Im so glad I did it. Alejandro: So Im completely there with you. Everyone in Boston, everyone in New York were straight nos and [25:15] didnt get second meetings but then a month later we came to Silicon Valley and we found a much better product market set for the kind of investor who was prepared to come early and invest early and we got a lot of yeses very quickly. Anthemos Georgiades is co-founder & CEO of Zumper, the largest startup in the rental industry. Thats quite motivating for people. My friend have had to camp out overnight outside the property management office to get access to the new apartment and this is [01:09] you know things coming online, you can order a cab via phone, you can book a hotel online. So I saw NEA, Kleiner Perkins, Graylog, Andreesen Horrowitz, just to name a few. See How I Can Help You With Your Fundraising Efforts. But I will say the one thing is true is that you always raise on momentum. I think just up front boundaries before you close the round is super important. So for Zumper our vision as I mentioned was to make renting an apartment as easy as booking a hotel and so instead of going in with just an idea, I built like a really crappy version of the end game that I wanted to build. Saying that, I have connections through both business school and previous people that have gone through BCG venture capital and most of your listeners and entrepreneurs will know so much of this is about like getting warm introductions to VCs so I did have a couple of cheats to get in through the network or through the BCG network. And even though that sounds so obvious six years later, people just werent doing this in 2011, 2012 and we created a bunch of data that overwhelming shows the renters wanted to be applying for apartments from their phone. Anthemos lives in San Francisco, where Zumper is HQd, with his wife. And so back to your point, yes, we want investors who are supportive of the fact that we didnt try to monetize the platform for the first three years because it would have created a barrier to entry. So Ill read it if anyone tweets anything interesting or if I can be helpful in anyway. He runs all the background of operation and he came from the real estate industry, two completely different background and neither of them was an obvious pick when I started the company at grad school. Your job as the CEO and the founder is to convince your investors of the reason to do this. "While many markets cool off during the winter, Miami is still posting month-over-month increases. Oh wow, good question. And so I wouldnt be too pressured. what was the premier league called before; Anthemos Georgiades. I mean to a point network gets you an intro but a lot of intros are 10 minute meetings where the VC immediately decides its not for them which is totally fair. Like what have you seen that really works? But theres no right answer in business. At the end of the day though, whether its senior people, junior people, interns who we want to bring back is all under pinned by culture. You kind of just all in [06:39] I think where the carving of the rose start to happen for me around 10, 12 people where you no longer just have [06:49]. Were growing very quickly but none of that was true obviously in the first two years. We have like four people at the company for the first year or maybe five for the first year and so theres so much to do and theres so little time and few resources that you actually theres no real intellectual whiteboarding session that you do to carve out rose. Russell Middleton Co-Founder. Anthemos Georgiades, Zumper, European Founder, International Founders, Marketplace The process of renting apartments hasn't changed since Craigslist was introduced. So I think three months is an efficient round. Got it. And you know I think hiring is definitely tough but retaining is even more complicated so is there any things that you for example seen yourself that work on that front? So strategically that was a good marriage where they had a great consumer brand and we have really fantastic supply side inventory. Anthemos Georgiades: Yeah. And we were talking about the $46 million round which was the C round, C as in cat and basically what you were talking about I mean what Ive seen is that you guys have shifted a little bit the strategy. Anthemos Georgiades: Yeah. You can filter down by city and . Oh yeah, on the seed round back in 2012, we had probably five investors come in to the seed round so we kind of had five yeses who put in small checks. We saw it would take three to six months to integrate Pat Mapper and their backend that engineering project we worked really hard and quickly just over a year to integrate so we underestimated like how much work was required to integrate them by 3x. Alejandro: Got it. Alejandro: Got it. So you kind of just have to [25:29] but just to be clear yeah, we had far more nos than yeses at the seed round. Anthemos Georgiades: Yeah. Alejandro: Really, really nice to have you here and excited for the chat that we have ahead here. Alejandro: Got it and before we actually dive in to the journey here, so consulting and business school, this is a few things that I typically hear so from some of our other guests. So strategically that was a good marriage where they had a great consumer brand and we have really fantastic supply side inventory. Whats your story and most importantly, how did you get started with the entrepreneurial bug? Youre exactly right. Really, really nice to have you here and excited for the chat that we have ahead here. At series A, you got to show product market set in a sub vertical. So I guess like I have one thing to follow up on this. It is ultimately the culture. We both had ideas to be entrepreneurs but neither of us have the guts to actually go for it. I knew the CEO for a while. So I as British person moving to Silicon Valley in 2012 I have never run a startup before. So you still have to land it and once youre on the door it doesnt matter where you come from you have to have something good. I