How Borderless Founders Build Global Companies

Key Takeaway

Map and activate your diaspora this week. Identify five people from your country, school, or prior industry who have built or operated in the market you want to enter; ask each for one 20-minute conversation and one introduction to a customer, operator, or peer. The episode’s core lesson is that global founders gain leverage by turning shared background into a giving network—then using that network to recruit talent, validate ideas, and secure early design partners.

Episode Overview

Angela Strange and Gabriel Vasquez explain a16z’s “founders without borders” strategy: supporting internationally minded entrepreneurs who build global companies from, into, and across multiple markets. They discuss how diaspora networks, local ecosystem leaders, and time spent in Silicon Valley can help founders access talent, customers, capital, and operating knowledge.

Full Transcript

Transcript of How Borderless Founders Build Global Companies from A16Z. Auto-generated from episode audio; may contain minor errors.

Anyone who is international, whether they are building primarily in their home country to start, but have global ambitions, is a founder without borders. They often harbor resentment. It is a desire to become a role model and show the world that, regardless of where they were born, they can achieve greatness. Unlike in the US, where you can get everything as a service at every layer of the stack, in many other markets you simply can't do that. There is no fraud as a stack, KYC as a stack.

Then you end up having to build everything. There is this interesting dichotomy in this technology that is very democratic. It distributes the ability to obtain it anywhere in the world. Open up other markets. But it also concentrates the kind of epicenter where things move the fastest in the Bay Area. In 10 years, what do you expect to see in the global topology of startups worldwide? I think... Welcome back to the a16z podcast . Today we're here with Angela Strange and Gabriel Vasquez, two of the architects of A16Z's global investment strategy.

Today, the same day we're releasing this podcast, we'll also be publishing an article about this idea of ​​founders without borders and who the founders without borders are. To answer our first question, historically, venture capital has really been located in Silicon Valley. So what makes founders without borders interesting, and what's the story behind international investment ? Yes. I remember that when I was very early in my career at A16Z, I was mainly investing in financial services or fintech. And one of the first articles I wrote was about how to get distribution in financial services.

It can be very difficult. You need to find a consumer at the exact moment they are ready to switch from their traditional services. It's as if there's a lot of inertia. Yes. And at the same time, my brother had just joined Nubank in Brazil. I remember him saying that David had said, "Yeah, you know, you could compete to be the fifth financial service for every customer in the US, or you could go into an open market with five fat, happy banks that only serve 20% of the population.

And yeah, it's a lot harder to get things going because you have to get a license, you have to build all the infrastructure, but these very open markets exist. And that's what initially interested me in Latin America. And the first check I wrote at A16Z was to Santiago Suárez, the CEO of Addi, which now serves a quarter of the Colombian population with banking and payment services. And that kick-started our international strategy, which was initially focused on Latin America. Yes. And shortly after, I remember getting a WhatsApp message from Gabriel, who had joined A16Z on a completely different team.

And he said, 'Hey, you do n't know me yet, but I see this huge opportunity in Latin America.' I've met 25 of the top CEOs . I have them all in a group chat." from WhatsApp. We should do something about this." That's it...And at that time, Gabriel, were they all fintech founders or did they work in all existing sectors? In all sectors, but historically in Latin America there are more fintech founders than in other regions, but that was the premise , you know, at the time I did the mapping, I think Angela, there were only 30 unicorns in Latin America.

So the thesis was that you could bring them all together in one room and get them to connect because Brazilian unicorn founders weren't talking to Colombian or Mexican unicorn founders. So the opportunity arose to bring them all together. And, you know, we ended up doing it. We created a WhatsApp group with Angela, Marc Andreessen, Alex Rampell and a bunch of other people from the company. And we brought them all together. And one of the interesting things is that they were discussing issues about the region, but they also started exchanging business flows within the group because they were all prolific angel investors.

