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Founder Weekly

Welcome to issue 644 of Founder Weekly. Let's get straight to the links this week.

General

Pattern Breakers: How to find a breakthrough startup idea
Mike Maples, Jr., co-founder of Floodgate, is a prominent early-stage investor known for backing companies like Twitter and Lyft. In his book "Pattern Breakers," he discusses what sets transformative startups apart, highlighting three elements of breakthrough ideas, the importance of unique thinking and actions, and the roles of storytelling and healthy disagreeableness. He also advises founders on avoiding common traps and applying these principles in large companies.

Why AI Infrastructure Startups Are Insanely Hard to Build
The article argues that AI infrastructure startups face significant challenges due to intense competition, rapid innovation by incumbents, and the difficulty of differentiating themselves in the enterprise market. It suggests that these startups need to focus on specific niches, secure substantial funding, or consider acquisition to succeed in this demanding landscape.

How Adriaan & Iron bootstrapped Simple Analytics from zero to $380k ARR in 5 years.
Adriaan and Iron bootstrapped Simple Analytics, a privacy-friendly Google Analytics alternative, to $384k in annual revenue by leveraging strategic SEO, viral marketing on Hacker News, and a product-led growth model. They emphasized simplicity, privacy, and strong positioning to attract indie hackers, developers, and enterprises, aiming to reach $1 million ARR through continued SEO efforts and a freemium model.

What will be the personal GenAI device?
A primer on the GenAI smartphone opportunity.

Marketing, Sales and PR

Enterprise Sales
Y Combinator Group Partner, Pete Koomen, led his startup, Optimizely, to $100M ARR. In this video, Pete breaks down the enterprise sales funnel and shares his top tips on how a technical founder can start closing real deals for their startup.

How Dovetail Grows: 15 ideas you can borrow from their journey building the $1B insights hub
The article discusses Dovetail's growth strategy, emphasizing systematic optimization of key levers through rapid prototyping, testing, and iteration rather than relying on long-term planning. It highlights the importance of addressing unmet needs of potential paying customers, continuously adding new acquisition channels, and building a versatile product that caters to various customer types and industries.

Money and Finance

First Cut—State of Private Markets: Q2 2024
Initial data from Q2 2024 shows modest increases in median valuation and round size across much of the U.S. venture ecosystem.

How to make money selling money
Why the canonical startup advice of "make something people want" doesn't apply to fintechs, who are ultimately in the business of pricing risk and "selling money".

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Founder Weekly - Founder Weekly - Issue 644

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