think Id say forget everything you think you know and everything, your education [38:28]. So Anthemos, theres always a first time and you know I guess this is the first time in the history of the DealMakers Show that Im able to interview someone that has been involve on the M&A but more on the buy side. Got it. I dont think theres a startup I could have launched that taught me more. I didnt think that either of them originally. We want investors who look at $100 million in revenue as table stakes but they wont agree to a billion. Alejandro: Got it. And investors love that story because its easy to believe that you can continue to do that. Over-Communication. So yes, we have a great cap table. Anthemos and Russell met in London while working at a consulting company back in 2006, but it was after they moved to the U.S and experienced the pain of finding a place to live that they decided to found Zumper along with Taylor Glass-Moore and Leah Jones. Theres never like an exact number you need like when Uber raised money or you know Zillow raised money, theres never like a number they have to be at. It was always a man, there is a really tough problem that consumers experience and no one is solving it. So I wouldnt be too picky early. Culture is everything and so investing in people making sure I as the CEO spend a lot of time as much as possible with people who dont report to me is absolutely critical and that is ultimately like the fabric on how most companies are run. I mean I called it like a cheat [33:33] my team. I think at that stage it makes sense. So if the story has changed in a way that merits the focus of the company but what is consistent every single time weve raised is that for six months in a row, we had really, really quick growth. So watching board members from the early investments are [19:38] who now runs Good Water but was originally Kleiner and then Eric [19:42] from Kleiner and theyre both experts at product market set. So lets talk about Zumper here. Georgiades founded Zumper after his own . In the early days we love the exposure to Silicon Valley investors. Because I speak with a ton of founders that are perhaps opening up the possibility of bringing on corporations and I think that you need to really do it right. You just get to this kind of motion of you all feel the same and you kind of pull in the same direction. They take every, some people go and warm theirif you have a brilliant idea, theyd be crazy not to take it and then their entire value is obviously give you a three month program and then at the end expose you to liek 40 investors. I met Russel who [04:01] engineering products through just the personal connections in London. The company was incorporated in California, Texas, and Florida ten years ago. Yeah, I mean BCG I think you get access to the 23 year olds CEOs who had been working for 40 years and kind of crazy in consulting you take the shortcut in your careers to being in the board room. You look at your cofounders and you know that they understand that and that theyre not freaking out, that is where you build real institutional culture and then you try and grow that across the team. And then now your job at five, six years in with a team of a hundred with higher and amazing executive team who are all better at doing their jobs than you would ever be and so your job is almost as a CEO is to like hire yourself out of a job where you hire people, where you look at them and you think, Wow, I cant believe you report to me. Weve only been working with Axle Springer for four months now but they are fantastic. So I guess for those listeners that are looking at acquiring other companies to perhaps grow a little bit faster, what kind of advice would you give to them? It is not closely married to [14:55] and thats where its still on [14:58] I think Silicon Valley has a long way to go where when I got my first introductions to VCs to Kleiner, to Andreseen, to Graylock, to NEA, it often came through my graduate school network where someone was like, Hey, this guy is leaving HBS. They were super lean team of under five people and its been a great deal for Zumper like we have one backend, one sales team and then two consumer platforms. At series B, you got to show product market set across the board with the revenue and then at series C, you got to show real traction and real revenue and a proper P&L. How did you find these investors? It was not something Ive really ever thought about before. Zumper Board Member Related Hubs So our CFO is fantastic and what he was able to bring to the series C was real credibility where I meet the investors, get them excited about our vision and our story and then they spend hours with the CFO on the second or third meeting digesting our historical financial as were talking about where were headed. Yeah. So paradoxically, I dont think the core DNA of a companys culture is built at ski tracks or offsite. He was with HBS 10 years ago. We envisioned a world in which a renter can find apartments, book in [tour 10:18], turn up the [10:21] and if they want to take the apartment pre-qualify, leave a deposit and book the apartment. At scale you get to do that and have those teams. So how did you meet your cofounders? For me, its Zumper, an apartment rental platform. You always have more nos that more yeses in fundraising but it was ultimately about just hustling my network as much as possible. They are the two ways that Zumper currently monetizes them and there are two folks that [11:35]. I think just up front boundaries before you close the round is super important. So in terms of timeline, you were mentioning that the C round, you guys closed this 46 million a couple of months ago. I think if you hire four cofounders like yourself, thats difficult and luckily we didnt have that problem. Im the CEO and Ive always felt that it was my responsibility to do the fundraising. Hello, everyone, to the DealMakers Show. I mean youre doing various jobs, head of sales, head of finance, head of fundraising, head of like DZ. How