That gave us a great opportunity not only to see the first business flows, but also to be able to participate in that community and help them. And what do you think the first people in this community had that a Silicon Valley founder wouldn't? What kind of knowledge or opportunities do you think they had? I think some, and this relates to what we're doing now, some of the best founders there grew up in their local markets , spent some time in the US, and then came back.

Like Santi de Addi, for example. He grew up in Colombia, went to Yale, spent time at several large and small financial services companies in the U.S., and then returned home. So it's a combination of looking at the models that worked in the US, but then deeply understanding your local market. And so Addi was able to begin. He recruited one of his best childhood friends, someone who possessed a very advanced technical profile. And then another thing you should know is that, unlike in the US, where you can get everything as a service at every layer of the stack, in many other markets, including Latin America, you simply can't do that.

There is no type of fraud such as stack , KYC as stack. Therefore, you end up having to create everything, which requires a much deeper knowledge of the local market, but it's very useful to be able to borrow from all over the world. Yes. Yes. And it seems that, you know, this originated in a WhatsApp group. And then, you know, now, suddenly, it's a whole strategy that you two are really leading in this company. And I'm curious to know what the moment was when you thought, "Oh, well, this has to evolve beyond what we're doing right now ." " Well, it was interesting.

We had very active communities in all the regions. And then, what really happened was AI. Yes. And there's this interesting dichotomy where, you know, this technology is very democratic. It distributes the ability to get it anywhere in the world. It opens up other markets. But it also concentrates the kind of epicenter where things move the fastest in the Bay Area. Yes. And then it shifted, compared to the Brazilian founders, the Colombian founders who wanted us to go to Brazil and Colombia and connect, everyone wanted to come to the Bay Area.

Yes. And integrate a lot faster. Yes. And when that happens, what kind of issues were you negotiating, challenges or opportunities? For example, you're an international founder, you come to the Bay Area, you know, maybe you have some connections, you know some investors, you know some customers, you know other founders, but what are the challenges? And also, what do you bring with you from your home country to the Bay Area? And what kind of learnings are you taking away?" Exchange? I think, you know, one of the things we noticed about these groups is that if you're, say, from Brazil, you end up mapping the best talent in Silicon Valley from Brazil.

So, we started to see that this trend is happening in almost every country, you know, you can extrapolate it to Europe or Asia and it's more or less the same thing, which is like, where are the smartest people from my country? Because they'll understand where I come from. So, the things you bring have less to do with local knowledge because now you're going to be playing on a global stage, and it's that connectivity you can have with someone you don't know. And the fact that they're in Silicon Valley, you know, Angela and I talk about this a lot, which is this culture of giving.

You know, people help you a lot even before you meet, but there's a closer affinity if you're from the same country because people can see themselves through that journey. So, that really ended up leading us to organize this, what started as a small community, Borderless Dinners. And we called them Borderless Dinners because at first we were very focused, We tried to focus on the niche, so at that time it was very focused only on Latin Americans. So what we did was map out the most successful founders from Latin America.

And every time people came to visit, we would host a dinner for them, and there would be like 20 or 30 people at these dinners. But they could see what the journey of a person from Latin America in Silicon Valley was like, and how they ended up being successful, right? So a big part of the strategy was Guillermo Rauch from Veracel. He's someone who has obviously been successful and has done very well in Silicon Valley, but he was very excited to meet people from Latin America and help them on that journey.

We have people from the founder of Brex who also do this . Pedro Franceschi, we also had, you know, many other founders who came. But the other interesting thing about this is that that group has also matured now. Where the people who attended that group early on have now graduated and become unicorn founders and are now speakers. So, we can give the example of Víctor Cárdenas from Slidor and Factory Ears. So, he's created this incredible connectivity. Yes. Yes. It's interesting how the American version of this is so identifiable if you think about some of the schools; the alumni networks around the top schools are incredibly powerful.

I would argue that the country- specific international diasporas are even more powerful. It's just that they often lacked that kind of organization. Yes. And now a lot of these diasporas are organizing, too, right? We're not the only people helping out here. But I think what we saw was this opportunity. For example , if you come from a country and land in the US, you figure out how to get your visa, you figure out where to live, you get into the network, you have clients, you have this desire to pay upfront.

