒ 00:30:39.470 scott walker: No problem, nice to meet you.

265 00:30:39.470 ⇒ 00:30:40.260 Robert Tseng: Nice to meet you.

266 00:30:40.650 ⇒ 00:30:41.339 Uttam Kumaran: Thanks, Rob.

267 00:30:44.330 ⇒ 00:30:50.649 Uttam Kumaran: It’s just a… this has been a crazy month, by the way, like, we thought a lot of sales was about to slow down.

268 00:30:51.290 ⇒ 00:30:54.949 Uttam Kumaran: And they have done, like, nothing but that. I think in the last 3 weeks.

269 00:30:55.060 ⇒ 00:31:02.760 Uttam Kumaran: I’ve just gone inundated with, like, hey, so-and-so, or we’re looking for a consultancy, and, like, so things are doing well. I feel like…

270 00:31:03.040 ⇒ 00:31:08.839 Uttam Kumaran: I don’t know what it is. I mean, we just have a lot of great wins in CPG and e-commerce.

271 00:31:08.840 ⇒ 00:31:10.489 scott walker: That, I feel like…

272 00:31:10.610 ⇒ 00:31:23.740 Uttam Kumaran: we’re just making the rounds in that industry, especially in, like, companies that are… most of the companies we work for are, like, between $20to$50 million in annual revenue. So it’s, like, a unique situation where they need, like, a…

273 00:31:23.900 ⇒ 00:31:31.250 Uttam Kumaran: sort of fractional data team to come, like, basically build the foundations. And yeah, even this week, I think we’re…

274 00:31:31.920 ⇒ 00:31:36.260 Uttam Kumaran: I mean, we’re… we just are getting a lot of inbound that we’re surprised to. I mean, this is now…

275 00:31:36.650 ⇒ 00:31:41.719 Uttam Kumaran: Why it becomes more important for us, because both of us are still leading most engagements, like.

276 00:31:41.720 ⇒ 00:31:42.630 scott walker: Yeah, yeah.

277 00:31:42.630 ⇒ 00:31:48.840 Uttam Kumaran: And then what we do is we both start it off, and then we sort of kind of fill it in with more folks on the team, but…

278 00:31:48.840 ⇒ 00:31:49.490 scott walker: Yep.

279 00:31:49.490 ⇒ 00:31:51.670 Uttam Kumaran: Not… not sustainable.

280 00:31:51.670 ⇒ 00:31:53.160 scott walker: Yeah, yeah, so…

281 00:31:53.160 ⇒ 00:31:57.730 Uttam Kumaran: It’s gonna be a brutal holiday week quarter for us, you know?

282 00:31:57.730 ⇒ 00:31:58.380 scott walker: Yep.

283 00:32:00.080 ⇒ 00:32:10.279 scott walker: Yeah, interesting, and I think on the broader market, a couple of the companies I just talk to all the time, saw the middle of the year things slow down like crazy, and they think.

284 00:32:10.280 ⇒ 00:32:10.920 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.

285 00:32:10.920 ⇒ 00:32:30.379 scott walker: And no one knows… no, they all… everyone… but they’re… the general thing they think, but based on no facts, is that, you know, the whole change of presidency and all… all the turmoil caused a lot of people to, you know, a combination of the presidency and,

286 00:32:30.380 ⇒ 00:32:35.599 scott walker: you know, everyone’s starting to think, well, maybe AI is going to transform my business overnight, made everyone.

287 00:32:35.600 ⇒ 00:32:36.089 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, yeah.

288 00:32:36.090 ⇒ 00:32:49.680 scott walker: make decisions, and so a lot of people had, like, bad sales in Q2 and Q3, or at least not the sales they were hoping for, and then they’ve been seeing a flood now, too, which is interesting, and it’s just a bunch of people that

289 00:32:49.860 ⇒ 00:32:55.270 scott walker: They weren’t losing deals, they just… deals weren’t happening, and then they said, now all.

290 00:32:55.270 ⇒ 00:32:55.680 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.

291 00:32:55.680 ⇒ 00:32:59.830 scott walker: are closed, like, people are like, screw it, we’re gonna go ahead and make decisions, and…

292 00:32:59.830 ⇒ 00:33:04.379 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, and we play in, like, kind of e-commerce and in, like, B2B SaaS, so we’re not.

293 00:33:04.380 ⇒ 00:33:04.840 scott walker: I’m like.

294 00:33:04.840 ⇒ 00:33:23.410 Uttam Kumaran: in e-comm, like, when tariffs hit, for a lot of people, that was, like, a huge shock, but now it’s sort of getting… a lot of that is getting resolved. Similarly, like, a few years ago, it was when there was all this supply chain issues with shipping and stuff like that, so if you’re concentrating e-com, it can be really difficult for that, because they’re very price sensitive.

295 00:33:23.980 ⇒ 00:33:24.510 scott walker: Awesome.

296 00:33:24.510 ⇒ 00:33:28.529 Uttam Kumaran: in… in B2B SaaS, I feel like it’s… it’s just growing.

297 00:33:28.650 ⇒ 00:33:29.779 scott walker: Yeah. What happened?

298 00:33:30.370 ⇒ 00:33:31.810 Robert Tseng: It’s actually tomorrow.

299 00:33:32.110 ⇒ 00:33:33.269 Uttam Kumaran: I just…

300 00:33:33.850 ⇒ 00:33:36.300 Robert Tseng: I dislike. Yeah, my bad.

301 00:33:41.240 ⇒ 00:33:52.589 scott walker: Awesome. So this gives me a good sense. I mean, I think this is sort of a two-way interview thing, I think, too, just to see if, you know, I think you’re trying to see… find someone who’s a good match. Are there any… any questions you want to ask of me, or…

302 00:33:55.520 ⇒ 00:33:58.310 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, I… Yeah, go ahead, Robert, yeah, you go first.

