Greg Gretsch: On Founder and Investor Trends from Silicon Valley.

Boardroom Governance with Evan Epstein

(0:00) Intro.

(1:17) About the podcast sponsor: The American College of Governance Counsel.

(2:03) Start of interview.

(3:08) Greg's "origin story."

(6:53) From the University of Georgia to Apple in Cuppertino.

(10:50) The start of his entrepreneurial journey in 1992 with his first company.

(13:03) The boom and bust cyclical nature of Silicon Valley. "[M]y father used to say that the stock market has predicted nine of the last three recessions. And, you know, I think in Silicon Valley, the investor and entrepreneurial class has predicted nine of the last three technology waves."

(17:24) His first foray with startup boards. The role and influence of Don Lucas, and Bob Frick (former CFO of BoA), on his board.

(21:49) On the shifting power dynamics in founder-investor relationships (ascendance of "founder ethos").

(29:02) On the differences between private equity (PE) and venture capital (VC). "Control investors"

(31:29) His experience as a director of public companies: Responsys, acquired by Oracle (2013), and Upwork (IPO in 2018).

(34:57) On equity comp (stock options and RSUs) in tech companies. *Reference to BG2 podcast episode.

(47:35) IPOs, private markets and secondary markets. *You can check out my newsletter #52 on this topic.

(54:24) On his investment in Cornershop (acquired by Uber) and Latin America market.

(1:00:58) On AI as the next technology platform shift.

(1:03:50) Books that have greatly influenced his life:

1. Titan: The Life of John D. Rockefeller, by Ron Chernow (1998)
2. Thinking Fast and Slow, by Daniel Kahneman (2011)
3. Black Boy, by Richard Wright (1945)

(1:05:36) His mentors.

(1:07:00) Quotes that he thinks of often or lives her life by: "Experience is what you get when you don't get what you want."

(1:07:47) An unusual habit or absurd thing that he loves.

(1:08:28) The living person he most admires.

Greg Gretsch is a Founding Partner and Managing Director of Jackson Square Ventures, an early stage venture capital firm that invests in software businesses.

You can follow Evan on social media at:

Twitter: @evanepstein

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/epsteinevan/

Substack: https://evanepstein.substack.com/

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Music/Soundtrack (found via Free Music Archive): Seeing The Future by Dexter Britain is licensed under a Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License