Tank Talks By Ripple Ventures

The petcare industry is a $100 billion dollar market, with about 2/3rds of US households owning a pet. Recently, consumers have started spending more on their pet’s health and well-being. On today’s show, we ask Marc about the petcare’s industry transition to healthtech, the effects the pandemic has had on pet adoption and ownership, and how startups like Pawp are helping owners take back control...

As everyone quickly realized during the pandemic, remote work and distributed teams are here to stay. How should startups think about managing their global payments? On today’s show, we ask Dileep about the issues with multiple payment rails, bringing on independent contractors as full-time employees, and setting up local and global entities with various forms of credit. About Dileep Dileep is the...

The construction industry is estimated to be over $2.5 trillion and growing in the United States, yet the industry has been especially slow at adopting newer technology solutions. Ron Goldschmidt joins us to share his thoughts on how construction companies can adapt to our remote reality, and why they have been resistant to change in the first place. About Ron Ron Goldschmidt co-founded Briq, a fi...

In the United States, the average household spends around $4200 a year on energy costs. How can we reduce this burden by building more efficient homes? We ask Manuel about how PowerX is helping consumers save costs and resources, how he attracted investments from the likes of Tesla and YCombinator, and more on today’s episode.  About Manuel Manuel Schoenfeld has been the founding CEO of PowerX sin...

Treasury departments are full of business-critical activities, but still have manual interventions. In a world gone remote, how have platforms like FinLync dealt with supply chain issues and real-time payments? All this and more, on today’s episode with Phillip Klein. About Phillip Phillip Ashley Klein is CEO and Co-founder of FinLync, a global fintech company. He was previously a management consu...

Paul Martino is truly a pioneer in the world of social networking. His early online gaming innovations from over 30 years ago are the inspiration for several of the modern social gaming offerings, and he holds over a dozen patents on core social networking concepts, content targeting, and recommendation systems. In this episode, we chat with him about his experience in finding product-market fit a...

Today, we’re revisiting an episode with the unbreakable John Ruffolo , recorded during the pandemic last year. Since then, John has suffered a cycling accident, made an incredible recovery, and launched a $500M growth stage equity fund, Maverix PE. For Canada Day, we’re chatting with this maverick about nurturing the next generation of tech and VC entrepreneurs. About John John Ruffolo is Founder...

What if you had a psychic digital gift concierge to help improve your corporate prospects and perhaps rid you of some decision fatigue in the process? That’s where Greg Segall, design/UX enthusiast and e-commerce expert comes in. How has this $120B industry evolved in a world where interpersonal exchange seems like an artifact of the past? All this, and more on today’s episode. About Greg: Greg Se...

Bruce Croxon is a legend in the Toronto startup scene. He’s led successful startups as an operator, but also is known as a mentor and investor, and of course he’s also become a bit of a media celeb. It was great to chat with him about the Canadian startup ecosystem, how much it’s grown and where it’s headed. About Bruce: Bruce Croxon is a Canadian entrepreneur, television personality, and venture...

Building a remote culture at work is something that has been thrust upon many businesses in the last 18 months, no so for today’s guest Nicolas Vandenberghe, co-founder and CEO of Chili Piper. Nicolas and the team are making waves in the competitive scheduling marketplace and recently closed a $33M Series B Lead by Tiger Global. About Nicolas: Nicolas started selling newspapers in the streets of P...

Finding and talking to your potential customers and discovering product market fit is one of the biggest challenges facing new startups, but our guest today Omri Mor, co-founder and CEO of Routable.com found joy in that process. Over the course of 9 months, Omri and his co-founder visited over 170 companies and held over 350 conversations around the pain point of B2B payments. What they learned al...

There’s a lot of talk about who will be able to compete with Amazon and Shopify post pandemic. Our guest today, Anton von Rueden , and his team at Boosted Commerce are looking at Amazon and Shopify as the OS for ecommerce, to see who is succeeding and then buying those winners and helping grow them through efficiencies and internal operating systems. Anton’s Background: Anton von Rueden is current...

It’s always a pleasure to talk with someone who is at the intersection of technology trends, and today our guest Boris Wertz is at the forefront of investing in crypto and has been for the last five years. Through his position as an early investor in Dapper Labs, creators of CryptoKitties and NBA TopShot , Boris has been an early believer in the power of blockchain and crypto and he’s now setting...