303 00:33:58.310 ⇒ 00:34:12.410 Robert Tseng: Okay, yeah, yeah, I was just gonna say, I mean, yeah, thanks for sharing kind of, like, yeah, kind of how this… how you work with other companies before. I’d like to kind of just better understand, at least for our stage, maybe just hearing about some of the challenges that we’re going through,

304 00:34:12.520 ⇒ 00:34:31.209 Robert Tseng: I guess, like, I hear you kind of, like, nudging us to think about enterprise and kind of investing in that market motion. You seem, like, very opinionated on channel partnerships. I wonder if there’s, like, a particular, like, domain that we should kind of work with? I mean, it seems like you’ve obviously seen everything under the sun, but, like,

305 00:34:31.210 ⇒ 00:34:40.979 Robert Tseng: yeah, I guess for us to, like, focus… focus our time with you, like, our… is there, like, some… is there an area that you… that you, you know, prefer to work with?

306 00:34:41.190 ⇒ 00:34:50.299 Robert Tseng: with, with founders, like, maybe you don’t understand, like, or you’re not… you’re not gonna be, like, our technical advisor and, like, kind of helping to be our innovation consultant or whatever.

307 00:34:50.300 ⇒ 00:34:57.479 scott walker: Yeah. Okay, I see what you’re saying, yeah. Yeah. That’s a good question. Yeah, so, so, so, like…

308 00:34:57.820 ⇒ 00:35:00.880 scott walker: I definitely…

309 00:35:02.020 ⇒ 00:35:13.999 scott walker: I’m a… I definitely have a broad business background, is what I feel like my bigger strength is, and so having run companies, and I feel like my strength is I learned every piece of the company.

310 00:35:14.050 ⇒ 00:35:32.180 scott walker: And then, you know, would hire people to do the work, but was, you know, I made sure I understood them enough, so I’m good on finance, you know, sales and marketing, I’m good on operations, I’m very strong. The tech side, weirdly enough, despite being an engineer, I’ve been away from it long enough.

311 00:35:32.180 ⇒ 00:35:49.570 scott walker: to know that I… I don’t understand it deeply anymore. I mean, I understand, you know, I know Agile from Waterfall, and I know, you know, the basics of data and the basics of AI, and my first company was actually an AI company a long, long time ago, when it would… and,

312 00:35:49.570 ⇒ 00:35:55.039 scott walker: So, I understand the business concepts around all the tech, but when you get down into the…

313 00:35:55.330 ⇒ 00:36:01.879 scott walker: To your point, the innovation, or if you’re trying to decide, you know, what offerings

314 00:36:02.120 ⇒ 00:36:07.919 scott walker: Should we be making, specifically within… in the data space to open a door?

315 00:36:08.120 ⇒ 00:36:14.180 scott walker: I’m not that person. That’s gonna be someone who’s much deeper in the technology for me. What I am…

316 00:36:14.180 ⇒ 00:36:16.149 scott walker: Good at is being able to say.

317 00:36:16.150 ⇒ 00:36:38.600 scott walker: Yeah, so if you’re looking for technical help, I’m the wrong guy. I can understand what you’re telling me, but I’m not deep enough into it. I’m more the kind of person who’ll be riding you on the tech side to say, what is opening doors? What are people buying? Yeah. What are the channel partners that are actually helping you get leads versus, you know, and what offerings are they interested in? And that’s the kind of thing

318 00:36:38.800 ⇒ 00:36:42.679 scott walker: I would be pounding you on. I wouldn’t be able to say, well, why aren’t you…

319 00:36:43.120 ⇒ 00:36:55.740 scott walker: you know, doing this specific package, or why aren’t you doing this, that, or that? That’s something I would expect you guys to have. I think on most of the other areas, I can, you know.

320 00:36:55.960 ⇒ 00:37:00.650 scott walker: I’m comfortable. I’m probably not,

321 00:37:01.970 ⇒ 00:37:10.569 scott walker: Another place that I’ve realized, working with the Vixel guys, where I’m probably weak, is… is, like, digital lead gen.

322 00:37:12.070 ⇒ 00:37:31.070 scott walker: And so I, like, because most of the companies… and it’s funny that most of the companies I still work with still get a lot of their leads the old-fashioned way. They network through channel partners, they network with people they know in the industry, and especially if you’re going after enterprise accounts or bigger accounts.

323 00:37:31.070 ⇒ 00:37:37.570 scott walker: you know, if you’re… if you’re working… if you’re trying to work with well-funded startups, you network with the PE world, and so it’s…

324 00:37:37.660 ⇒ 00:37:48.149 scott walker: it’s more what are the offerings, what are the networks and channels we’re going to use to get to those offerings. That’s where I’ve seen a lot of success, the sort of,

325 00:37:48.270 ⇒ 00:37:55.420 scott walker: you know, coming up with a big… you know, I understand that digital marketing is, like, once you’ve built your database, you know, continuously.

326 00:37:55.420 ⇒ 00:38:11.310 scott walker: communicating with and showing what you do to the people on your list, but that’s sort of, you know, Google Ads and all that stuff for services. I just… I’m not even sure how well it works, but if you feel that is a strong channel for you.

327 00:38:11.310 ⇒ 00:38:17.190 scott walker: you know, I’m not gonna… it’s like, you figure that out, because I’ve not seen it work great.

328 00:38:17.660 ⇒ 00:38:26.729 scott walker: for companies to get to an enterprise level. It works great. Like, one of the companies I worked with, they get a lot of their work through Upwork.

329 00:38:27.050 ⇒ 00:38:40.699 scott walker: But they’re doing, you know, $65,$85 an hour work, they’re grinding through proposals, it’s just a numbers game, and I’m like, you know, if that works for you, great.

330 00:38:41.030 ⇒ 00:38:53.839 scott walker: you know, I’m not… you know, I’m not all that interested in it, but yeah. So that’s probably, you know, when I think about things with the Vixel, where I’ve had some frustrations, not frustrations where maybe people have been frustrated with me.