Yes. But there isn't an easy way to do it the same way you can go back and talk at your university. Yes. Right? Yes. And so, we thought, "Hey, what if we made an easy way to go back and talk at your university? "But your university is made up of all the smartest young people who graduated from college, or dropped out of high school, or found their way into these different programs who really want to build global companies." And then, the power of that is really exciting when you walk into the room.

Yes. Yes, no, that makes a lot of sense. I think for someone listening to this who's wondering, "What 's the difference between, you know, a borderless founder and an immigrant founder, or a borderless founder and someone who happens to be an international person who comes and starts a company in the United States?" How do you help them understand how we define or understand what a borderless founder is ? I like to adopt the most inclusive view possible, which is anyone trying to create a global company.

Yes. And then, you know, Americans could technically be founders without borders, but they tend to be connected here anyway. And so, any international entrepreneur, whether you're primarily creating in your home country to start with, but have global ambitions, you're a founder without borders. Yes. And I think there's something unique about these people too, that, while not all of them, they tend to behave as if they carry some kind of resentment or grudge. Or they grew up in a country that was ignored. Well, my story is that I grew up in El Salvador.

TRUE? Because it's a small country, when you arrive in the US nobody tells you, "Hey, I met another great guy who came from El Salvador." "You like to create your own role model. And I think a lot of these people grew up in, you know, we have a German founder who grew up in a very, very small town in Germany. And Germany is obviously very well-known and everyone respects the country, but the fact that he came from this small town is like , you know, I'm going to make the most of this opportunity.

So, even in the US, we've seen people who grew up in small rural areas, and that's what drives them. And I think it's the desire that they want to become role models and show the world something, that regardless of where they were born, they can achieve greatness, right? And I think that's the mindset these people have, that they want to go and create, yes, dominate globally. Yes. Yes. When, like I like what you were saying earlier, Angela, about how it works almost like an alumni network at a university or something.

How do founders find each other, like the E16Z Borderless Founders community, but how do other communities find each other, and how do we find them ? Yes, I think it's interesting, maybe a Well... I'll answer your question, but I think there's an interesting history of countries doing this. And part of the reason I was so passionate about working on this with Gabrielle is that I 'm from Ottawa, Canada, which isn't too far from Silicon Valley. But it was also a country where a lot of companies were founded, but very few actually grew.

So about 15 years ago, a group of Bay Area Canadians and I founded this organization called C100. It was 100 Bay Area Canadians who had founded very large companies or held influential positions where they could help. And this forum was created so they could give back, but in doing so, help Canadian companies grow. And it was really two things. One, helping them find design partners . Obviously, the startups had to be good enough to get the contract, but we opened the door for them. And the second, helping them find executives who could really help them scale.

Because I think that's one of the hardest things to put in place. Ecosystems are developing: you can have very, very smart people, you can get customers, but then, when you're looking for someone to be your sales leader and take you from 50 to 500 million, you probably have to find them in another market until your market matures a bit. And I think with the Canadian network itself, there are now a lot of unicorns around the world created by Canadians. Shopify is one of the big ones, but Open Text, the founder was Canadian.

So these markets are starting to grow, and that means it's easier to get into those diasporas and find them. And what that brings to our current network, I think it's also starting to become easier to find. Like there are iconic founders who tend to be in those networks. And then, they really want to give back. The smartest founders are able to network to get into them. But I also think, and you know, this is largely to Gabriel's credit, who takes multiple flights to various countries around the world.

Just being on the ground to find the next generation of talent before it's obvious is very key. Yes, from Actually, I have a follow-up question, which is whether there are places that resemble where Canada was 15 years ago. Or does it have something like AI and the promise and allure of Silicon Valley? Has that narrative proliferated much faster now? Or are there still places where they 're really like...? Yes, I think market maturity is very relative. For example, some of the markets we spend the most time in are like the UK, Sweden, and Israel is very well known for this because historically, in per capita terms, these countries have produced a lot.

