Kevin Siskar 3/5/22 Kevin Siskar 3/5/22

How Jordan Levy Left His Mark On The Venture Capital Industry

In the fall we sat down with one of the godfathers of Venture Capital, Jordan Levy, who shares his very inspiring founder story and how that led to his career as an investor.

Jordan Levy | SEed Capital Partners (SBNY)

In the fall we sat down with one of the godfathers of Venture Capital, Jordan Levy, who shares his very inspiring founder story and how that led to his career as an investor.

Jordan co-founded Software Distribution Services which was acquired by Ingram Micro, before going on to be a Partner on the early-stage investing team at SoftBank Capital (SBNY) for 16 years.

Jordan has served on the boards of BuzzFeed, TalkSpace, Work Market, ACV Auctions, and many others. Using his upbringing and religion to pay it forward (Tzedakah) to the community that he grew up in, in Buffalo, New York. Jordy also co-founded Z80 Labs, a startup incubator in Buffalo, and 43North, an accelerator that hosts an annual startup competition, investing $5M per year in Buffalo, NY. We cover a lot of ground in this episode, including:

Topics Discussed:

Building Software Distribution Services in the early days of venture capital.
How to think about the private vs public markets.
The intricacies of SPACs vs the IPO.
Lessons learned from decades of investments.
Betting on the first days of the internet and what has changed since.
Investing through the dot com boom and bust.
How ACV Auctions re-defined the auto market.
The importance of investing in people over markets, trends, and other aspects of the business.

Quote of the Episode:

“You invest in the people and I will always believe that” and “if you don’t think someone can take this company to the promised land, then don’t invest in them.”

The Greatest Piece of Advice:

As his grandmother passed down to him, “never go to bed angry with your wife.”

Links & show notes from this episode:

Jordan Levy’s Bio
Jordan Levy on LinkedIn
Jordan Levy on Twitter
Finta
43North

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Kevin Siskar 10/5/21 Kevin Siskar 10/5/21

Scott Wayman's Plan for Kangarootime to Support the $648 Billion Care Economy

From a 6 year old calling around on car repairs for his mother, to a thriving CEO of Kangarootime, our next guest Scott Wayman gives us insight on how he got to where he is today. Scott was the oldest son of 24 kids (18 of which were adopted).

Scott Wayman's shares his very inspiring founder story. His passion for Kangarootime is next level and the company is currently focused on winning the childcare management software space for daycares and preschools. With plans to expand to the larger “care economy” which includes not only early education & childcare but also elder & senior care. A $648B TAM in the U.S. Alone according to Melinda Gate's Pivotal Ventures.

The Kangarootime team brilliantly positioned themselves throughout COVID19 as leaders in the space, by taking time to host educational sessions about how their customers can best adapt their centers, as well as quickly shipping new features such as contactless check-in/out, health checks, and more. I have personally watched Scott relentlessly grow this company from their early days at Founder Institute, through several investments from 43North, and was very excited to sit down with him for this episode.