331 00:38:53.890 ⇒ 00:39:07.859 scott walker: That piece, you know, is just… I’m not as strong in, but I know you can, you know, if you… honestly, almost… I feel like almost every company I talk to through Vixel that goes down that path.

332 00:39:09.120 ⇒ 00:39:12.749 scott walker: And depends on that path, you know, hits a limit pretty quickly.

333 00:39:14.160 ⇒ 00:39:17.329 scott walker: And I’m trying to think of other areas, but that’s…

334 00:39:17.650 ⇒ 00:39:27.250 scott walker: you know, I feel most… I feel comfortable with the rest of it. I mean, I feel like I’ve done most of it a couple times. You know, definitely on the operations, definitely on.

335 00:39:27.250 ⇒ 00:39:31.029 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, I feel like that’s… that’s pro… for me, the biggest things I think about

336 00:39:31.370 ⇒ 00:39:34.349 Uttam Kumaran: is, like, how do we get into enterprise?

337 00:39:34.490 ⇒ 00:39:39.029 Uttam Kumaran: And, like, really start working on that, and, like.

338 00:39:39.500 ⇒ 00:39:43.360 Uttam Kumaran: looking through our Rolodex, finding out, I know the sales cycles are very long, but just…

339 00:39:43.610 ⇒ 00:39:45.820 Uttam Kumaran: Brake, really going for that.

340 00:39:45.820 ⇒ 00:39:49.570 scott walker: Second, I think, is purely operations. Like, I…

341 00:39:49.570 ⇒ 00:39:55.409 Uttam Kumaran: I feel like how we structure the internal business, how we structure KPIs, how we recruit.

342 00:39:55.590 ⇒ 00:39:58.240 Uttam Kumaran: The best folks for what we need.

343 00:39:58.380 ⇒ 00:40:00.909 scott walker: I… I feel pretty comfortable…

344 00:40:01.060 ⇒ 00:40:03.979 Uttam Kumaran: On the technical offer generation.

345 00:40:03.990 ⇒ 00:40:23.660 Uttam Kumaran: And, like, coming up with… with the… actually, like, what we’re doing. I think most of it, I think, for us is, like, how do we crack into the next phase? And, you know, a lot of our business has started, sort of, in that world where we’re, like, yeah, through Upwork or whatever, but for us, it’s quickly moving away from that.

346 00:40:23.690 ⇒ 00:40:37.250 Uttam Kumaran: And I think overall, like, we’re trying to listen to Vixel a lot, and saying, like, okay, we should depend on doing things like events and partnerships and things like that, versus cold has never really worked tremendously for us, and I…

347 00:40:37.260 ⇒ 00:40:46.669 Uttam Kumaran: I think it may be something that, like, we continue to do as, like, more awareness, but certainly not depending on that, and not… we’re not at all trying to compete at the low end.

348 00:40:46.720 ⇒ 00:41:00.649 Uttam Kumaran: I think we’re very, extremely interested in building, like, these long-term relationships with these technical leaders or operators, and them bringing us in and really driving towards, like, a outcome change.

349 00:41:00.650 ⇒ 00:41:03.960 scott walker: Versus, like, we haven’t gone after anything where it’s, like.

350 00:41:03.960 ⇒ 00:41:18.429 Uttam Kumaran: give us 10 people here, like, dev shop mentality. It’s all been core partnerships with the operating crew in those companies, whether that’s the C-suite or kind of directly below. It’s all the stuff that we’ve been going after, and then also.

351 00:41:18.430 ⇒ 00:41:24.400 Uttam Kumaran: I think one piece that’s always coming up that we’re starting to think about is, like, driving away from, like, the billable hour.

352 00:41:24.570 ⇒ 00:41:44.300 Uttam Kumaran: I think at Enterprise, like, I don’t… I feel like maybe that seems to be still the case, but I feel like we’ve able to actually achieve pretty good margin on projects when we’ve, scoped things more on, like, a monthly fixed amount, and we’re handling a couple work streams. So I feel like there is some interesting things for us to do there and think about.

353 00:41:44.730 ⇒ 00:41:51.659 Uttam Kumaran: Given, like, AI is making… we’re able just to move so fast, and so I’m trying to think of ways for us to…

354 00:41:52.300 ⇒ 00:41:53.939 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, and I think.

355 00:41:53.940 ⇒ 00:41:54.760 scott walker: for that.

356 00:41:54.760 ⇒ 00:41:55.230 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.

357 00:41:55.230 ⇒ 00:42:12.420 scott walker: container-based, or the fixed monthly, or those kinds of things, that’s what everyone… you know, that… if you can sell that, then that’s the place to be for both easier to manage your business. And once again, when people… you know, and I guess I’m assuming, you know, at some point, you… you… you’re looking at an exit?

358 00:42:12.760 ⇒ 00:42:18.749 scott walker: And, you know, recurring revenue of any kind is a driver of valuation.

359 00:42:18.750 ⇒ 00:42:19.510 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.

360 00:42:19.510 ⇒ 00:42:22.849 scott walker: So, I think that sort of stuff is important. I think.

361 00:42:22.850 ⇒ 00:42:26.039 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, so for me, like, my whole background is in a lot of, like.

362 00:42:26.220 ⇒ 00:42:29.060 Uttam Kumaran: B2B SaaS, or B2C SaaS, so…

363 00:42:29.370 ⇒ 00:42:36.489 Uttam Kumaran: It’s like, for sure, and I… I think we’ve done a good job, and, like, most of our portfolio is on these, like, fixed monthly contracts.

364 00:42:36.490 ⇒ 00:42:36.880 scott walker: Yeah.

