SaaStr 053: Assessing Product Market Fit, Why Customer Segmentation Is Crucial & The Rise Of The Full Stack CEO with Greg Sands, Founding Partner @ Costanoa Venture Capital

Greg Sands is the Founder and Managing Partner of Costanoa Venture Capital. Prior to founding Costanoa Venture Capital, Greg was a Managing Director at Sutter Hill, where he was an early investor in the likes of Feedburner, AllBusiness, and Return Path just to name a few. Before Sutter Hill, Greg was the first hire at Netscape after its founding engineering team. As Netscape’s 1st Product Manager, Greg wrote the initial business plan, coined the name Netscape, and created the SuiteSpot Business Unit, which he grew from zero to $150m in revenue. He also served as Manager of Business Development at Cisco where he architected a global channel management plan.  

In Today’s Episode You Will Learn:

• How Greg made his way into the world of VC from Netscape?
• Why did Greg see the opportunity for an early stage B2B fund like Costanoa? Why did this fund not exist in B2B but was becoming popularised in B2C?
• To what extent does Greg agree SaaS investing is ‘traction capital’? When investing pre metrics, what are the signs of promise Greg looks for?
• How does Greg assess product market fit? Why is customer segmentation and customer archetypes so important?
• What does Greg make of the ‘full stack CEO’? Is it better to be specialised or jack of all trades? When is the right time to specialise?

60 Second SaaStr

1. Greenfield opportunity in SaaS?
2. Biggest advice to startup founders in SaaS?
3. Easier or harder to raise money now than before?

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Jason Lemkin

Harry Stebbings

SaaStr

Greg Sands