So, what we've seen is that AI has enabled that, but it has also made it grow exponentially in some cases. But then again, there are other countries where, due to their internal dynamics, you don't yet see the same level of flourishing . But this is where we see many of these founders moving to Silicon Valley. And it's an interesting tension that you sometimes see. Because these local ecosystems that are fruitful and creating many companies, people are very proud and think, "We want In the case of Sweden, we want to make Sweden great, right?

We want to make the UK an independent ecosystem. Compared to other ecosystems that might be a bit further along, they feel the next step for them is to create an ecosystem and drive that whole movement, which will take a long time. And there are a lot of founders, to be fair, who want to dedicate their lives to building that ecosystem in their own country. So, this is one of the things Angela and I spend a lot of time on, which is like this: you know, sometimes we see this kind of father figure in these early ecosystems that are building a very, very difficult business, and all these AI-native founders come to them first.

They act as a kind of beacon, shining a light on what Silicon Valley is and also guiding them in defining who the people are that they should be connecting with. So, it really depends on how mature the ecosystem is, but there's definitely a big difference by country. I think what's really interesting that's happening now is, first, I think any ecosystem benefits from its diaspora building amazing companies all over the world. But what's interesting What's happening now, we see it with us as investors in a company called Taco, which handles payroll and HR workflows across Brazil, but its bigger mission is really to reduce bureaucracy in Brazil.

And one of its founders was previously the founder of Rappi, uh, he partnered with another founder, Fernando. This is his second company. And they've been able to recruit Brazilians from the US who really grew up in Brazil, they understand these bureaucratic issues. They believe that now with the right talent, with the right AI, with the right companies , they can really help their country. And this flow of talent has become really interesting. Yes, yes, that's great. Actually, that brings me to my next question, which is...

I want to talk about the article you wrote where you talk about these three native advantages that borderless founders have. Uh, as you said, they have talent and access to talent and these really deep local talent networks, and they can even call people who live abroad. They have a brand, and then they have a base of a very solid customer base to which they can also sell. I'd love to hear you talk about the brand and the customers, because we've already talked about talent and what you're seeing in these kinds of founders.

Yes, I think that, in turn, in terms of branding, one example that's in our portfolio is 11 Labs. Well, this is a company that started in Europe, in the UK, but it has Polish founders. And one of the things that has happened is that for Poland, 11 Labs has become such a big name for them that they're representatives, you know, there's a founder we know who calls this the AI ​​Olympics. So, every country wants its own candidates to win medals, right? So, in Poland, 11 Labs has become that candidate, right?

And I think, you know, the Polish government has just invested in 11 Labs and is going to carry out a lot of initiatives with them. So, we see this happening quite frequently. In Sweden, we've witnessed many situations where the Swedish government It has provided great support to both Lovable and Legora. And when this happens, it gives you a huge boost and a lot of validation from all the major companies that are part of your country. And not even your country, even countries that are auxiliaries to it, because everyone sees the government's support .

They say, "Well, wow, that's a seal of approval." I really want to work with them." Well, that's on the branding side, some of the things that aren't very obvious when you invest internationally. I think on the other point about clients, you know, we've had several examples of our companies in very early stages where there's just a design partnership that eventually turns into a multi-million dollar contract, but they start working with the biggest companies. You know, we invested in a company called Factor Labs. They started working with the largest conglomerate in all of Latin America, which is owned by the Slim family.

And that introduction has led them to another type of workforce that they could tap into to expand within that corporation. And then we also see that this develops from what Angela described earlier, it's like, well, if I'm a founder, let's say I was born in Spain, as in the case of Supersonic. Who is the smartest person who went to my university and what are they doing now? And in his case , you know, the person who used to be the CRO of Salesforce is now the CEO.