365 00:42:36.880 ⇒ 00:42:51.119 Uttam Kumaran: and then for our job is to deliver the outcome, and I think we’re now… everybody is using AI, we’re able to move really fast, and, like, that is something that we’re trying to continue to push. I don’t know, at the enterprise level, everybody we’ve been going after still really is

366 00:42:51.280 ⇒ 00:42:56.960 Uttam Kumaran: thinking in times and materials, but maybe at some point we have the leverage to push them a different way, I don’t know.

367 00:42:57.240 ⇒ 00:43:04.250 scott walker: Yeah, and I think that’s… I think that’s… I’ve… you know, once again, it’s sort of that thing where it’s transitioning, and.

368 00:43:04.250 ⇒ 00:43:04.570 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.

369 00:43:04.570 ⇒ 00:43:19.430 scott walker: I’d say a lot of them are used to the average, what’s your billable rate, and how many hours is it going to take, and but I think… I think more and more people are opening up to the idea of, you know, give me a team of people, and it’s not a team that’s just a body shop, it’s a team that’s, you know.

370 00:43:19.430 ⇒ 00:43:20.750 Uttam Kumaran: It’s a real team, yeah, yeah.

371 00:43:20.750 ⇒ 00:43:27.340 scott walker: a real team that’s working through and delivering on a monthly basis, and I think, you know, you see more and more people buying pods.

372 00:43:27.460 ⇒ 00:43:31.990 scott walker: And that kind of stuff, so it’s at the enterprise level. But it’s just everything there is.

373 00:43:31.990 ⇒ 00:43:32.350 Uttam Kumaran: Interesting.

374 00:43:32.350 ⇒ 00:43:49.799 scott walker: It’s like… it’s like when you talk about Agile, you know, a company, like an enterprise company that’s very comfortable with Agile, is comfortable buying pods. A lot of companies, shockingly, are still not very agile, and… and you gotta sell them a waterfall and agile, hide the Agile behind it all, because…

375 00:43:49.810 ⇒ 00:43:57.909 scott walker: you know, whatever. So, you know, there’s flexibility involved, but I think that’s… I think you’re thinking about it the right way. I think the one other thing that

376 00:43:58.080 ⇒ 00:44:03.749 scott walker: I’ve, I, you know, I’m just sort of in philosophy, whether it’s in, you know, good or bad,

377 00:44:03.920 ⇒ 00:44:10.690 scott walker: and I… you know, as an engineer, when I first got involved in startups, I… I paid no attention to culture.

378 00:44:11.030 ⇒ 00:44:30.180 scott walker: Of a… of a company, and I… and then by the, you know, after a couple years, I became a fanatic of a company, have to have a culture, and that culture just drives so many good outcomes, and it’s very tough to build a strong culture with all contractors, so… Yeah. You know, I think…

379 00:44:30.180 ⇒ 00:44:34.990 scott walker: I think you can only scale so far. I mean, I understand the reason… there’s so many good reasons for doing it.

380 00:44:34.990 ⇒ 00:44:40.989 Uttam Kumaran: No, and also, we move… most of our people are, like, full… like, they’re, like, getting fixed monthly contracts, and so…

381 00:44:40.990 ⇒ 00:44:41.410 scott walker: Yep.

382 00:44:41.410 ⇒ 00:44:58.039 Uttam Kumaran: they’re all… a lot of the folks… we actually moved from this model of, like, having all these part-time folks, because we just got jammed, because nobody cared about us, to now, we’re moving towards… actually, most of the people are part-time on a path towards having 40 hours of work, or a lot of the folks on the team are 40… of course, like.

383 00:44:58.210 ⇒ 00:45:10.739 Uttam Kumaran: they have the freedom to go do other stuff, but actually, I think all of the folks that we’re working with now, for the most part, are very committed to the company. But that was, like, a change we made from just, like, having a bunch of, like.

384 00:45:10.740 ⇒ 00:45:11.930 scott walker: Yeah, yeah.

385 00:45:11.930 ⇒ 00:45:18.829 Uttam Kumaran: I don’t know, but it was a very meaningful change, and I think our crew right now is, like, really, really solid.

386 00:45:19.080 ⇒ 00:45:23.380 Uttam Kumaran: we are trying to spend as much time on investing in the bread. Again, like.

387 00:45:23.520 ⇒ 00:45:34.759 Uttam Kumaran: it’s sort of understanding, like, what are the highest leverage activities or things we could do to promote that. Because, of course, as you know, like, we’re just even just trying to just, like, keep pushing on everything else.

388 00:45:34.760 ⇒ 00:45:36.050 scott walker: And so I’m sure…

389 00:45:36.050 ⇒ 00:45:41.460 Uttam Kumaran: I’m sure, like, It’s something that can fall by the wayside, you know, for sure.

390 00:45:41.460 ⇒ 00:45:49.120 scott walker: Yeah, yeah, and the bigger you get, the more important… the more important it gets, and so it’s hard to,

391 00:45:49.320 ⇒ 00:45:51.560 scott walker: It’s hard to change along the way.

392 00:45:51.760 ⇒ 00:46:04.680 scott walker: So, you know, even if you’re not spending a ton of time on it, kind of being aware of what it is and what you want it to be, and making sure your communication and the things you do on a daily basis tie back to that.

393 00:46:04.960 ⇒ 00:46:11.180 scott walker: Makes it easier to put in something strong down the road, because you’re already on that road.

394 00:46:11.830 ⇒ 00:46:24.280 scott walker: And I… I don’t know, it’s just… it’s one of those things where I would just strongly, strongly suggest not underestimating it, because if… at a certain size, that’s one of those places that breaks.

395 00:46:24.280 ⇒ 00:46:24.960 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.

396 00:46:25.330 ⇒ 00:46:30.259 scott walker: Yeah. So… so yeah, I don’t know, that was a long rambling…

397 00:46:30.290 ⇒ 00:46:36.469 Uttam Kumaran: discussion to answer your question, but… No, very helpful. Any other questions?

