Tyler Willis
Entrepreneur and Angel Investor. Techno-optimist & occasional asteroid hunter
Discussion
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Tyler Willis
@tylerwillis · Asteroid Hunter
Hi! I'm Tyler Willis, an entrepreneur and investor from San Francisco. I'm excited to talk about whatever interests you all, here are some silly things I've done that may be interesting to you.
Marketing: I ran marketing at Involver (2M customers, acquired by Oracle) and Hired (just raised $40M).
Investing: I taught a class about angel investing that became super popular and I'm the host of season one of AngelList Radio (a podcast launching this week).
Startups: I was on the founding teams of both Involver (ran marketing) and Unified (ran BD and M&A). I joined both pre-product and helped build them into successful startups (Involver was acquired by Oracle, Unified just raised $40M).
Global Entrepreneurship: I co-founded Nomadic Mentors and am a part-time partner at TheFamily, both of which are helping create entrepreneurial ecosystems internationally.
Personally, I'm obsessed with books and podcasts, I'm a techno-optimist and wanna-be philosopher, I'm in love with The Long Now (seriously, please ask me about this), I love debating anything (especially politics), and I travel a lot.
So... what do you want to talk about? :-D
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Arielle Zuckerberg
@ariellezuck · Partner at KPCB
Which tech companies that exist today are most likely to still exist 100 years from now?
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Tyler Willis
@tylerwillis · Asteroid Hunter
@ariellezuck I'm most bullish on Amazon, Facebook, and Google – but 100 years is a long time, and the average lifespan for big companies has been steadily decreasing.
While I think we're entering a boom time for incumbents, I don't have a high amount of confidence that any entity currently around will still be important in 100 years.
BTW - this type of question is exactly why I love going to The Long Now. They are trying to build an organization that makes an impact of millennia, which always blows my mind.
Shaherose Charania
@shaherose_charania
You've been spending a lot of time in Cuba getting to know the tech entrepreneurial space. I too was just there and see a lot of challenges ahead. What are 3 things Cuba needs to do to effectively participate as a competitive startup ecosystem and what 3 things do they already have going for themselves?
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Tyler Willis
@tylerwillis · Asteroid Hunter
@shaherose_charania I spent a ton of time last year working on internet policy there and am really in love with the country. Unfortunately, the conclusion I drew was that progress won't come as fast as many Americans currently hope.
Cuba's a long-way from having a thriving startup scene, they need to 1. embrace entrepreneurial endeavors (still mostly illegal), 2. increase internet penetration and speed, and 3. continue to allow the strengthening of ties between local Cubans and the Cuban diaspora.
However, the country has good engineering talent and an incredible technical creativity. I think in the short-term, most Cuban entrepreneurship will come from Cubans operating in the US or Europe and building startups that serve the Global Cuban population. There are some great examples of this like Revolico.com that could be guiding lights for future entrepreneurs.
I could (and would love to!) spend another hour talking about all the craziness I uncovered over 6 months working on this... maybe Erik will invite me back someday for a round 2. :)
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Tyler Willis
@tylerwillis · Asteroid Hunter
@vsodera This shampoo: http://www.illumai.com/
About two years ago, my dad became the CEO of Illumai, which makes shampoo. This was utterly ridiculous at the time... he was a tech CEO and not a fashion-forward kind of guy, but he said he was really convinced by the science of the product and the raving customer reviews.
I obviously gave it a try and it worked pretty damn well. My girlfriend loved it and said it makes her existing conditioner work better. Basically, it turned out to be legit, so now I use that. I actually need to order another bottle now (Dad, if you're reading this, hurry up and launch auto-subscription features!).
Mandy Zibart
@mandyz · Content Writer at Lyft
What are you most excited to talk about on AngelList Radio? Which other podcasts do you recommend?
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Tyler Willis
@tylerwillis · Asteroid Hunter
@mandyz I really like the guests I found that aren't famous. Kirill Mahkarinsky, Sumon Sadhu, Oussama Ammar, etc. –– Getting the really in-depth insights from people who live and breathe this stuff every day was the most fun I had on the project.
