The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch

20VC: Fiverr CEO: 'If You're Not Adapting to AI, F* You. You're Done | Why "Time to Copy" is the Most Important Metric in Startups Today | Why 99% of AI Companies Today Will Die | Why Governments Will Take Control of AI with Micha Kauffman

09 Jun 2025

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Micha Kaufman is the Founder and CEO of Fiverr, the leading online marketplace for freelance services. Fiverr has had an insane ride in the public markets, in 2019 the company went public with a $650M market cap, at their peak that hit over $8BN. Today, facing a wave of AI, the company has a market cap of $1.121BN on an estimated $430M EOY revenues. Prior to co-founding Fiverr, Micha successfully founded and led several startups over the last 30 years. In Today's Episode We Discuss: 00:00 – "Fuck you. It's not my job to make you better." Micha's viral internal email that sparked a company-wide awakening 05:00 – The real reason Micha thinks Fiverr is vulnerable to AI 07:00 – "Replace 100% of your job with AI": Micha's challenge to every employee 11:00 – The brutal truth about entitlement in the modern workforce 13:00 – Wake the f*** up: Micha on the crisis of work ethic and ambition 15:00 – "Too many startups, zero value": Why AI is the new dot-com bubble 17:00 – The time-to-clone has collapsed: Why your startup can be copied in 10 days 21:00 – Why distribution, not code, is the moat that matters now 23:00 – The new game of investing: Why backing "missionaries" is all that counts 25:00 – The seed investment Micha wrote off… that became his biggest win 38:00 – "Being a CEO today is like captaining a ship in a storm" 39:00 – Will governments take control of AI? The Manhattan Project analogy 42:00 – The rise of AI superpowers—and the brutal decline of everyone else 46:00 – The single-person unicorn: Is it real? Micha says yes 47:00 – Why Micha's hiring more engineers—not fewer 48:00 – Marketing is being disrupted faster than engineering. Here's how 54:00 – What cost Micha wants to cut—but can't 56:00 – Why Micha would tell his kid: "Don't go to university" 57:00 – The business Fiverr could have built before OnlyFans—and why they didn't 59:00 – How Micha decides every year whether he should still be CEO 01:00:00 – The ultimate metric: When meaning matters more than happiness

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The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch

20VC: Fiverr CEO: 'If You're Not Adapting to AI, F* You. You're Done | Why "Time to Copy" is the Most Important Metric in Startups Today | Why 99% of AI Companies Today Will Die | Why Governments Will Take Control of AI with Micha Kauffman

This episode hasn't been transcribed yet

Other episodes from The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch

20VC: Will SpaceX IPO at $1.5TRN | Will Cursor Kill Figma | Lightspeed Raises $9BN | OpenAI: $1BN from Disney, New CRO & #1 App in App Store | Oracle and Broadcom Hit: Now the Time to Buy?

20Growth: How Wiz Built a $30BN Brand in Enterprise | What Worked vs What Was a Mega Failure: Lessons Learned | Why Marketers Make the Worst CMOs & What To Look for in Growth with Raaz Herzberg

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