And they connected with him, and then Salesforce became his first design partner, and eventually, he became a customer. So, these advantages are not very obvious. It may seem that, in reality, sometimes, when you haven't studied it, it's quite random, but everything is connected to the same root. The other way the brand can help is that, as I mentioned, these global companies need to recruit global talent. And so, I will use Audius as an example. It grew very quickly and then, okay, how do you find a loan officer who can make billions of dollars of GMV?

The best credit scorers tend to come from Capital One. How do you attract someone from Capital One in Virginia to work in Bogotá? You become the most popular company in Colombia. Mhm. So instead of joining one of the 50 similar companies in the US, why not join the clear brand winner? And I think that, in trying to attract international talent, that can be very interesting. The other element of the brand is that you can build, a bit like Gabe said, relationships with the government. And so Jeeves has done a lot with Brazil's central bank.

And they are helping corporations move money internationally through stable currencies. And they are starting to earn that reputation among businesses as the fastest and most reliable way to do it. And as a result, they attract more talent, and that starts to accumulate on top of each other constantly. Yes, I think this capitalization cycle is really interesting. Well, it's something we talk about a lot at the company. I believe Mark was the first to introduce this idea: the idea of preferential linking. So, the idea is that, you know, if you signal very early on that you can attract the best talent and the best, the best clients and you really get that attention and that momentum, the next incremental person, the next incremental client becomes much easier to attract.

Do you think that really strong borderless founders or international founders, you know, assuming the company is, you know, strong and , in a way, their big startup, do you think they have it easier in some way or that maybe they have a more differentiated kind of this in some way? I think, you know, you could kind of say that the whole A16Z was founded to accelerate our founders' preferential attachment. Yes. And how do you make that steering wheel move as fast as possible? And I would say that founders without borders have more levers at their disposal.

Yes, to get it up and running. Yes. And then, if you start with talent, this is the fiercest talent market I 've seen in my career as an investor and also as an operator; they have information and access to differentiated groups. We have an AI insurance company in Brazil. And then, you might think that the best talent is at the most well- known universities there. Actually, the talent in AI is at a university you've never heard of. And how do you find it? Well, actually you go to scholarship programs that travel the country looking for the best students.

and take them there. In fact, these are robotics competitions. So , if you're a company that gets 10 incredibly smart people very quickly, the eleventh person you might be trying to recruit from the US, who has 100 other offers, meets with your team and thinks, " Damn, how did they get such good people over there?" And that sets the talent wheel in motion. As for the client, whenever you want to acquire a major client, the first question they will ask is: " Who else is using you that is in my sector and of my size?" And there are many opportunities in the US to sell to banks and insurance companies.

Nobody wants to be the first bank or the first insurance company. But through the Borderless Founder Network, you can get a large bank and a large insurance company in another country much faster, and that will greatly accelerate your business in the US. So, I think you have these levers to make things move faster. And even going back to the point about Tangent , this is like when you try to start in that specific country. But we also see this in the cases of really attractive companies in Silicon Valley like Cognition, where their first market launch was actually in Brazil, and that represents their largest percentage of revenue from the beginning because these companies want to adopt the IS as soon as possible, and they can't find many providers to do it at that time .

And in the case of Cognition, they managed to build a fairly solid network within Brazil to be able to carry it out. Interesting. Interesting. So, at that point, does that mean you can also pursue a borderless strategy or a borderless strategy simply by selling in markets that might not necessarily see that kind of thing? Yes, I think the best way to think about it is like, you know, there's the bridge to Silicon Valley and then there's the same bridge that can be used in the opposite direction as well.

Yes. Yes. And that's how we try to position ourselves, which is that these borderless founders come to Silicon Valley, but obviously they have global ambitions. They could have a strong network if they are from Germany. in Germany, but they probably have no knowledge about Brazil or Japan. And those are things we can be very helpful in helping them master. Yes. Yes, and then it's interesting that we started this by connecting the diaspores to each other and now almost a greater power is the intradiaspore. Mhm. TRUE?

