Zach Perret

Yeah, if you try to over-processize that, then it doesn't really work. A lot of people try to run an internal VC-style model, which is like, we'll fund you for a million bucks for a year, and we'll figure it out. And you want to come back and pitch for Series A style internally.

Yeah, and you can do that, but it becomes over-processized, and then everyone starts to try to hack the process as opposed to really finding the unique insight. I'd rather just let people go run at a thing for a while, and usually they'll come back and say, hey, this is not going to work. Or like, hey, there's something very real here.

Yeah, and you can do that, but it becomes over-processized, and then everyone starts to try to hack the process as opposed to really finding the unique insight. I'd rather just let people go run at a thing for a while, and usually they'll come back and say, hey, this is not going to work. Or like, hey, there's something very real here.

Yeah, and you can do that, but it becomes over-processized, and then everyone starts to try to hack the process as opposed to really finding the unique insight. I'd rather just let people go run at a thing for a while, and usually they'll come back and say, hey, this is not going to work. Or like, hey, there's something very real here.

They might come back in a week and say, like, there's something very real here. And like, I have a customer that's like chomping at them to buy it. Like, I really need to fund it now. I don't want them to wait 18 months to come back and ask for more resourcing. On the flip side, no one inside the company wants to go like off in a foray for like three years finding nothing.

They might come back in a week and say, like, there's something very real here. And like, I have a customer that's like chomping at them to buy it. Like, I really need to fund it now. I don't want them to wait 18 months to come back and ask for more resourcing. On the flip side, no one inside the company wants to go like off in a foray for like three years finding nothing.

They might come back in a week and say, like, there's something very real here. And like, I have a customer that's like chomping at them to buy it. Like, I really need to fund it now. I don't want them to wait 18 months to come back and ask for more resourcing. On the flip side, no one inside the company wants to go like off in a foray for like three years finding nothing.

MARK MANDELMANN- Yeah, so the early history of Plaid was we needed to integrate with all the banks. And these integrations were not like flip a switch, magically integrations on. It's like a lot of work to actually set up integration with the bank. In the early days, we had to actually build screen scrapers for the banks, because the banks didn't have APIs. And every screen scraper was different.

MARK MANDELMANN- Yeah, so the early history of Plaid was we needed to integrate with all the banks. And these integrations were not like flip a switch, magically integrations on. It's like a lot of work to actually set up integration with the bank. In the early days, we had to actually build screen scrapers for the banks, because the banks didn't have APIs. And every screen scraper was different.

MARK MANDELMANN- Yeah, so the early history of Plaid was we needed to integrate with all the banks. And these integrations were not like flip a switch, magically integrations on. It's like a lot of work to actually set up integration with the bank. In the early days, we had to actually build screen scrapers for the banks, because the banks didn't have APIs. And every screen scraper was different.

And we had this realization, if we're able just to grind out all the integrations, we're going to be better than anyone else. We will build better technology, yes, for these integrations, but also no one else is going to do this thing that we're doing.

And we had this realization, if we're able just to grind out all the integrations, we're going to be better than anyone else. We will build better technology, yes, for these integrations, but also no one else is going to do this thing that we're doing.

And we had this realization, if we're able just to grind out all the integrations, we're going to be better than anyone else. We will build better technology, yes, for these integrations, but also no one else is going to do this thing that we're doing.

No one else is as crazy as we are to be willing to go grind out 12,000 bank integrations and then make them all scale and build all the software that you need to self-heal the integrations. It was just a mess. And anytime I find a problem like that, I'm like, yeah, that's it. I get excited about it.

No one else is as crazy as we are to be willing to go grind out 12,000 bank integrations and then make them all scale and build all the software that you need to self-heal the integrations. It was just a mess. And anytime I find a problem like that, I'm like, yeah, that's it. I get excited about it.

No one else is as crazy as we are to be willing to go grind out 12,000 bank integrations and then make them all scale and build all the software that you need to self-heal the integrations. It was just a mess. And anytime I find a problem like that, I'm like, yeah, that's it. I get excited about it.

And everyone inside the company, even though we talk about this concept, people inside the company are often like, it's gonna be so hard. It's gonna be like, you know, it's gonna be difficult. There's like a long path. It might not work. So, and so forth.

And everyone inside the company, even though we talk about this concept, people inside the company are often like, it's gonna be so hard. It's gonna be like, you know, it's gonna be difficult. There's like a long path. It might not work. So, and so forth.

And everyone inside the company, even though we talk about this concept, people inside the company are often like, it's gonna be so hard. It's gonna be like, you know, it's gonna be difficult. There's like a long path. It might not work. So, and so forth.

I just believe that sometimes if you're willing to grind it out, you're gonna have a unique product that no one else is willing to build or able to build. Sometimes, you know, those things that are not necessarily like, it's not about the intellectual brilliance of the strategy that you come up with. It's about your ability and desire to do the work. I love those kind of challenges.