E310 | Adapting as a Founder During Growth with Renan de Villiers
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Renan de Villiers, CEO and co-founder of OSS Ventures, discusses his niche in B2B SaaS for manufacturing. He explains that manufacturing accounts for 25% of the world GDP and highlights the importance of software in factories. Renan shares his experience as a former factory director and how it led him to start a venture builder and investment firm focused on SaaS B2B for manufacturing. He emphasises the challenges of scaling executive talent in mature companies and the need for better incentive packages in the VC world. Renan also discusses the state of the economy, de-globalisation, and the future of manufacturing. The conversation explores the importance of hardware in tech companies, the challenges of scaling businesses, and the myths and realities of venture capital. It also delves into the personal journey of the guest and his sources of inspiration.
On today’s podcast:
- Manufacturing accounts for 25% of the world GDP, making it a significant niche for B2B SaaS.
- Scaling executive talent is a challenge in mature companies, and better incentive packages are needed in the VC world.
- The US is decoupling from China, and there is a trend of reshoring and nearshoring in manufacturing.
- Energy and chip production are becoming increasingly important in the manufacturing industry. Hardware will play a significant role in the success of tech companies in the future.
- Scaling a business involves two major breaking points: transitioning from founder-led chaos to a more structured approach and managing the challenges of communication and processes as the company grows.
- Founders need to be willing to adapt and change as their company scales, and sometimes, that means letting go of the chaotic energy that fuelled the early stages.
- Ideas do matter in business, but they are nothing without execution.
- Success in life is measured by the impact you have on others.
- Recommended books: ‘No Rules Rules’ by Reed Hastings and ‘Hunger, Famine, and Wealth’ by London philosopher.
- Recommended podcast: ‘Revenue Builder’ for insights on revenue generation in B2B SaaS.
Follow Renan de Villiers :
- OSS Ventures Website: https://www.oss.ventures/
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/renan-devillieres-4b8a3a83/
- OSS Ventures on Linkedin https://www.linkedin.com/company/oss-ventures/posts/?feedView=all
Who is Renan de Villiers
Renan Devillieres is a CEO who is passionate about making a positive impact on society and the environment and who believes in using technology to drive change. With a diverse background that includes working as an economist at the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), co-founding a start-up in Brazil, and founding OSS Ventures – a firm focused on creating start-ups for manufacturing, Renan has a wealth of experience in areas such as manufacturing operations, SaaS, and venture capital.
Renan’s unique perspective on the challenges facing modern corporations, particularly with the increasing pace of technological change and the importance of sustainability, makes him a valuable guest for podcasts targeting VC analysts, investment managers, and senior partners of funds. With his expertise, he can discuss critical issues such as navigating the changing landscape of digitization and building more sustainable and adaptable organizations to prepare for the future. If you’re looking for an engaging and knowledgeable guest with a wealth of experience in the world of start-ups, venture capital, and corporate strategy, look no further than Renan Devillieres!
What you’ll learn from Renan de Villiers
02:11 Scaling Executive Talent in Mature Companies
06:21 Challenges in Incentive Packages for VC-backed Companies
13:22 The Decoupling of the US from China
24:07 The Importance of Energy and Chip Production in Manufacturing
25:55 The Role of Hardware in Tech Companies
30:25 Scaling Challenges and Breaking Points
32:17 Adapting as a Founder During Growth
39:37 The Importance of Ideas and Execution
45:22 Measuring Success in Life
49:08 Timeless Inspiration from ‘Meditations’
49:53 Debunking the Myth: Ideas Do Matter
Quickfire questions
1. What resources should people dive into?
So, I have one book that I have read almost every year for 20 years now, Meditations by Marcus Aurelius. So he’s a stoic philosopher and the guy was the most powerful guy in the world, in the known world at the time, and he was writing for himself on how not to be an asshole and live a life well lived. And I think it’s really timeless and really incredible. So, really love that. It’s actually, as all incredible books are, deceptively simple, but very hard to implement, and a lot of people are not implementing it. So I read it at least once a year. So that’s an awesome book.