As the first German company to partner with the largest Spanish conglomerate. That's incredible. But it's something that wasn't very intuitive to expect to happen. Yes. I think there's something that's very unique about us, and, you know, I'm pretty confident about what we've built here, is that there probably isn't another investor who can do that for you— cross-pollinate between different ecosystems in different countries and different geographies, basically from the very beginning. Yes. Yes. At the beginning of the conversation, Gabriel, you mentioned that, you know, your first market map of Latin American unicorns was of 20 companies or something like that.

30. 30 30 companies. Now, when tackling a new geography or a new country, how do you begin? What is that process like now? Yes, we have this term that we use called local luminaires. So, it goes back to what we mentioned earlier, but it's like highly respected people in the local ecosystem who have created companies. The scale of the company and the success of the company don't really matter, what matters are the people who work hard to make their ecosystem worthwhile, right? So, as you know, in the case of Sweden, we have a founder we met, the founders of Voi, who are Fredrik Hjelmstedt and Adam Jafer.

Looking at it from the outside, one would n't think that, because what they built turned out to be a company very similar to Lime, which is dedicated to the electric scooter rental service . You wouldn't have thought they'd be in the middle of the AI ​​boom in Sweden, would you? But if we look closely ... All the angel investments Fredrik made, he's in almost all the relevant companies that emerged from Sweden. And the reason is because it is very well connected with both younger founder groups and experienced ones.

And try to bring them all together and defend Sweden's arguments as to why Sweden should be part of this, going back to the analogy of the AI ​​Olympics. And this same person can be observed throughout each of the different markets we have mapped. So, our first task is: how do we understand who these people are? How do we help these people? Because there are clearly many ways we can help them. One of them is simply to validate their message , right? When you've been, you know, an evangelist and then you get some kind of validation from a company like ours, it really helps them prove their point.

So, they approach us, we start working with them, doing events, helping their companies recruit. And that gives us access to the best people within their network. And I think the second step is, well, once you've identified these people, you've identified the equivalent of the rising stars or who these Silicon Valley luminaries are in that country, right? So, you know, one of these rising stars was in Sweden, it 's Gabriel Pettersson. TRUE? Well, this guy dropped out of high school in Sweden, came to the US without an education, got a job at Midjourney, then became one of OpenAI's youngest researchers and now founded a company.

But every time there's a Swedish founder who wants to move to Silicon Valley, they want to get in touch with him. Yes. Right? So, if you build this network you identified when they 're in Sweden, and then when they move to Sweden, you help them connect with successful people from their home country, you're more or less in the flow. Yes. Yes. And that's how we build every ecosystem. You know, the joke that many people often tell us is something like: "Hey Gabe, you're very well known in Sweden, Germany, or Brazil." And I tell them a joke like: "In every country I make them feel like it's the only country I look at." "Right?

Because, you know, we try to drift to a very, very local level. Yes. Or this local nation in this ecosystem . Yes. I think the other thing, like phase three, as the ecosystems mature a little more, the executives in the next emerging group—one of the things that makes it so powerful is that it's really mission-driven. So they saw how hard it was, and the sales chiefs at NC, like founding engineers, have a little bit of liquidity and now want to pass it on to the next generation of founders.

And we have a global scouting program where we recruit the best emerging stars from companies to be a part of it as well, and that helps build the ecosystem. Yes. And the last part I'll add to drift this point is that when we find enough density, we even do events just for that community. About a year ago , we did one with Angela and Ben Horowitz , where he was a speaker, and we brought the best Nordic founders to Silicon Valley for a week. And then we invited them to our events.

So when we see that density, we try to do Very local events to help that ecosystem. Yes. Yes. It's funny, we just launched a podcast with Will Gaybrick from Stripe, and it's funny the parallel between how Stripe works and what you're describing, where it's like you start very early with people or teams, as very small companies, and then you grow and start offering more and you grow with those companies as they become large companies and you're there for every generation or every step of the lifecycle.