Successful founders have been mythologized in startup culture, but the reality of getting to a success is less glamorous, and much harder than it seems. Our guest today, Mike Silagadze , founder and now former CEO of TopHat , joins me to discuss his journey founding one of the largest EdTech companies, his decision to hand over the CEO role, and why he’s joining Ripple Ventures as a Venture Partne...

Working with startups a common theme emerges, the need to hire qualified people at scale is a challenge all of them face. Our guest today, Amit Bhatia, co-founder and CEO of Datapeople.io , is working to improve the recruitment process through data and science to allow much more precise measurement of how companies hire. Amit’s Background:CEO Co-Founder of Datapeople for 6 years, before you were a...

There’s a lot of stories around how the pandemic has changed and shifted business, our guest today Shaunak Amin is one of the biggest success stories. His startup Stadium was able to quickly pivot and grow a new business SnackMagic entirely during the lockdown and now is at $20M ARR. Shaunak’s Background:  Shaunak Amin is co-founder and CEO of STADIUM and SnackMagic . He is an experienced entrepre...

On today’s Tank Talk we have Jonathan Tower, renowned venture capitalist and author of a recent piece on the Series A gap in VC . Jonathan’s Background: Jonathan Tower is the Managing Partner at Catapult, a cross-border venture capital platform which specializes in investing in emerging tech hubs outside Silicon Valley. Jonathan has deployed more than $220mm in more than 50 companies across three...

On today’s Tank Talks we have Eric Woo , founder and CEO of Revere VC . With so much funding and new ways for founders and VCs to raise capital, what will be the new normal for fundraising and VC in general. Eric’s Background:Eric is an experienced investor and thought leader in the emerging manager and micro VC ecosystem. Eric has deployed over $150M across funds and direct investments throughout...

On today’s Tank Talks we have Braughm Ricke , founder and CEO of Aduro Advisors , which is a platform that allows fund to streamline accounting and operations. Braughm’s Background:CEO and Founder of Aduro Advisors in Denver, CO. Former Founding CFO of True Ventures with over 20+ years of VC experience. He began his career in venture capital in 1999 and was the Controller at Sofinnova Ventures. Be...

It’s been a busy week in the Rippleverse with adding a new partner , two Clubhouse events , and starting Q2 . With all that going on we thought we would revisit Samir Kaji ’s episode from last October. Samir is a friend of the pod and he has recently announced a new venture, Allocate , which is dedicated to helping emerging managers connect with LPs. We will be back with fresh episodes for the res...

Today on Tank Talks! We have Rob Petrozzo , co-founder of Rally Rd to talk about “Democratizing investing in rare collectables.” Rob’s Background: Rob Petrozzo is the Co-Founder & Chief Product Officer of Rally Rd , a platform where investors can buy and sell equity shares in collectible assets like cars, watches, sports memorabilia and art. The company aims to make investing in these illiquid ass...

On today’s Tank Talk! We welcome Kyle Westaway , founder and Managing Partner of Westaway , an innovative law firm for startups. Guest Background:Kyle is is a Lecturer on Law at Harvard Law School where he co-teaches a course on social entrepreneurship. He’s the author of Profit & Purpose and every Saturday morning he sends out the Weekend Briefing , a newsletter on how innovation is impacting soc...

On today’s Tank Talk! We welcome Aaron Upright , co-founder of ZenHub to talk about “From Bootstrapped to Venture Backed.” Aaron’s Background: Aaron Upright is the cofounder of ZenHub a Vancouver and SF Based startup that was spun out of the incubator Axiom Zen which is also famous for starting Dapper Labs the creators of CryptoKitties and NBA TopShot. ZenHub is a powerful software platform that i...

On today’s Tank Talk! We welcome Chris Douvos , founder and managing director of Ahoy Capital to talk about “How to build a lasting startup ecosystem.” Chris’s Background:Chris Douvos founded Ahoy Capital in 2018 to help invest in the micro-VC movement. Prior to Ahoy Capital, Chris spearheaded investment efforts at Venture Investment Associates and The Investment Fund for Foundations. He learned t...

On today’s Tank Talk! We welcome Addie Lerner, founder and general manager of Avid Ventures and Charley Ma of Alloy to talk about “The Rise of APIs in Fintech Explosion.” Guests Background: Addie Lerner is the Founder and Managing Partner of New York City-based Avid Ventures , a $68M early stage venture capital firm that has invested in fintech companies including Alloy, Nova Credit, Staircase, Lo...