Other than that, I recently read No Rules Rules. I like the management style and I like also the fact that he acknowledged that a lot of execution is a little chaotic and you have sometimes to go with your guts and you are allowed to be a human and have sentiments and feelings and everything. So I really, really like that. And I recently also reread Hunger, Famine and Wealth, which a book from a London philosopher, which is, about how do you live your life wealthy when there is hunger in the world. Which is a good question to ask yourself. I’ll save you 300 pages of very interesting physical conversations; it boils down to like one-third to a third. You give one-third of what you gain, and you keep two-thirds to yourself because screw it. Yeah, it’s sound.
I’m at 50 episodes out of 300 of The Revenue Builders Podcast. That’s incredible. Revenue Builder is the podcast for revenue and growth and everything. And it’s done by the former revenue guy from Snowflake. And did you know Snowflake is out from a venture builder? So Snowflake was created by a venture called Sutter Adventures. So people like me very much more successful, but people like me. And so yeah, it’s just this series of podcasts is incredible for anyone interested in truly groundbreaking revenue generation for B2B SaaS.
2. What’s your genius?
I think I’m really good at system thinking. I almost never get an idea where it’s a random idea not connected to anything. I always think in systems and saying, if we change that, we change that, we change that, which is awesome, and it will flow like that. And I have always had that kind of system thinking since I was a baby.
3. Who’s your biggest source of inspiration?
If I say Elon Musk, it’s just so cliche, but it’s so true. I have the most admiration for people actually tangibly changing the world. So the guy who invented penicillin, Steve Jobs, the guy who invented the TCP IP protocol, all those people, just really changed the world at scale. And I have the utmost respect for them.
4. What unpopular opinion do you hold?
I think if we someday upload all of human thoughts and personalities to a big computer and give up the whole body thing, it would be a good.
5. What’s the most significant risk you’ve taken?
I think it was when I came to my co-founders and I said, I really, really don’t think we should be doing that; here is why, and I’m willing to exit the company if you disagree with that. That was like, I was in series B. Maybe if I was getting fired, I was working away with zero and I did it anyway. And I ended up having a nice settlement and life-changing money, which was not the outcome I was looking for, that was the biggest risk.
6. How do you measure success? Not in business, but in life?
Impact. The total of solutions that we have are used daily by a little over 90k
And I think their life is a lot better than without what we do. And so that’s the thing. A life well lived is a life serving others with great impact, maximum
7. What’s the worst business advice you’ve ever received
I’ve had so many. Yeah, there was one. When I came back to France, I went to a venture capitalist and I said, I’m going to try to invest my money and blah, blah, I’m going to invest in manufacturing operations. And he said, don’t do that. It’s niche. And it was actually the term he used. And fun fact, three years later he was invited by some guy at the Ministry of Economy in France, and he was a speaker at a panel on reshoring, which I found so funny. I was like, yeah, you told me it was niche literally four years ago, and now you’re holding a panel on the thing.
8. What’s the most recent thing you’ve learned or the most recent skill you’ve acquired?
So it was last week I learned Flutter, which is a dev language. And so it was a sort of personal challenge. I sat down with Claude, the Entropic new AI. And I said, Claude, I know nothing about Flutter. I have one afternoon without the kids and the wife. Let’s go. We are going to learn Flutter. And so Claude and me, we learned Flutter together. I put up together a very bad application where you can upload a PDF like you’re a student, you can upload the PDF, and then LLM creates flashcards for you. I did that in five years.
9. What’s the biggest myth in business?
I think in our line of work, venture capital when people say ideas don’t matter, I think it’s bullshit. Ideas do matter. They are nothing without execution. And you cannot pivot your life away using some lean methodology and doing one-week sprints. This is bullshit. Ideas matter. And what you want from the world and the ideas that you have, it does matter.