Fund/Build/Scale
After working for years in early-stage startups and as a journalist, here are three hard truths I’ve learned:
1. Success in Silicon Valley hinges on connections, hard work and luck.
2. Startups often fail because founders lack fundamental business knowledge.
3. Real, actionable advice comes from those who’ve actually done it.
There’s no such thing as “founder DNA.” If you’re willing to take on risk and invest years of your life in something that has maybe a 10% chance of paying off — less if you’re a woman or person of color — you can be a startup founder.
Here’s why I founded Fund/Build/Scale:
1. To help founders make fewer mistakes.
2. To share successful strategies that can accelerate your go-to-market journey.
3. To inspire more people to see themselves as potential founders. There’s a lot of overlooked talent out there, and we are missing out.
This podcast is for anyone who’s interested in learning the basic skills required to launch a startup, secure initial funding and transform an idea into a sustainable business.
I’m talking to guests about everything: finding a co-founder, conducting customer discovery, recruiting early employees, developing a PLG strategy, fundraising when you’re outside a major tech hub — all of it.
Interested? Subscribe to Fund/Build/Scale on all major platforms and follow the podcast on LinkedIn or Substack to get articles, excerpts, transcripts and more.
- Update frequency
- every 5 days
- Average duration
- 40 minutes
- Episodes
- 88
- Years Active
- 2023 - 2025
![Fund/Build/Scale mini-episode | From seed stage to Series A with Coalesce CEO Armon Petrossian [Part 1]](https://pbcdn1.podbean.com/imglogo/ep-logo/pbblog17670315/Better_Armon_Petrossian_FBS_1400px_tile_za62vq.jpg){kind=logo}
Fund/Build/Scale mini-episode | From seed stage to Series A with Coalesce CEO Armon Petrossian [Part 1]
I interviewed Coalesce CEO and co-founder Armon Petrossian in February 2024 to talk about his company's journey from seed stage to Series A. I had no idea he was already working on his next round: ju…
Episode 6 | AI compliance and regulation with Laura Bisesto of Nextdoor
I interviewed Laura Bisesto (global head of policy and privacy at Nextdoor) in January 2024 to get her advice for AI startups that are just starting out.
We talked about compliance, how to recogniz…
Episode 5 | Breaking into enterprise sales with Maria Latushkin (GVP of Technology and Engineering, Albertsons) and Jack Berkowitz (CDO, Securiti)
For episode 5, I interviewed Maria Latushkin, GVP of Technology and Engineering at Albertsons, the second-largest grocery chain in America, and Jack Berkowitz, Chief Data Officer at Securiti (previou…
Episode 4 | Fundraising from both sides of the table with Jorge Torres (CEO/co-founder, MindsDB) and Vijay Reddy (AI Start investor, Mayfield)
Jorge Torres (CEO, co-founder, MindsDB) and Vijay Reddy (AI Start investor, Mayfield) were the first two people I interviewed for Fund/Build/Scale.
We met up at Jorge's office in San Francisco's M…
Episode 3 | Tapping into the AI Developer Community with Ozzy Johnson (Director of Solutions Engineering, NVIDIA)
I wanted to learn more about how inception-stage AI founders can tap into developer ecosystems, so I spoke to Ozzy Johnson, Director of Solutions Engineering for NVIDIA Developer Programs.
In his rol…
Episode 2 | Digging Your Moat: Customer Discovery + PLG for AI Startups with Rodrigo Liang (CEO/co-founder, SambaNova)
Idea-stage investors are still excited about AI, but the savvier ones are looking for social proof and tangible takeaways from the customer discovery process. Before they commit, these investors are …
Episode 1 | Building Trust with Your Inception Investor with guest Navin Chaddha (Managing Partner, Mayfield)
In the first episode of Fund/Build/Scale, Mayfield Managing Partner Navin Chaddha spoke about the need for founders to identify investors they can trust, how to pitch Mayfield's AI Start seed fund, a…
Welcome to Fund/Build/Scale
Hi. I’m Walter Thompson.
I worked in startups for years before becoming a journalist.
Now, I’m launching “Fund/Build/Scale,” a podcast that explains how to create an AI startup when all you have is…