Marten Mickos

Beware the False Dawn of Product Market Fit A few wins doesn't mean you have repeatability

You think and hope you've reached product-market fit (PMF) but actually you haven't yet.
buildtoscale.substack.com/p/false-dawn...

Three Roads to the S&P 500: Datadog, Coinbase, CrowdStrike IVP's Three Roads to the S&P 500: Datadog, Coinbase, CrowdStrike

Three roads to the S&P 500: Datadog, Coinbase, CrowdStrike. All 3:
* Remain founder-led
* Began with a single product that solved one problem exceptionally well
* Quickly became platform companies
* Harnessed a demonstrable and powerful "Why Now?" moment

www.linkedin.com/pulse/three-...

The most successful founders we’ve seen almost never had the CV you’d expect. | Adam Shuaib, PhD | 13 comments The most successful founders we’ve seen almost never had the CV you’d expect. They didn’t work at a unicorn or drop out of an elite university. On paper, most looked like an obvious “pass”. After ana...

After analysing thousands of founders, one pattern kept repeating: the ones who built generational companies were often complete misfits. - Adam Shuaib, GP at Episode 1 Ventures

www.linkedin.com/posts/adamsh...

Kuukausiliite | Rouva Suorasuu kertoo nyt, miten Suomi laitetaan kuntoon Sanna Suvanto-Harsaae on Suomen elinkeinoelämän vaikutusvaltaisin nainen. Nyt hän linjaa, mihin tämän maan pitäisi – vihdoin – panostaa ja miten.

Sanna Suvanto-Harsaae: Jos haluaa menestyä, täytyy fokusoida, ja se on eri asia kuin priorisointi.

Priorisointi tarkoittaa, että päättää, mitä haluaa tehdä ensin, mutta sitten tekee vähän kaikkea. Fokusointi tarkoittaa, että valitsee, mitä tekee, eikä sitten tee muuta.

www.hs.fi/kuukausiliit...

chart: capital expenditures, quarterly shows hockey-stick like growth in the capex expenditures of Amazon, Microsoft, Google and meta, almost entirely on data centers in the most recent quarter it was nearly $100 billion, collectively

The AI infrastructure build-out is so gigantic that in the past 6 months, it contributed more to the growth of the U.S. economy than /all of consumer spending/

The 'magnificent 7' spent more than $100 billion on data centers and the like in the past three months *alone*

www.wsj.com/tech/ai/sili...

Your first startup step doesn’t need to be beautiful. It just needs to be taken. - Nishant Mittal, co-founder of PingSafe (acquired by SentinelOne)

I met Dylan Field in 2011, when he was an intern at Flipboard. | Danny Rimer I met Dylan Field in 2011, when he was an intern at Flipboard. He was curious, thoughtful, and clearly passionate about building products in a way you don’t see from many 19-year-olds. I left that mee...

Figma is going public today. A remarkable startup journey.

Check out the linkedin postings by Danny Rimer and Martin Mignot of Index Ventures:

www.linkedin.com/posts/dannyr...

www.linkedin.com/posts/martin...

Why can’t I stop cleaning fake dirt off fake objects? In praise of ‘PowerWash Simulator’, part ponderous game, part dreamlike state

A great column on why Oliver Roeder can’t stop cleaning fake dirt off fake objects:
on.ft.com/4mliUPs
‪@okr.bsky.social‬

The world's largest companies by market cap are US tech companies.

YouTube video by SiliconANGLE theCUBE Peter Vesterbacka, FinEst Bay Area | theCUBE + NYSE Wired: Mixture of Experts Series

How did SLUSH start? How do you build startups? How do you empower entrepreneurs?
Peter Vesterbacka explains, as excitedly as always.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=236F...

OpenAI agreed to pay Oracle $30B a year for data center services | TechCrunch OpenAI was the customer that signed the huge deal that Oracle disclosed last month.

OpenAI, currently at $10bn revenue, will pay $30bn annually for datacenter capacity to Oracle which currently has $25bn in total cloud revenue.
The customer is buying what they currently lack money for and the vendor is selling what they currently lack capacity for.
techcrunch.com/2025/07/22/o...

The AI Revolution in Healthcare: Vinod Khosla's Vision - DOC Venture capitalist Vinod Khosla outlines a 10,000‑fold AI leap set to democratize medical expertise, reshape doctor roles, and hinge on policy choices.