So, it's funny. It's almost like you see how these kinds of flywheels, especially when it comes to startups, have repeatable movements regardless of whether it's an international investment strategy or a payments platform. It seems very similar when you really look at what's happening behind the scenes. 100% Yes. And I think also, if you think about all of us, we remember the people who helped us. Mhm. when it wasn't obvious. Yes. And so, I think, you know, in our role, we have to have a real passion for meeting people, paying it forward, generally, increasing your ecosystem, and some of them will become great founders you can invest in.

Others will become broader parts of the ecosystem, but you have to be there early. I'd love to talk about some of the recurring founders we've identified and spoken to and built relationships with. What are your thoughts on that? It's just that it's something we've done a couple of times already, so it's very interesting. Yeah, well, you know, it was kind of like continuing to execute the WhatsApp strategy, quite interesting. But, well , you know, I think these local ecosystems had a surge, an initial wave of entrepreneurs that reached significant scale, let's say between $1 billion and $5 billion, generally.

But they didn't get to see it all, right? So, certain things happened because it was the first time, and because the ecosystem itself turned out to be something really, really difficult. There were a lot of lessons they learned that they couldn't see or fulfill their vision. That makes them move on and think, "Okay, I'm going to do a next business, but this time I'm going to apply everything." The knowledge I have, the entire network I've built, and I'm going to build something even bigger, because I know I can." Right?

So that's been, you know, the way we've identified these people, because they're motivated to say, "Well, this $5 output or this $5 result wasn't enough for me." I want to do something bigger from my local ecosystem. "And the way we build these relationships is, you know, we follow up with them very, very closely. We help them come to events. What these people often want is to reactivate their network from time to time, right? Especially in AI, they want to connect with the smartest engineers at Stanford, right?

They want to be in the flow of talent, and we give them that bridge to it, right? So we map these people, we connect them, and we also help them brainstorm their ideas. In that case , we introduce them to customers so they can have these honest conversations and validate what they're thinking. And then we're also very intentional when it comes to bringing everything together for them, right? Like in the case I'm going to give as an example, we invested in Freder Gilliam, he has a startup.

When the company was called pit.com. So when they came to Silicon Valley, we connected them with senior executives at DoorDash, senior executives at Lyft—the thing is, they're from many of our portfolio companies. And We helped them brainstorm the idea. And then , when they came back from the trip, they had a pretty clear vision of what they wanted to do and accomplish. And then they decided to work with us because , even though they had pre-existing relationships, at that time, you know, it wasn't very obvious that many investors wanted to invest in them.

But by differentiating ourselves on the ideation side, they decided to work with us. Yes. I think the other opportunity to bridge the gap, especially for recurring founders, is that they probably don't have a network of the smartest 18, 19, or 20-year-olds in AI. And these are incredible engineers who probably want to be founders, but they might want an in-between job. And sometimes these recurring founders are the best, especially the ones who are really hungry to start over. They've learned a lot of lessons. And it's a great school for CEOs to come and work for their companies for two, three, or four years.

And this kind of collaboration that we get through networking ends up being very powerful for both sides. If I'm a founder, I'm in an early stage, I'm a founder in Seed stage, what's my experience like entering this ecosystem, and how do you grow with these companies from Stage A to growth? Yeah, so the first thing we focus on is visas. Yes. It might not sound like a big deal, but it's the most stressful process when it comes to moving to the US. It's like, what's the right visa?

What am I qualified for ? Who, who, who's going to write a letter of recommendation for me? And those are things we can help a lot of founders with. We actually invested early in the season in a visa company and a visa called Extraordinary. Yes. And through Extraordinary, we collaborate a lot to help these founders come to the US to make sure they have the right qualifications or help them understand what they need to come to the US as soon as possible. Well, you know , the other thing is there are a lot of hacker houses that started overseas, but now they've created campuses—to use Angela's analogy—in the US where they offer rooms free for people to stay for a short period of time.

