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How Great Startup Partnerships Are Built | Best of Build Mode

This week on Build Mode, we’re diving back into the archives for a special best-of episode all about effective partnerships, from cofounder relationships and team trust to investor dynamics and leadership communication. Host Isabelle Johannesen and producer Maggie Nye revisit some of the most insightful conversations from past seasons to explore what makes startup partnerships…

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3 weeks ago

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This week on Build Mode, we’re diving back into the archives for a special best-of episode all about effective partnerships, from cofounder relationships and team trust to investor dynamics and leadership communication.

Host Isabelle Johannesen and producer Maggie Nye revisit some of the most insightful conversations from past seasons to explore what makes startup partnerships actually work.

In this episode, you’ll hear from:
Jasper Carmichael-Jack, cofounder & CEO of Artisan
Ian Schmidt, partner & consultant at Trimergence
Hala Jawani and Alessio Trestani, cofounders of Rieo
Leah Solivann, founder of TaskRabbit
Ross Fubini, managing partner at XYZ Venture Capital and Leslie Feinzaig, founder & CEO of Graham & Walker
Sarah Lucena, founder & CEO of Mappa

Whether you’re searching for the right cofounder, managing conflict on your team, scaling as a solo founder, or building relationships with investors, this episode is packed with practical advice and honest founder lessons from people who’ve lived it.

Chapters:
00:00 Intro:
01:00 Jasper Carmichael-Jack (Artisan): Meeting a cofounder online and navigating a founder breakup
04:20 Ian Schmidt (Trimergence): Frameworks for conflict resolution, communication, and team trust
08:15 Hala Jawani & Alessio Cristante (Riveo): Building a startup as married cofounders
10:20 Leah Solivan (TaskRabbit): Transitioning leadership and building executive trust
12:30 Ross Fubini (XYZ Ventures) & Leslie Feinzaig (Graham & Walker): Choosing the right investors and building your cap table
16:05 Sarah Lucena (Mapa): Compatibility, investor alignment, and finding the right people

Subscribe to Build Mode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you like to listen. And watch the full videos on YouTube. New episodes of Build Mode drop every Thursday. Hosted by Isabelle Johannessen. Produced and edited by Maggie Nye. Audience development led by Morgan Little. Special thanks to the Foundry and Cheddar video teams.
Apply to Startup Battlefield: We are looking for early-stage companies that have an MVP. So nominate a founder (or yourself): techcrunch.com/apply. Be sure to say you heard about Startup Battlefield from the Build Mode podcast.

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1 Comment

1 Comment

  1. @Tobias_From_MingleMinds

    May 28, 2026 at 10:08 am

    My original cofounders exited after 63 days so I get it. We weren’t a fit and they didn’t understand the user or market; did they want to.

    Reply

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Science & Technology

Why startups should ‘be more concerned’ about competition in VCs’ portfolios l Best of Build Mode

This week on Build Mode, we’re diving back into the archives for a special best-of episode all about venture capital. Host Isabelle Johannesen and producer Maggie Nye revisit conversations from past seasons to give founders a glimpse behind the VC curtain and a better understanding of what investors are really looking for. From choosing the…

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1 day ago

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June 18, 2026

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This week on Build Mode, we’re diving back into the archives for a special best-of episode all about venture capital. Host Isabelle Johannesen and producer Maggie Nye revisit conversations from past seasons to give founders a glimpse behind the VC curtain and a better understanding of what investors are really looking for.

From choosing the right investors to building a differentiated go-to-market strategy, these venture capitalists and founder-turned-investors share hard-earned lessons on fundraising, portfolio dynamics, investor-founder relationships, and what separates the companies that successfully raise their next round from those that don’t.

