SaaStr

JUNE 1, 2025

The Infrastructure Math Is Unprecedented The Capital Intensity Is Off The Charts: Big Six tech CapEx: $212B annually (63% YoY growth) Microsoft AI business: $13B run-rate (175% YoY growth) NVIDIA data center revenue: $39B quarterly (78% YoY growth) Amazon AWS CapEx as % of revenue: 49% (vs. The Scary Part: Energy consumption is exploding.

AI Search 264

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SaaStr

JUNE 12, 2025

” His real-world example is that when he gets a contract to review as the CBO of Perplexity in a buying role, he doesn’t immediately send it straight to legal anymore. Pipeline Reviews Became Data-Driven (Finally) This one hit us hard. Your AI can process a lot more data and can know more about your deals than your reps do.

Scale 219

Scale AI Sales Hiring CTO Hire 219

Scytale

DECEMBER 3, 2024

Penetration Testing Explained Imagine you hire someone to try to break into your business – not physically, but digitally. If penetration testing is like hiring a hacker to test your defenses against security threats, then a compliance audit is like inviting an official inspector to verify whether you’re playing by the rules.

compliance 52

compliance CTO Hire Technical Review Software Review 52

Scytale

FEBRUARY 10, 2025

ISO 27001 is the leading data security standard, trusted by companies worldwide. In addition to significant losses in customer and stakeholder trust, as well as severe reputational damage, let’s consider what hurts the most when it comes to data breaches – the financial impact. What is ISO 27001? The result?

Systems Review 52

Systems Review Software Review CTO Hire compliance 52

SaaStr

JANUARY 28, 2025

Founder Collective is quietly one of the top seed funds of all time. Because they could build it, but that would take time. Salesforce bought an online wordprocessor for $750m … just to get its CTO. #2. Hire an M&A Banker: Their expertise and negotiation skills can prevent costly rookie mistakes. What do I mean?

Technical Review 273

Technical Review CTO Hire CTO Cloud 273

TechEmpower SaaS

JULY 24, 2023

Still, if you’re a business leader and your developers haven’t asked you these questions, look for a Fractional CTO to help navigate the critical early stage of development. What special data, content, APIs, etc., What’s the state of the relationships that brings you that data? Where’s the mystery?

Innovation 780

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Crafty CTO

JUNE 10, 2025

First, my book of business on the fractional CTO side of things filled up completely, reducing available writing time. 2023-07-07 ChatGPT+ subscribers can prevent OpenAI from using their inputs as training data. Thinking back on it, I see two causes. Really, OpenAI?

AI 40

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SaaStr

MARCH 30, 2025

Co-founders Dharmesh Shah (CTO) and Brian Halligan (Chairperson) shared at SaaStr Annual the unfiltered truth on building an SMB powerhouse, pivoting to product-led growth, and why the “M” segment is SaaS gold. Enterprise sales cycles were painfully long with limited data points.

Scale 194

Scale SMB Sales Hiring Scaling 194

Sales Hacker

FEBRUARY 18, 2025

Discussed in this Episode: When to hire your first account executives Key traits to look for in early sales hires Structuring compensation for first sales reps Should you ‘hire the buyer’ to be your sales rep? 31:55 Hiring for grit, curiosity & determination. What does Joe look like at that time?

Sales Hiring 98

Sales Hiring CTO Hire Scale VP of Engineering 98

TechEmpower SaaS

MARCH 4, 2024

Post-sale, AI analyzes customer data to improve service and loyalty, making it a cornerstone of modern sales methodologies. This AI-centric approach transforms sales into a data-driven field, emphasizing efficiency and personalized customer experiences.

Generative AI 443

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SaaStr

MAY 26, 2023

Dan Robinson, current Advisor and former CTO at Heap , shares five essential learnings from nearly a decade of building a SaaS business. What Your Job Is (And What It Isn’t) Your Job is to Make the Company Win A CTO may imagine their primary job is to provide technical expertise, lead engineers, and help build the product.

CTO Coach 242

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Valerian Tech

DECEMBER 30, 2022

The role of a Fractional Chief Technology Officer (CTO) is to provide technical expertise and leadership to a company on a part-time or temporary basis. This can be a useful option for startups or small businesses that may not have the resources to hire a full-time CTO or may not need one on a permanent basis.

Fractional CTO 52

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SaaStr

JANUARY 16, 2023

Hiring a reliable team is an all-encompassing issue where startups dive in head-first but fail to optimize it for success. . Hiring an expert produces 1000x better results than someone with interests elsewhere. . “A Hiring in a streamlined manner with a rigorous selection process initially builds momentum for long-term goals.