Here are two unique things I love about those types of guests: 1. they offer insights that still has an awareness of "beginner's mind" and 2. they aren't yet media-trained into thinking and speaking in plastic-sounding platitudes.
As for other Podcasts: I love Hardcore History (start with Wrath of Khans, see you in 20 hours!). I listen to every podcast from The Long Now (usually about one a month, themes are wildly variant). I love Tim Ferriss's podcast. I listen to every episode of Common Sense (Dan Carlin is my spirit animal). I really like Intelligence Squared debates. I'm addicted to Serial, like everyone else on the planet. Here's a bunch more recommendations I made on Product Hunt: https://www.producthunt.com/@tyl...
Mike Wadhera
@mikewadhera · Founder, Sports Feed
what's something interesting you've learned hunting asteroids?
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Tyler Willis
@tylerwillis · Asteroid Hunter
@mikewadhera That telling the difference between asteroids and image artifacts make discovery super painful, and that I probably should have spent more time studying astronomy and physics. :-P
David Lerman
@davidlerman · VP of Growth & Strategy, VenueBook
Hey Tyler, thanks for doing this! Investing question: The public markets are pulling back, there's still a ton of dry VC powder on the sidelines, and the barriers to angel investing have never been lower. What are some resulting trends you're seeing on the early end of this investing spectrum, and how do you believe one can differentiate themselves among so many other angel/seed funding sources?
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Tyler Willis
@tylerwillis · Asteroid Hunter
@davidlerman As an investor, you generally pick first, but ultimately the entrepreneur has to pick you as well. I talked a bit about this in the video (in case anyone missed it), but I think that as an angel investor, you don't have to be as differentiated. You can either be an expert in a particular area, or an early believer, or someone who is really thesis driven. When you're ultimately committing less than 10% of the total round, an entrepreneur needs less justification to make room for you.
When you're leading the round, differentiation becomes hugely important... I think it generally comes down to what your reputation is with entrepreneurs. If the person pitches you thinks of you as smart, on their side, having a great brand they can use in recruiting/etc., those are all big positives.
Andrew Torba
@torbahax · CEO, Gab.ai #SpeakFreely
What does your angel investment strategy look like? Are there any character traits you look for in a entrepreneur before you invest?
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Tyler Willis
@tylerwillis · Asteroid Hunter
@torbahax I have some super simple heuristics I use, but probably the biggest is: "If I'm right about this, and wrong about every other investment I make, will I still come out ahead?"
Making sure that the genuine upside opportunity is huge is more important than being able to really accurately being able to predict the likelihood of success (because directionally accurate is about the best I think anyone can get).
David Lerman
@davidlerman · VP of Growth & Strategy, VenueBook
Techno-philosophy question: Robots -- how worried should we be? Take this question any way you'd like :)
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Tyler Willis
@tylerwillis · Asteroid Hunter
@davidlerman I think we should be deeply worried about automation if, and only if, we're not also willing to innovate around social structures and safety nets. I'm generally supportive of (and deeply curious about) Universal Basic Income. With better safety nets, I think robotics and automation are a huge positive for humanity (more time to pursue the things we want to do).
David Lerman
@davidlerman · VP of Growth & Strategy, VenueBook
@tylerwillis Fully agreed... however that can still easily lead to a distinct 2-class system of the UBI-recipients, and those who own the means of production (the modern factory owners) who collect the social rents exponentially larger than everyone else. In other words, it'll be the fraction of the 1% on steroids, and then the commoners.
Ty Danco
@tydanco · Angel investor
What gives with the asteroid hunter?????? Not your usual background...
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Tyler Willis
@tylerwillis · Asteroid Hunter
@tydanco I love Asterank (which is trying to predict the value of precious metals found in Asteroids) and think it's one of the coolest things ever. I've spent way too much time trying to discover asteroids using their tools. Come join the fun here: http://www.asterank.com/discover