In this episode, you’ll hear from:
⁠Yuri Sagalov, managing director at General Catalyst⁠
⁠Ross Fubini, managing partner at XYZ Venture Capital⁠ and Leslie Feinzaig, founder and general partner at Graham & Walker⁠
⁠Paul Irving, partner at GTMfund⁠
⁠Leah Solivan, founder of TaskRabbit and founder of Precedent VC⁠

Chapters:
00:00 Intro
01:19 Yuri Sagalov (General Catalyst): The three types of investors and who founders should avoid
03:29 Ross Fubini (XYZ VC) & Leslie Feinzaig (Graham & Walker): What great investors actually bring to the table
08:36 Paul Irving (GTMfund): The go-to-market signals investors look for
12:30 Leah Solivan (TaskRabbit / Precedent VC): Understanding the competition inside your investors’ portfolios
14:30 Outro

Subscribe to Build Mode on⁠ ⁠Apple Podcasts⁠⁠,⁠ ⁠Spotify⁠⁠, or⁠ ⁠wherever you like to listen⁠⁠. And watch the full videos on⁠ ⁠YouTube⁠⁠. New episodes of⁠ ⁠Build Mode⁠⁠ drop every Thursday. Hosted by Isabelle Johannessen. Produced and edited by Maggie Nye. Audience development led by Morgan Little. Special thanks to the Foundry and Cheddar video teams.

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CNET

’90s Tech Nostalgia: Look Back at the first Video Phones and Video Conferencing Software

Go back in time with former CNET hosts Ryan Seacrest, Desmond Crisis and Richard Hart as they investigate video phones and video conferencing technology in 1995, including CU-SeeMe, Intel’s ProShare and AT&T’s Vistium Video Conferencing system. Read more about old school tech on CNET.com How to Go Analog in 2026 0:00 Introduction & Philips P100…

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1 day ago

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June 18, 2026

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Go back in time with former CNET hosts Ryan Seacrest, Desmond Crisis and Richard Hart as they investigate video phones and video conferencing technology in 1995, including CU-SeeMe, Intel’s ProShare and AT&T’s Vistium Video Conferencing system.

Read more about old school tech on CNET.com
How to Go Analog in 2026

0:00 Introduction & Philips P100 Screen Phone
01:12 The Rise of Video Telephones
01:39 The 1956 Picture-Phone Prototype
02:20 Desktop Video Conferencing Emerges
04:56 Document Sharing with Intel ProShare
06:04 Comparing Video Conferencing Costs & Systems
07:01 The Importance of Frame Rate
07:21 Early Internet Video with CU-SeeMe

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#90s #nostalgia #nostalgia #ryanseacrest #videoconferencing #intel #internet #internetculture

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Science & Technology

NEA’s Tiffany Luck says enterprises are still figuring out their AI ROI | Equity Podcast

Tokenmaxxing was the hottest trend in Silicon Valley earlier this year, with CEOs encouraging employees to push AI usage as far as it would go. Then the bill came due. Uber reportedly blew through its annual AI budget in a few months, some companies cut Claude licenses for parts of their org, and Meta killed…

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2 days ago

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June 17, 2026

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Tokenmaxxing was the hottest trend in Silicon Valley earlier this year, with CEOs encouraging employees to push AI usage as far as it would go. Then the bill came due. Uber reportedly blew through its annual AI budget in a few months, some companies cut Claude licenses for parts of their org, and Meta killed its internal leaderboard.

This tension between hype and ROI is exactly where NEA partner Tiffany Luck lives these days. She got her start convincing companies that e-commerce was the future, and now she’s all in on AI, especially when it comes to the possibilities for “magic moments” in the consumer business.

On this episode of TechCrunch’s Equity podcast, Luck joins Rebecca Bellan to talk about the future of personal agents, her thoughts on this year’s AI IPOs, and how startups are stepping in to help enterprises track return on AI spend.

Subscribe to Equity on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify and all the casts. You also can follow Equity on X and Threads, at @EquityPod.

Chapters:

00:00 Intro

00:51 Tiffany Luck’s path from Lot18 to Amazon to VC

3:45 Magic moments: Waymo, healthcare, and the gap in personal agents

7:36 Privacy, security, and trusting AI with your life

10:39 IPO outlook: Anthropic vs. OpenAI on public markets

13:58 Compute, infrastructure, and where the value sits

15:41 What’s the ROI on tokenmaxxing?

27:07 Forward deployed engineers as a ‘Trojan horse’

32:49 Outro

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