Scale 259

Scale CTO Hire Cloud Scaling 259

SaaStr

MARCH 7, 2021

These are all full-time jobs by $1m ARR. Fixing it yourself becomes the biggest time sink and excuse for not hiring there is. You end up spending all your time backfilling roles you should have hired. And even worse, you often sort of give up trying to make the hire. And hire against it. More here.

Part-Time VPE 293

Part-Time VPE Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Scale 293

SaaStr

MARCH 5, 2023

Ode to the $100,000,000 Exit Dear SaaStr: Should You Hire Someone That Seems Good … But Always Job Hops? SaaStr 637: Unveiling the Data Behind Effective Scaling with ICONIQ Growth General Partner Doug Pepper and ICONIQ Growth Partner & Head of Analytics Christine Edmonds    4. TAM is Great. If So, How Much?

Scale 246

Scale Sales Hiring CTO Hire Startup 246

SaaStr

FEBRUARY 15, 2023

Look at your install base, do a data analytics exercise, and understand your free and paid customers. Let the customer buy through their preferred channel.” – Kim Walsh Data: If you’re serious about building a PLG company, you need a robust, unified data platform. The next hiring focus should be growth marketing.

Scale 244

Scale Sales Hiring CTO Hire Scaling 244

SaaStr

JUNE 12, 2022

with Jenn Knight, Co-founder and CTO of AgentSync, and Daryna Kulya, Co-founder of OpenPhone. Attract, Hire & Build a Diverse Sales Team | Handshake VP, Employer Partnerships Jessica Peluso. Attract, Hire & Build a Diverse Sales Team | Handshake VP, Employer Partnerships Jessica Peluso. appeared first on SaaStr.

Scale 237

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SaaStr

JANUARY 12, 2022

“For large enterprise customers, your stakeholder map is almost always too small” — Alex Farmer, VP CS, Cognite Data. You have to be careful to pair that with someone strong to manage the relationship, that has more time and that also can be trusted. ” — Blythe Morrow, Microsoft Data Platform.

CTO Hire 325

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ProfitWell

JANUARY 29, 2019

On this episode of the ProfitWell Report, Brendan Schwartz , Co-Founder and CTO at Wistia , wants to know what proportion of paid plans should be annual versus monthly. To answer Brendan's question, we gathered data from just over two and a half thousand subscription companies. Click to enlarge.

Churn 103

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SaaStr

JUNE 1, 2021

Co-founder and CTO Dharmesh Shah shared with us how they got there — and the top mistakes they made — just 3 quarters after their IPO. We have someone that probably 98 percent of you know virtually or socially in some sense, Dharmesh Shah, founder and CTO of HubSpot. ” We didn’t do any annual contracts.

Part-Time VPE 290

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SaaStr

DECEMBER 20, 2023

Today, triangulation is how people prioritize who they will reach out to — what’s happening on their list of accounts, if they’ve posted a job, if they’ve hired a new CTO, etc. By examining a company, their intent data, the companies visiting their website, who’s on the pricing page, who the buyers are, etc.,

New CTO 312

New CTO Scale Sales Hiring CTO Hire 312

SaaStr

AUGUST 25, 2023

You have to see: A couple of good hires brought in Improvement on some metrics A big deal or two hanging out there, brought in and closed Things taken off your plate. More time may make them better if they’re already progressing, even if it’s just 10-15% in the first sales cycle. Hiring someone too junior. That often compounds.

Part-Time VPE 242

Part-Time VPE Sales Hiring Scale CTO Hire 242

Intercom, Inc.

FEBRUARY 22, 2022

As a SaaS business, Intercom is a data processor: our customers entrust us with their data, which we store and process on their behalf. Hiring and cultivating incredible talent on our Information Security team. Shipping quickly and securely. Continuous risk management. There will be many more challenges ahead.

Data 118

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Sales Hacker

OCTOBER 13, 2020

You can access that data set once you contribute your own information on a blinded basis. You can access that data set once you contribute your own information on a blinded basis. Hiring managers are also just trying to sell as well. Using RepVue, you can figure out exactly what people are making. In some cases it does.

Marketplace as a Service 111

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Intercom, Inc.

APRIL 19, 2018

We will use only a specific set of AWS data stores. Some of the things we talked about were operational overhead and cost of various data stores we were running, along with whether or not we needed to hire dedicated database administrators for various different technologies. Ciaran, our CTO , came up with this magical line.