You know, we sponsored one called Palo Alto House. We met this company at Slush, which is a big event held in Finland. And then, you know, there were four very smart students from CDTM, which is one of the best programs in Germany. And they had this idea, like, "Hey, we want to have a house in Palo Alto, and we want to bring the smartest people we know to stay with us in Palo Alto and help them brainstorm." So we decided to sponsor this house, and, you know, for a period of four months.

And for four months, they overstayed their welcome . I think they hosted 1,200 people for dinners. Because of that, we ended up meeting some exceptional people who we're still in touch with today. Great. They were actually running a small college. A small liberal arts college. And now, interestingly enough, they want to find a way to keep it going independently. But there are many examples of campuses in different countries. So they We help connect in the way they say, and then, through our borderless communities, we say to them, "Hey, you're here for a couple of weeks, why don't you come to this dinner and meet all the really smart founders and operators who just went through a similar process?" "So, yes.

And then I think, as founders start building their companies, the next step is usually for them to be very technical founders and have an idea of ​​what market or use case they should be addressing. And one of the things I think is particularly interesting internationally is that many countries have, you know, several powerful families that control many of the companies. And the next generation of those families is very, very motivated to become AI natives. And we've brought them into our Bartle founders' group. So, you know, COOs, finance from all over the world to contribute ideas, talk about their problems, and they're very willing to talk to the smartest people in our community about what they should be building.

And that can also be a really interesting kind of connection . Yes. We've gotten actual contracts for portfolio companies out of those initiatives. Very cool. Well, you know, right now I'm an international founder who's listening to this. I'm thinking about moving to Silicon Valley. What should I know? What should I be looking for ? Should I consider..." Should I come for just one month or three? Should I consider moving all together? What kind of questions should I ask myself? I think the answers vary greatly from person to person.

But I think one thing that's very common is coming and spending time in Silicon Valley. I think this is one of the things we highly recommend because even if you're going to come back, you'll come back with a lot of ideas and you'll return. I've never met anyone who came to Silicon Valley and thought it was a waste of time. Everyone comes back excited, and that helps them gauge the speed as well. I think this is one of the things that keeps Silicon Valley ahead of any other ecosystem: the speed at which people operate.

I think gauging speed is very important , and one of the things I would personally recommend is that you allow at least three to six months to emerge, because a couple of weeks can be... I do n't think it's that impactful because you have to go through the network death and realize it, and in a couple of weeks some people get discouraged because sometimes it's very difficult to connect with people. But I've found that people who spend a little more time here come back with the right connections, even if they decide to move back or eventually decide to relocate here.

Yes. I would say lean into your diaspora , whether through us or not. We've published about many of the things we can do. It's much deeper than you probably think in the Bay Area, and it's very helpful in helping you build your company. Ten years from now, what results do you expect to see from this, not just in E6Z and our portfolio companies, but in the global startup landscape, all over the world? I think this trend is going to continue. We actually ran the stats, and based on our applications, 40% of our investments were in international founders.

Half of them were based here, and the other half were based in other countries. I think all nationalities and internationalities are mixing, so more diverse mindsets are creating bigger and bigger companies, and I think that's great for consumers and businesses, and we're only scratching the surface of 1% of what we can do. to do with AI. Absolutely. I support it, and I think there's a statistic that a lot of people in Silicon Valley used to use frequently, which is that 90% of venture capital returns come directly from companies located in Silicon Valley.

I think if that share went from 10% to 20 or 30%, that's something I'd really like to see , because that's what ultimately strengthens that argument. And I think the other reason I've never been entirely fond of statistics is because they don't tell the whole story. There are a lot of these borderless founders, many of them based here, but a lot of the engineering team might be in their home country, and a lot of those advantages have never been accounted for. So, there are a lot of these companies that are actually owned by two different countries, right?

And that story was never really told, and it's something that's been observed historically; I think this is going to continue, but hopefully now, from this perspective, we can consider ourselves a global company that has operational headquarters in at least two countries. different. Well, Angela Gabriel, thank you so much for joining me today. This was a lot of fun, and when this episode is released , everyone will be able to read your article on the topic, so check it out on Substack and on the A16Z blog.

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