398 00:46:38.530 ⇒ 00:46:39.979 Uttam Kumaran: Anything else, Robert?

399 00:46:39.980 ⇒ 00:46:42.039 scott walker: Or thought in general?

400 00:46:42.040 ⇒ 00:46:53.760 Robert Tseng: Yeah, I guess, like, you know, we alluded to these kind of, like, step functions. I mean, I know you don’t know too much about our business, so we’ve, you know, just the first time we met, but I’m curious, like, I don’t know if you have

401 00:46:54.530 ⇒ 00:47:04.899 Robert Tseng: you know, what your… what your takes are on, like, you know, knowing what you know about us? Like, what are some of the hard decisions that you feel like we’re gonna have… we’re gonna run up against? .

402 00:47:05.590 ⇒ 00:47:06.540 scott walker: I… Yeah.

403 00:47:06.890 ⇒ 00:47:24.939 scott walker: Yeah, I mean, I think we’ve been talking about one, talking around it some, but it’s… it’s, you know, focusing, you know, on bigger… figuring out how to focus on bigger clients along the way. Okay. And it’s just… and part of it is a math problem. You know, if you’re a $10million\dots ifyouwanttobea$10 million company, and you’re doing…

404 00:47:24.950 ⇒ 00:47:28.589 scott walker: You know, $100,000 projects, or a series of

405 00:47:28.590 ⇒ 00:47:45.430 scott walker: projects that are $100,000, that’s a lot of clients to generate, you know, so you gotta have some half million dollar clients mixed in there to get to 10 million. And so… so if, like, in my mind, where you guys are, my next target’s that, like, 8 to 10 million range, and how do you get to that? And so starting to think about

406 00:47:46.230 ⇒ 00:47:49.099 scott walker: You know, and the math problem is how many clients

407 00:47:49.270 ⇒ 00:47:55.890 scott walker: can you really run and have that, and what chunks of work do you have to sell to get it? And so, I think that’s…

408 00:47:56.480 ⇒ 00:48:01.990 scott walker: That’s a… that’s a… a thing. I do think…

409 00:48:03.250 ⇒ 00:48:09.050 scott walker: You know, you’re gonna need some lieutenants you can trust as you… as you scale, and…

410 00:48:09.290 ⇒ 00:48:20.969 scott walker: can those be contractors or not? I’m kind of biased that they can’t, because I… I’m… I like having a lot of loyalty in my senior team. It makes my… you know, you talk about handing things, I think…

411 00:48:21.050 ⇒ 00:48:38.350 scott walker: Udom, you said it, about handing things off. Yeah. I just… I wouldn’t be comfortable handing off things the same way to a contractor that I would to an employee who’s in it for the long run. And I think the size you are, and the way you’re growing, and the way you’re selling, you’re gonna need to have…

412 00:48:38.760 ⇒ 00:48:52.190 scott walker: You know, so you guys can focus on some, you know, not being every client, and it’s the classic thing, it’s like, you guys are probably both billing some hours, or maybe even a lot of hours, and, you know, how do you get to the point where you guys are maybe

413 00:48:52.320 ⇒ 00:48:56.009 scott walker: Not billing as many hours, and have other people

414 00:48:56.160 ⇒ 00:48:58.290 scott walker: Kind of running pieces of the business for you.

415 00:48:58.290 ⇒ 00:48:58.690 Uttam Kumaran: Totally.

416 00:48:58.690 ⇒ 00:49:03.249 scott walker: And those people are employees, and that can get scary because you’re not,

417 00:49:03.590 ⇒ 00:49:12.850 scott walker: you know, now you have a commitment. And and, you know, I don’t know if you guys even, you know, if you have benefits, or…

418 00:49:12.850 ⇒ 00:49:24.489 scott walker: you know, since it’s all contractors, if you have all that overhead and crap, that’s kind of painful. It’s not as painful as it used to be, because there’s all sorts of third-party providers that’ll do all that and make it completely painless, basically, but it’s costly.

419 00:49:24.490 ⇒ 00:49:27.719 scott walker: Yeah. But you, you know, if you don’t have that.

420 00:49:27.820 ⇒ 00:49:33.879 scott walker: stuff, you’re gonna need to start having that stuff in order to get people to come on board as employees, and…

421 00:49:34.070 ⇒ 00:49:39.459 scott walker: And I think that’s… that’s gonna be an important thing for you to do to get next stage, because it just…

422 00:49:40.250 ⇒ 00:49:44.589 scott walker: You know, you gotta start finding those people you can rely on, and honestly, you’re gonna make some…

423 00:49:44.880 ⇒ 00:49:52.490 scott walker: you’re not going to get them all right. And so… Yeah. It’s starting to go through that process, because it’s…

424 00:49:52.490 ⇒ 00:50:00.370 Uttam Kumaran: I think the lieutenant problem is, like, yeah, probably… it’s exactly what we’re talking about this week. I think probably what’s… our conversation is, like.

425 00:50:00.520 ⇒ 00:50:06.070 Uttam Kumaran: what’s the priority? Like, kind of stack ranking who we need by, like.

426 00:50:06.310 ⇒ 00:50:10.140 Uttam Kumaran: Priority, like, revenue opportunity, and, like.

427 00:50:10.330 ⇒ 00:50:12.440 Uttam Kumaran: The risk of that hire, basically, and then…

428 00:50:12.440 ⇒ 00:50:12.880 scott walker: Yeah.

429 00:50:12.880 ⇒ 00:50:29.409 Uttam Kumaran: thinking through. So, for example, if, like, hey, you guys need just someone to own ops, it’s… they’re cheap, and it’s, low risk, higher, okay, like, maybe we should go after that first, right? And, like, recruit the best… and, like, again, this is, like, sort of where I think we can only sort of, like.