Outsourcing Services 192

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CloudGeometry

JULY 8, 2021

When you treat your cloud provider as a fractional colo. When business-critical applications move out of the data center with “lift and shift”. See a useful background talk from their CTO Pini Reznik here ). Here are some signs to look for: When change is hard to make as a result of cascading dependencies up and down the stack.

Well Architected Framework 130

Well Architected Framework Payment Methods CTO Hire Payment Solutions 130

Sales Hacker

FEBRUARY 17, 2021

A few months back, I was inspired by a section in Scott Barker’s “The Forecast” newsletter where he referenced some data from Chorus.ai Your CTO probably does not need to be on the first Demo, but instead that could be an opportune time to loop in a Manager or director. Who doesn’t love a good combo of ham, egg and cheese?

Underperforming Technical Team 130

Underperforming Technical Team CTO Hire CTO Coach Technical Review 130

SaaStr

JUNE 26, 2024

Deals are contracting, not because of layoffs, but because people are managing budgets so tightly. It Takes Time To Bounce Back Jason was the first investor in RevenueCat , a company that automates mobile subscriptions on your phone. Maybe if you have the ex-CTO of Github, but that’s still a super speculative bet. in 12 months?

CTO Hire 144

CTO Hire AI Venture Capital Sales Hiring 144

Sales Hacker

SEPTEMBER 29, 2020

Today on the show, we’ve got Vishal Sunak, CEO and co-founder of LinkSquares, a company that applies AI to your contract. Sam Jacobs: Today on the show, we’ve got Vishal Sunak, CEO and co-founder of LinkSquares, a company that applies AI to your contract. Sam’s Corner [28:45]. Show Introduction [00:10]. What is LinkSquares?

Scale 117

Scale CTO Hire CTO Coach Scaling 117

Valerian Tech

JUNE 19, 2023

Introduction In today's digital age, healthcare companies face increasing threats to the security and privacy of patient data. The potential consequences of data breaches, such as financial losses, reputational damage, and loss of patient trust, highlight the critical importance of robust data security measures.

Healthcare 52

Healthcare CTO Hire Data CTO 52

SaaStr

JANUARY 14, 2020

That was when we realized we had to go hire some experienced enterprise go-to-market leaders, like Heather Zynczak who runs marketing at Pluralsight. We realized that what the CTO and the CIO need to know is what skills do I have, what technology skills exist in my business, what skills are missing relative to my tech strategy?

B2B 173

B2B B2C Scale New CTO 173

Valerian Tech

JUNE 5, 2023

With the rising frequency and sophistication of cyber threats, safeguarding sensitive customer data and protecting against potential breaches is of paramount importance. Protecting this data from cyber threats is crucial for maintaining customer trust and complying with stringent data protection regulations.

Cybersecurity 52

Cybersecurity CTO Hire CTO compliance 52

Intercom, Inc.

JULY 21, 2022

We spent a lot of time and effort setting up that foundational system, making sure that our data was really good. “The biggest thing I can do for Slack is to hire people who know a lot more than I do and give them free rein to do their best work” Adam Risman: You mentioned the team started with performance marketing.

Outsourcing Services 215

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Intercom, Inc.

OCTOBER 31, 2019

Dee: And you’ve worked in the industry for more than 22 years, so you have an incredible insight into the expansion of cloud networks, enterprise and data center technologies. It is no better than the data that you feed into it, and it has no soul. Balancing human-computer interaction. “AI is fancy statistics.

Artificial Intelligence 169

Artificial Intelligence Scale CTO Hire Technology 169

Tom Tunguz

OCTOBER 24, 2021

A thanks to [Marsh 00:00:34] for stepping in at the beginning of the month, and a great session with our own Jason Warner and Adrian, the CTO of Zendesk. Lionetti, the CMO at Confluent, and most recently, the CTO from Zendesk, Adrian. ” And so I tried it initially, I think it was toward the end of my time at Google actually.

CTO Coach 161

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User Pilot

JULY 27, 2023

Before hiring, assess your current needs and hire as your company grows. What to do before building a team for your SaaS company You can’t just jump into hiring without some forethought, or you’ll make many mistakes. Before the hiring process, take some time to decide on your current needs and hire as your company grows.

Sales Hiring 98

Sales Hiring SaaS Payments Sales Recruiting CTO Hire 98

SaaStr

NOVEMBER 21, 2019

There’s a lot of companies now in our portfolio that have been very successful like Collibra, who became sort of a data insights category and it started with cataloging and then they added lineage. They defined what data insights is. It’s known that you can probably sell those first couple of contracts.

New CTO 179

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