Expertise will be near-free.
-- Vinod Khosla commenting on AI in healthcare
doc.health/the-ai-revol...

Build your personal AI copilot A guide to using AI as a long-term thinking partner (including prompts to get you started)

A guide to using AI as a long-term thinking partner, including the prompts to get you started. - by Tal Raviv
www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/build-your...

I need to say it: the cyber industry is exhausting. | Jorge Monteiro I need to say it: the cyber industry is exhausting. Seriously, I have a love-hate relationship with it. LOVE, because cybersecurity is like public health. There is a big mission behind it: You’re...

This industry of cybersecurity… it thrives on fear and ego.
Most vendors? Sell confusion.
Most clients? Hide their fragilities.
Most "Experts"? Laggards and deniers of innovation.
-- Jorge Monteiro, Ethiack

www.linkedin.com/posts/jb-mon...

How fast can you grow from $1m to $100m in ARR?

Exclusive | Musk Allies to Raise Up to $12 Billion for xAI Chips as Startup Burns Through Cash XAI is tapping into the booming private-credit market to find the cash it needs to build massive data centers.

xAI is slated to burn about $13 billion in cash in 2025. The startup isn’t profitable and generates a very small amount of revenue.
www.wsj.com/tech/ai/elon...

Amazon Braket adds new 54-qubit quantum processor from IQM - AWS Discover more about what's new at AWS with Amazon Braket adds new 54-qubit quantum processor from IQM

Amazon Braket adds new 54-qubit quantum processor from IQM.

With a median two-qubit gate fidelity of 99.5%, IQM Emerald is based on superconducting transmon qubits arranged in a square lattice and interconnected via tunable couplers.

aws.amazon.com/about-aws/wh...

The Board Trap: What Founders Want vs. What They Need It’s late on a Thursday evening. A startup founder, let’s call him Alex, sits alone in his dimly lit office, staring at the screen filled with investor emails, recent board meeting notes, and a loomin...

What founders want from their board: support, encouragement, and validation. What they need: clarity, candor, and accountability.
Too many boards miss the mark.

www.linkedin.com/pulse/board-...

Why Startup Founders Struggle With Adaptability (And How To Overcome The Challenge) Why do so many founders struggle with adaptability? The reasons are as varied as the founders themselves, according to Richard Hagberg and Tien Tzuo, co-authors of 'Founders, Keepers.' They share an e...

Startup CEO, if you’re struggling with adaptability, your ego is probably clouding your ability to listen, respond, and bring people along. - Rich Hagberg and Tien Tzuo

news.crunchbase.com/startups/ove...

To most people, $100M for one employee feels like Silicon Valley finally lost it.

Those people don't understand the bet hyperscalers are making. When you’re aiming for a Trillion in value, $100M is just table stakes.

- Reid Hoffman ‪@reidhoffman.bsky.social‬

99% of the world's best ideas are trapped in the heads of people who can't code. They have problems. They know the solutions. They just can't build them.

Today, there are 47M developers worldwide. Lovable is going to produce 1B potential builders.

- Anton Osika, Lovable

Elvene Boats debuts new solar-electric model The Finnish builder is planning to add further models to its range next year

Solar-electric boats:
www.ibinews.com/news/elvene-...

What it is like to work at OpenAI.
calv.info/openai-refle...

Becoming an AI-first company-report 2025.pdf | Powered by Box

Becoming an AI-first company.
A white paper by Aaron Levie, CEO of Box, and Olivia Nottebohm, COO.

cloud.app.box.com/s/58461dcylj...

Intelligence is the new currency and most people are broke.
- Reuven Cohen, AI innovator

Ex-Sequoia partner closes in on $400mn European tech fund Matt Miller, who left the firm after a boardroom battle at Klarna, raises money to become a solo venture investor

Ex-Sequoia partner Matt Miller closes in on a $400mn European tech fund because he believes in Europe. Matt will do B round investments in AI and tech infra startups.
www.ft.com/content/3d5c...

In this episode of The Eric Ries Show, I’m joined by Sid Sijbrandij, co-founder and Executive Chair of GitLab—one of the world’s most radically transparent and values-driven software companies.

CEOs make the right decisions yet sometimes too early and often too late.

VCs work in a state of intellect.
Entrepreneurs work in a state of will.
- Bipul Sinha, Rubrik

Eric Schmidt interviewed by Henri Delahaye att the RAISE Summit.