430 00:50:29.520 ⇒ 00:50:45.440 Uttam Kumaran: put a certain amount of hours a week towards, like, recruiting that best person, and so, for me, I think the biggest question is, like, who do we go after for… or should we go after someone that’s more on the delivery side to, like, run delivery? And that… because that… that frees us up. I think I’m just curious to hear, like.

431 00:50:46.120 ⇒ 00:50:53.090 Uttam Kumaran: If there was… if there was a couple that are, like, the real pivotal ones that are staged, and we can just put the rest off to a side.

432 00:50:53.320 ⇒ 00:50:54.949 Uttam Kumaran: You know.

433 00:50:55.080 ⇒ 00:51:03.989 Uttam Kumaran: things like that is… it’s actually, I think, very helpful for me, because I’m… it’s sort of tough for me with so many options, so many holes to fill in the company, like.

434 00:51:04.120 ⇒ 00:51:10.399 Uttam Kumaran: Who to go after, because not necessarily, like, having pain from one area doesn’t indicate its, like, importance.

435 00:51:10.700 ⇒ 00:51:11.190 scott walker: You know, so…

436 00:51:11.190 ⇒ 00:51:19.050 Uttam Kumaran: I want to make sure if it’s, like, towards a revenue opportunity, or towards freeing up our time, and that way we can sell more.

437 00:51:19.050 ⇒ 00:51:21.409 scott walker: And some of it, some of it’s what you guys are good at.

438 00:51:22.060 ⇒ 00:51:25.289 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, yeah, it’s also, like, Jesse, where can we cover?

439 00:51:25.290 ⇒ 00:51:26.130 scott walker: Yeah, and so…

440 00:51:26.130 ⇒ 00:51:28.119 Uttam Kumaran: Continue and cover, and then, yeah, exactly right.

441 00:51:28.120 ⇒ 00:51:39.099 scott walker: Yeah, and so, you know, you may… even though, you know, if you guys, like, it sounds like you guys are good at selling, you know, you… you know, a lot of times they would say a salesperson’s real important, but I don’t think in this situation it is.

442 00:51:39.100 ⇒ 00:51:48.160 Uttam Kumaran: We tried, it’s just tough. Yeah, and I… And they’re hard, yeah. I honestly think… I honestly think at this size, if you need a salesperson, you’re probably in trouble.

443 00:51:48.160 ⇒ 00:51:49.950 scott walker: And, yeah.

444 00:51:49.950 ⇒ 00:51:57.049 Uttam Kumaran: I think both of us have learned how to sell pretty well, and, like, we’re… I feel committed to continue to do it. I don’t have no problem doing that, so…

445 00:51:57.050 ⇒ 00:51:57.779 scott walker: Yeah. That’s…

446 00:51:58.270 ⇒ 00:52:01.549 Uttam Kumaran: Instead, it’s more like the sales operations, like go-to-market operations.

447 00:52:01.550 ⇒ 00:52:02.020 scott walker: Yeah.

448 00:52:02.020 ⇒ 00:52:08.500 Uttam Kumaran: Like, getting us into more meetings, or getting us into more networking to go shake hands, like, that’s more of what’s needed.

449 00:52:08.790 ⇒ 00:52:16.530 Uttam Kumaran: you know, I think still, like, I think founder-driven sales is gonna be, like, still really big for a lot of this for a while.

450 00:52:16.530 ⇒ 00:52:19.879 scott walker: I, I, I think so, too. I think… I think, to me, the…

451 00:52:19.990 ⇒ 00:52:33.039 scott walker: We always found an operations person to be invaluable, and just someone that could do ops, and honestly, early on, you know, do the finance and ops. And at your scale, you don’t need, like, a…

452 00:52:33.040 ⇒ 00:52:43.300 scott walker: you know, a world-class kind of person, because it’s not that complicated, but it’s someone to take that crap off your plate, so you’re not worrying about it. Yeah. And then, I think…

453 00:52:43.560 ⇒ 00:52:47.059 scott walker: You need someone that you can start handing clients to.

454 00:52:49.030 ⇒ 00:52:49.560 Uttam Kumaran: Okay.

455 00:52:49.560 ⇒ 00:53:03.159 scott walker: you know, if you’re… if you’re really driving the sales, and if you’re going to drive the channel partnerships, and I think at your size, the founders need to drive the char… with the… for credibility, you guys really need to drive the channel partnerships, because they’re going to want.

456 00:53:03.160 ⇒ 00:53:21.159 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, and that’s what’s been working, too, by the way. And we also started doing a lot of unique things on the marketing side, like, we’re one of the few SI partners, I feel like, for a lot of these guys that actually care about, like, how we market and the events, and like… so they’re enjoying working with us, because we actually can… we have execution muscle behind that.

457 00:53:21.160 ⇒ 00:53:32.189 Uttam Kumaran: Versus, like, I feel like a lot of their folks are just like, yeah, well, we can do an event or do something. Like, I feel like we built a good arm on that, so a lot of folks are like, oh, we’d love to work with you, because

458 00:53:32.360 ⇒ 00:53:42.449 Uttam Kumaran: you can talk about our product in a video or an event in, like, a very unique way, versus just, like, give us leads, like, let’s just… just hand us leads to work on, you know? So…

459 00:53:42.450 ⇒ 00:53:43.189 scott walker: Yeah, yeah.

460 00:53:43.190 ⇒ 00:53:43.920 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.

461 00:53:44.430 ⇒ 00:53:50.019 scott walker: Yeah, and I guess the question there, too, is that are you guys doing all that, too? Are you guys managing that and organizing that?

