Episode Highlights:
- Chris began his career in IT at Nintendo before the company itself had a product.
- As he matured in his career Chris began to refine his expertise across sectors and products to deeply understand how to approach the sales process for different conditions.
- Chris then walks us through the EagleView and Pictometry merger.
- Chris uses the metaphor of dating before marriage to exemplify how the companies became familiar with one another through their customer and supplier relationship before carrying out a merger.
- Boards are the needed “adult supervision” for strategic business decisions, Chris believes. It was ultimately with the board of Pictometry that was the best audience to push forward the merger.
- While departments like finance or HR needed to be downsized in the merger, they kept the two sales organizations running to expand growth.
- “When I first became a CEO, one of my board members gave me some advice. He said, he said, ‘as a CEO, You're gonna experience two emotions, uh, more often than not, and you're gonna experience euphoria and you're gonna experience terror.’”
- Insurance is a small professional circle which means if you have a bad proof of concept at one carrier, word will certainly travel.
- Chris started a business in 2008 and with such tight capital, he stressed getting to profitability in 3-4 years as a key intention.
About the Guest:
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