article thumbnail

A Look Back: How $13 Billion Ramp Began To Scale with Co-Founder and CTO Karim Atiyah

SaaStr

Co-founder and CTO Karim Atiyah came to SaaStr Annual to share how they got this rocketship … off the ground. ” This framework can be applied across every aspect of building and scaling a company: 1. “These individuals scale with the company and can grow into 10x performers.”

CTO Hire 205
article thumbnail

From 0 to $10m ARR, At What Point Do We Start Hiring and Whom?

SaaStr

Dear SaaStr: From 0 to $10m ARR, At What Point Do We Start Hiring and Whom? From 0 t o $ 10M ARR, the hiring roadmap is critical because every hire has a disproportionate impact on your trajectory. But one small rule: once you even have 2 big customers, hire someone full-time to make them successful.

Insiders

Sign Up for our Newsletter

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

article thumbnail

Dear SaaStr: Why did Jason M. Lemkin Change his Point of View on The Value of a COO for Earlier Stage Startups?

SaaStr

I felt part of your core job as CEO was to assemble a management team, not complain about how you couldn’t get it all done. Or couldn’t stand your CTO. I still believe a CEO should “do it all” in terms of building a decent management team first before hiring a COO. Hiring a strong COO between Management Team 1.0

article thumbnail

AI and Cybersecurity: How Rubrik’s Co-Founder Built a $1B+ ARR Platform While Joining the AI Revolution

SaaStr

AI and Cybersecurity: How Rubrik’s Co-Founder Built a $1B+ ARR Platform While Joining the AI Revolution Lessons from Arvind Nithrakashyap, Co-Founder and CTO of Rubrik, on scaling cyber resilience platforms, building multiple product curves, and implementing AI across both products and operations.

article thumbnail

The $939B Question: Is AI Eating SaaS or Feeding It?

SaaStr

The Billion-Dollar AI Unicorn Factory The scale of AI startup funding isn’t just impressive — it’s existential for SaaS: The AI Billion-Dollar Club: OpenAI : $8.4 billion valuation after 175M round Scale AI : $29 billion valuation / “sale” with Meta’s $14.3 billion in funding xAI : $6.4

AI Search 289
article thumbnail

The Top 10 Reasons to Attend 2025 SaaStr Annual, May 13-15 in SF Bay!!

SaaStr

Our 10th Annual Meet-a-VC program to opt-in ahead of time, to set up VC-Founder matchmaking, Note: the above programs are only for Cloud / SaaS / AI founders and executives. Speakers share their playbooks on everything from achieving product-market fit to optimizing CAC:LTV ratios and scaling go-to-market strategies.

article thumbnail

June 30, 2025: The Date Where If Your Team Hasn’t Rolled Out Truly Great AI Into Production Yet… It’s Time to Reboot the Team

SaaStr

The CTO who said “we don’t need AI people, our engineers can figure it out “ is now 12 months behind companies that hired AI-native talent in early 2024. Meanwhile, their competitors hired AI-native talent and shipped three product iterations. Hire for AI-first thinking, not AI expertise.

AI Search 172