462 00:53:50.020 ⇒ 00:53:59.740 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, I would say, yeah, again, like, I think it’s a mix of, like… I can go into… of course, you know, I didn’t go into any meetings, shake hands, or dance, or whatever, but it’s everything after that that I just…

463 00:53:59.740 ⇒ 00:54:01.160 scott walker: I don’t…

464 00:54:01.160 ⇒ 00:54:12.609 Uttam Kumaran: I can… I’ll go into 16 back-to-back meetings a day, shake hands and dance, I don’t mind that, but it’s, like, all the follow-ups and execution that’s so difficult, you know, and

465 00:54:12.740 ⇒ 00:54:16.430 Uttam Kumaran: I don’t know, I think that’s… that’s always what I’ve been thinking about, so…

466 00:54:16.720 ⇒ 00:54:19.950 scott walker: Yeah, and I think the more of that stuff you get off your plate, the more you can…

467 00:54:20.670 ⇒ 00:54:30.640 scott walker: you know, focus on the higher value things. Those are just… and those are just parts of turning it into a, you know, not that it’s not a real company, but it’s more of a.

468 00:54:30.640 ⇒ 00:54:31.160 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.

469 00:54:31.160 ⇒ 00:54:36.269 scott walker: Because, I mean, honestly, you guys are still two guys with some contractors, which…

470 00:54:36.690 ⇒ 00:54:43.039 scott walker: It’s great, you know, and you’ve done a great job of building it to a great size, but… but it’s like, how do you…

471 00:54:43.380 ⇒ 00:54:45.679 scott walker: get out of that mindset, and I…

472 00:54:46.770 ⇒ 00:54:52.560 scott walker: I, you know, and this is another thing where I’ll say, you know, who knows, but… I…

473 00:54:53.130 ⇒ 00:55:08.259 scott walker: I see virtual companies working great in services, you know, where for years, people struggled with them. You know, they wanted bodies and seats in offices, and then they tried doing virtual, and it didn’t work for various cultural reasons, and now, like.

474 00:55:08.400 ⇒ 00:55:16.689 scott walker: almost every services company that starts up is completely virtual, so the virtualness, to me, I think, is… is… is awesome, but I still think

475 00:55:18.110 ⇒ 00:55:34.779 scott walker: you know, not having employees and relying entirely on contractors, and I’ve seen people try that, and I haven’t seen them scale. I’m sure there’s examples where they have, but I just haven’t seen it. I just don’t think you can deliver the quality, and…

476 00:55:35.000 ⇒ 00:55:38.589 scott walker: You know, kind of build that consistency you need in a…

477 00:55:38.750 ⇒ 00:55:45.270 scott walker: in a real company, doing purely virtual, so I, you know, I hardly know you guys, so I’m giving you my opinion based on…

478 00:55:45.270 ⇒ 00:55:47.589 Uttam Kumaran: No, and I… I think it’s totally… A 45-minute conversation.

479 00:55:47.590 ⇒ 00:55:48.200 scott walker: So.

480 00:55:48.200 ⇒ 00:55:48.560 Uttam Kumaran: contributor.

481 00:55:48.560 ⇒ 00:55:52.499 scott walker: you know, maybe you guys have figured out something with AI that’s totally changed the game, but…

482 00:55:52.500 ⇒ 00:56:01.309 Uttam Kumaran: I think it’s totally valid. I think part of it is, like, we both just worked in remote companies for a while, and so we learned how to sort of run these.

483 00:56:01.640 ⇒ 00:56:12.209 Uttam Kumaran: like, and I worked at scaling companies that were fully remote, but it’s difficult, and I think you’re right, we’re at the point where these, like, lieutenant game is, like, exact… we literally… that’s what we’re talking about all week this week.

484 00:56:12.300 ⇒ 00:56:26.130 Uttam Kumaran: And so thinking exactly about that challenge, and I don’t think we were risk-averse in, like, having those people be closer to the business. I actually think it’s… we’re more… I’m like, do we have those people now, or, like, what are their qualifications? That’s more of, like, what I’m worried about, is like.

485 00:56:26.130 ⇒ 00:56:34.529 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah. Do we know enough about what that person not only needs to do today, which I think we have a good handle on those responsibilities, but, like, between now and then.

486 00:56:34.960 ⇒ 00:56:40.200 Uttam Kumaran: And, like, finding that person that maybe is not, like, 10 steps ahead, but also isn’t, like, just one step, like.

487 00:56:40.440 ⇒ 00:56:40.800 scott walker: Yeah.

488 00:56:40.800 ⇒ 00:56:42.320 Uttam Kumaran: about those profiles and getting.

489 00:56:42.320 ⇒ 00:56:42.720 scott walker: support.

490 00:56:42.720 ⇒ 00:56:47.970 Uttam Kumaran: with, like, understanding, like, okay, this person’s gonna be good for 6 months, and then as soon as you get to this number, they’re like.

491 00:56:48.500 ⇒ 00:56:56.899 Uttam Kumaran: They’re gonna be just as dumb as we are about that next, you know? Like, that’s what, like, that’s what’s been hard to think about.

492 00:56:56.900 ⇒ 00:57:15.409 scott walker: Yeah, yeah, and I think I, you know, once again, it’s… and some of it just depends on your… on your margins and what cash flow you have, because I… Yeah. I’m a big believer in hiring as far… far enough ahead. You know, hiring… because the other… and once again, we’re just rambling about a bunch of things, my experience is hiring people too far ahead.

493 00:57:15.570 ⇒ 00:57:20.620 scott walker: Like, hiring people from a much, much bigger company, often doesn’t work.

494 00:57:20.680 ⇒ 00:57:25.650 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah. Because they don’t have the hunger and the entrepreneurship that someone your size does.

495 00:57:25.650 ⇒ 00:57:28.320 scott walker: But you definitely want to be ahead of where you are.

496 00:57:28.320 ⇒ 00:57:35.209 Uttam Kumaran: What did you think about, like, incentives for, like, that crew of folks? Like, did you plan that early on, or did you, like… yeah.

497 00:57:35.210 ⇒ 00:57:38.069 scott walker: Yeah, so this is a whole… we can have a whole other hour.

498 00:57:38.070 ⇒ 00:57:41.729 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, sorry. That was a brutal, like, last question, but I just got.

