Revolut

Inside Sequoia's Investment Committee | How the SpaceX & Citadel Deals Went Down | Julien Bek

Aug 24, 2026 · 1:28:28

Julien Bek, a Partner at Sequoia Capital, says Sequoia wins by hunting with conviction, not waiting for inbound calls, and shares founder-reading lessons from Don Valentine, Doug Leone, Pat Grady, Alfred Lin, and Shaun Maguire. He highlights Leone's 'worst reference' question, Lin's warning not to mistake an outlier operator for an outlier founder, and Maguire's ELO method for calibrating references. Bek also explains how asking 'why' five times exposed a fraudulent founder, how his read changes by country (French/German references get 1-2 extra points; Americans get subtracted), and why he missed Anton Osaka of Lovable. On AI, he argues agents become the new customer, AEO parallels SEO, and the next trillion-dollar company will be software masquerading as services. He tells how his mother invested in Revolut at a ~$200M valuation, now worth over $100B.

Uber President on Travis, China & Self-Driving | Why Autonomy Is Existential | How to Beat DoorDash

Aug 17, 2026 · 1:09:44

In a rare interview, Uber President and COO Andrew Macdonald tells 20VC host Harry Stebbings that autonomy is existential for ride-hailing and distribution beats superior technology. He says Uber One is the most efficient long-term lever — membership beats price incentives — and admits he was wrong to resist it. On AI, Uber blew through a year's budget in four months because usage is vertical; ROI is real but hard to quantify, so he advises combining compute and headcount budgets. Recounting Uber China, Uber burned $52 million a week on subsidies before exiting to Didi, a deal he calls successful. He also explains the Delivery Hero acquisition, why Uber Eats trails DoorDash, and leadership lessons from Travis Kalanick and Dara Khosrowshahi.