Ep. 320 How I Raised It with Andrei Serban of Console
episode
How I Raised It - The podcast where we interview startup founders who raised capital.
40 min
8 chapters
transcribed 11 days ago
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What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
Welcome to How I Raised It! The podcast that goes behind the scenes with entrepreneurs who've raised capital. We uncover the tips, tricks, and techniques they use to get investors to write a check. Strap in and turn it off. Hi, welcome to another episode of How I Raised It, produced by foundersweet dot com and fundingstack dot com. Today I have a repeat guest, Andre Surbon of Console, joining us from San Francisco. How's your day going?
Anything. Uh good so far. Thanks for having me having me on. Uh appreciate it. Uh it's good to see you again.
Good to see you again. So so I think you're one of the very few repeat guests I've had, which is pretty cool. So you were on previously with your startup Fuzz Buzz. Maybe briefly describe, and I'll link to the that episode in the notes if people really want to, you know, trace your history or whatever, but briefly describe what that was doing. And then since we recorded that, which was probably right after you raised capital. In a short version, what's what happened to the business? Sure.
Yeah, I think uh it was a while ago, six, seven years ago. F FuzzBuzz was an application security testing company. Uh started that right out of college. And yeah, I think we talked right after we raised we raised like a three and a half million dollar C ground, went through Y C and so on. Um spent about three more years after that working on it and then ultimately sold the company to Ripling. in uh I think it was uh late twenty twenty two, early twenty twenty three, something like that. And joined up link for a little bit and then, you know, jumped into console uh shortly after.
Very cool. Let's spend m another minute or two on that. But you know, if you can disclose the acquisition price or any details about the exit, were they hunting you or did you at one point say, Hey, it's I wanna go do something else.
What is the story behind Andrei’s first startup, Fuzzbuzz, and its acquisition by Rippling?
Let me sell this company. Like how'd the exit kind of come about?
Yeah. So we were selling largely so security software, uh, largely to like US government, large enterprises. We were seeing a lot of traction. I think we were feeling this like market shift uh starting. And I think you know, it felt like a natural kind of time to to go in and sell the company. I think, you know, rippling is notorious for just bringing on founders and founding teams and kind of giving them a lot of scope and and and building out new products with them. And so uh we were very I think we were very kind of open to to that idea. And so that that's kind of how it came about. Uh it's honestly selling a company is a lot like raising uh in many ways. Um so is is a interesting experience for sure.
Um great grateful to to to Rippling and and the team there to for giving us the opportunity. Yeah.
Yeah, that's awesome. Yeah, I was gonna kinda go down that vein just for one more question or two. Um, you know, most people listening here is like, Hey, I wanna go raise money, but then obviously if you're raising money, there is that exit consideration. What What would you tell yourself or or you know, or tell founders what one or two bit of advice would you tell founders for running a good exit. Anything you maybe either didn't do quite optimally that you would improve next time when going through kind of the exit process or just general tips for kind of having a smooth and successful exit. I know it's pretty open question. Yeah. Yeah
yeah. I I think like I said, it's it selling a company is actually quite similar to to raising. And so um I think we realize that a little Too late in the process, but you know, you want to make sure you have like a strong list of of companies you're if you're actively selling, right? Um you want to try and find a a good list of companies that you want to go after. You want to run a really tight process. You want to have all the materials ready to go. Um and you know in our case, I think, you know, if if if a company comes to you, same thing there, right? You want to make sure you can turn that quickly into a process um where you're just prepared. Otherwise these things drag on forever.
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Chapters
8 chapters
1
What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
0:01–1:49
2
What is the story behind Andrei’s first startup, Fuzzbuzz, and its acquisition by Rippling?
1:49–8:17
3
How did Andrei navigate the exit process and what lessons did he learn from selling Fuzzbuzz?
8:17–15:15
4
Why did Andrei decide to start Console and what problem is it solving in IT service management?
15:15–21:17
5
How does Console use AI‑powered agents to automate internal support requests via Slack and Teams?
21:17–27:33
6
What was the fundraising strategy for Console’s $29 M round and how did the two‑week process work?
27:33–32:34
7
How did Andrei target the right VCs and what criteria did he use to choose Thrive Capital and DST Global?
32:34–36:52
8
In what ways did AI assist Andrei’s fundraising – from the investor memo to deal sourcing?
36:52–40:54
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