much respect is there? Yeah. It was like $46 million. Anthemos Georgiades is the CEO and co-founder at Zumper. Every company is completely different and theres no gold standard. Anthemos Georgiades: One Lesson That Led To Raise $90 Million From The Top Venture Capital Firms by Alejandro Cremades Like many of our most successful entrepreneurs, Anthemos Georgiades was drawn into startup life to solving a burning problem. Anthemos Georgiades: Yes, weve raised $90 million in capital including a series C that we just closed three months ago. In the first two or three years you will kill your marketplace if you create any barriers to entry from either side. We didnt go that route because I have the network but if I didnt have the network and some people have the network and still do it, they are really good cheap in to getting scaled quickly. So Zumper is the vision for the company is to make renting an apartment as easy as booking a hotel. So today, we have another founder and another one that is quite successful in their own paths. So you acquire not long ago Pat Mapper and how did this come together? And it was just [22:11] during the process that its a startup, were at growth stage but not to expect to be able to predict our courses like that public company again. The other large investor in this round [20:05] scale so once you have product market set, how do you scale that? So I as British person moving to Silicon Valley in 2012 I have never run a startup before. Zumper has 7 current employee profiles, including CEO and co-founder Anthemos Georgiades. Well help you prequalify renters and actually get the renter in to a lease, signing the documents, paying the first month deposit but well charge you a percentage of the lease fairly. And so I wouldnt be too pressured. For every successful fundraise, every single company have a lot of nos. And at one point I just told one I just feel like I want to step on the egg and shoot the chicken because it was so repetitive. We both wanted to be entrepreneurs. So in the first two years, Zumper is now [07:52] $90 million in capital. Well, first of all, your point about quashing the egg and shooting the chicken. hendrick motorsports hats; anthemos georgiades net worth In many instances, really acquisitions are great to either feel growth on the company itself, either on the product or perhaps by adding a great talent, but unfortunately many M&A transactions fail really on the integration side of things. They wanted to close apartments like they book a hotel and so took the status of like 35 different apartments we leased using the technology in San Francisco to VCs and said, Hey, were really going to rebuild all of this but heres some data that shows this really can work at scale, and thats how we raised the first million dollars from some of the names that you mentioned. The most important thing is to surround yourself with an amazing support group because it is so much harder to build a company than I thought it was and the emotional resilience you need to get through the dark days and come back to the bright days even now is what [38:54] just get harder like yeah, we have more revenue now but with that there are people [38:58] and like huge revenue targets we have to attain and so the most important thing is surround yourself with a network of family, friends, mentors, peers, your team, your investors, whoever is an emotional crutch for you where you can take from them but also maybe get back to them as well when theyre having a tough time, thats the single most important thing is look after your mental health because it is lonely and it is stressful and if youre able to kind of be resilient you have a great outcome but it is really hard on some days to push through, so build that around just [39:35] and you can be happy while running your company. Anthemos Georgiades: Hey, thanks for having me. Alejandro: Of course and I agree with you there, Anthemos. Zumper which is a little bigger in terms of audience now caters more to urban professionals moving within cities. In the first two or three years you will kill your marketplace if you create any barriers to entry from either side. And we built this website using an outsource development shop in Europe that just tested one assumption of the end game which was can we get users in 2011, 2012 just as mobile was coming online to apply and close apartments from their phone. Theyre struggling to kind of grow their audience because they didnt have enough listings whereas Zumper at the getgo we had a lot of unique landlords on the platform that no one else had. Unluckily weve made some phenomenal early hires so the company that have all scaled to leadership roles, thats fantastic for retention because those people know that we could have hired from outside but we bet on them and it worked and so Zumper is a place to build theyre career not somewhere else. Got it. Alejandro: Got it. They were [sexy 23:47] company and really fantastic fundraisers but the rounds just take a long time, due diligence take a long time. Culture is everything and so investing in people making sure I as the CEO spend a lot of time as much as possible with people who dont report to me is absolutely critical and that is ultimately like the fabric on how most companies are run. For me, its Zumper, an apartment rental platform. So I learned a lot from a few companies that I loved, a few companies that I thought are doing crazy things I learned so much. So in terms of timeline, you were mentioning that the C round, you guys closed this 46 million a couple of months ago. One is I wouldnt be too pressured about it too early. Got it. His passion for relieving the stress for others in apartment rentals has given birth to a venture which has now raised $90 million, has experienced tremendous growth, and boasts a VC line up of some of the most prized investors in Silicon Valley. Alejandro: Of course. Well, Anthemos, it has been a pleasure to have you on the show. So all good companies have multiple offers on the table.