499 00:57:41.730 ⇒ 00:57:46.660 scott walker: No, I have such strong opinions on this, haven’t gone through it a few times. I have…

500 00:57:46.950 ⇒ 00:57:48.350 scott walker: I have much…

501 00:57:49.350 ⇒ 00:57:54.180 scott walker: I think you have to put in your head a percentage of your company you’re willing to give up.

502 00:57:54.790 ⇒ 00:58:04.559 scott walker: And in options of some kind, you know, we even had a lot of success across a couple companies with Shadow stock, which, and you leave, you lose it.

503 00:58:05.250 ⇒ 00:58:11.060 scott walker: Like, so that people… they gotta be there to the end to make the money. And if they leave along the way.

504 00:58:11.660 ⇒ 00:58:13.390 Uttam Kumaran: I’m down for that. Hell yeah.

505 00:58:13.390 ⇒ 00:58:23.440 scott walker: And I’ve had a lot of people tell me that’s stupid, and you know, we’ve used this across 3 companies, and it’s worked, because it’s like, hey, we’re paying you a fair comp.

506 00:58:23.480 ⇒ 00:58:41.610 scott walker: we’re not… you’re not working cheap, so this is an incentive for you to help us get this to the end. And, and that’s been… those are super effective, or you can just do options in a normal way, but the key is to put a… put… it’s so easy to start handing out equity. Yeah. It just… it’s so easy.

507 00:58:41.610 ⇒ 00:58:58.850 Uttam Kumaran: I mean, I’ve just worked, again, I don’t know… I don’t know, Robert, Ruggable, or… I mean, I know Flexport, but, like, yeah, I worked at all these companies where it’s just completely useless, like, and it was purely a game to just underpay people, and most of the people didn’t… I mean, you didn’t rec… you don’t… we had, like, cliffs that were brutal, and, like.

508 00:58:58.850 ⇒ 00:59:15.090 scott walker: Yeah, and people… and honestly, people, we… we went through an experiment at one point, because we got sick of giving out equity, and we… for, like, the next 10 hires, when we made their offer, we gave them two choices, and one was more money and no equity, and one was less money and equity, and 100% took more money.

509 00:59:15.090 ⇒ 00:59:15.760 Robert Tseng: Funny, yeah.

510 00:59:15.760 ⇒ 00:59:20.559 scott walker: And so we realized the equity, we were just handing up something they put no value on, and in reality.

511 00:59:20.560 ⇒ 00:59:21.060 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.

512 00:59:21.060 ⇒ 00:59:21.730 scott walker: You know.

513 00:59:21.730 ⇒ 00:59:22.629 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, yeah, yeah, of course.

514 00:59:22.630 ⇒ 00:59:30.510 scott walker: So we made it, we would say, you know, we did 10%, you know, some people do 15, but you say that’s the max.

515 00:59:30.690 ⇒ 00:59:45.060 scott walker: And this has got to last till an exit, and… and then use that as… as incentive, and… and… and you have to… you have to… usually have to give… especially for services, because it’s not like…

516 00:59:45.380 ⇒ 00:59:48.389 scott walker: You know, this is not, like… you know.

517 00:59:49.050 ⇒ 01:00:07.459 scott walker: some Silicon Valley thing with $100 million in funding behind it, and it’s money. You know, this is a… this is a different kind of business, and so people and services, you… you generally are not having to throw crazy equity at them, and… and you’re crazy too, and and… and yeah, and to me, it’s…

518 01:00:07.780 ⇒ 01:00:10.449 scott walker: I would just fight it as much as you can.

519 01:00:10.450 ⇒ 01:00:11.000 Uttam Kumaran: Okay.

520 01:00:11.000 ⇒ 01:00:12.519 scott walker: You’ll end up giving some, but…

521 01:00:13.530 ⇒ 01:00:16.780 scott walker: Probably not a lot. It needs to be for key people, and they need to earn it.

522 01:00:17.110 ⇒ 01:00:17.780 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.

523 01:00:18.100 ⇒ 01:00:18.760 scott walker: Yeah.

524 01:00:19.250 ⇒ 01:00:23.650 Robert Tseng: I’m only, I’m only passionate about this, because when we first started, we were like, oh, yeah!

525 01:00:23.650 ⇒ 01:00:25.399 Uttam Kumaran: No, this is really helpful, I mean, I don’t…

526 01:00:25.400 ⇒ 01:00:31.240 scott walker: Man, we’re just… we’re just handing… handing away dilution for very little value.

527 01:00:31.240 ⇒ 01:00:32.060 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.

528 01:00:32.680 ⇒ 01:00:34.760 Uttam Kumaran: No, it’s super, super helpful.

529 01:00:36.250 ⇒ 01:00:40.899 Robert Tseng: Yeah. Perfect. I mean, I want to be mindful of your time, Scott. I know we’re kind of at the hour.

530 01:00:42.260 ⇒ 01:00:53.080 Robert Tseng: I guess, like, next steps from here, I mean, Vixel’s having us talk to other people, too, but I wonder where… I guess, we’ll be in touch, or I don’t know what the next step…

531 01:00:53.080 ⇒ 01:01:11.429 scott walker: Yeah, yeah, and if, you know, if you want to work with me, great, I’d love it. You guys are… I love where you guys are, I love what you’re doing, I love smart people. So, you know, I’d be super interested, but even if not, if someone else, you’re like, damn, this fills some gaps we have that he doesn’t have, you know, feel free to reach out anytime.

532 01:01:12.090 ⇒ 01:01:13.860 Uttam Kumaran: Totally. Appreciate it.

533 01:01:15.130 ⇒ 01:01:16.040 scott walker: Have a good one!

534 01:01:16.500 ⇒ 01:01:17.660 Robert Tseng: Okay, thank you, Scott.

535 01:01:17.940 ⇒ 01:01:18.330 Uttam Kumaran: Bye.