Renaud Visage
February 21, 2024
Scaling New Heights: Renaud Visage on Eventbrite, Fatherhood, and Forging a Sustainable Future
I heard that you had a baby recently, so how has the past year been? And how is it personally and professionally for you at the moment?
It's very busy so it’s like I have two babies at the same time – my physical baby and then my work baby, which is a new fund that I'm launching. Both interesting in very different ways but also two very new experiences because I am not an investor by training. I enjoy investing more as a hobby and now I'm becoming the founding partner of a fund. So I need to ramp up a lot of knowledge and delve into my networks as there are lots of decisions to make when you launch a fund ahead of doing the fundraising.
So that's what's been keeping you busy?
Yes, our daughter is 14 months old now and that has been a new experience for me. It's my first one. It's enriching because I find new things in her all the time and it's pretty fascinating to see a human develop different skill sets so quickly and surprise you every day. I am being very present for the baby and really focused on that one person and then being a strategic and high level thinker when thinking about the fund and the next 10 years.
Would you say that they are similarities between the two, being a father and being a founder?
Not really, except to say that a baby is a separate creature that will evolve on its own. You are just there to be the coach and that's what parents should do. I think helping the little thing grow on its own versus creating a fund from nothing where we have to figure everything out, make all the decisions and shape that entity into something that's compelling and will grow nicely in the future, they’re different roles. So, I don't know. They're very different and they require different parts of the brain.
Yeah, but it's two very new things. And so this is a very new phase in your life, would you say?
Yeah, that's true for sure. There have been a lot of learnings in the last two years on many different fronts. Which is great. I mean I left Eventbrite to think about other things and to try a new career and then the baby added another layer to the desire to build a family as well as the desire to build a new business. Both help me to feel satisfied with my life on a daily basis. Contentment is important in life.
These are all new journeys...
Exactly.
So they say that having a baby is the biggest demonstration of our hope for the future. Would you say that you're an optimist? Has optimism informed the way that your career has progressed.
So I think I'm a realist optimist, so not overly bullish and out of reason. But I am also hopeful that the world will find solutions to complex problems. Having a baby was definitely a catalyst to start a lot of work in the space of climate tech but definitely thinking about it all much more than I did before. What is Earth going to look like in 50 years when I'm no longer here, but my daughter will have lived a long life through it all, hopefully. This was definitely a great motivator to think beyond what I can do and think how I could package all this knowledge and experience I have into making something impactful. That's maybe more useful than just making more money for investors, to to combine all this into a great Mission first of all and then make my skills available to a new generation of entrepreneurs. That's much more mission-driven.
You started your career in environmental consultancy, right? So it's kind of coming full circle… You're combining your work with Eventbrite and being a founder on the tech side with your experience in environmentalism.
I mean I started in the real world and then while I was doing that, the virtual world or digital world started to come into being, and I thought that's what the future is gonna look like. So I definitely wanted to participate in the revolution that the Internet and the mobile and all the things that came after that brought to society. The knowledge, the accessibility of information, the interactions that you can have through all these platforms. So I definitely felt the same kind of mission in the late ‘90s when I switched from civil engineering to software. There was this massive thing waiting to be deployed and it was changing the world in the process. That was something I wanted to be part of, that's what attracted me to startups and the internet in the first place. I have a very similar feeling today that we need to go back to the real world. The digital revolution has happened. Yes. There'll be many more great companies to come but the next revolution is the climate tech revolution because we have to change everything we do. How we produce goods, how we transport them and how we consume them. So this big transformation in our entire industrial system is quite compelling as a problem to solve with many different angles, many actors and many states that have a lot of interest in moving things in the right direction, but also a lot of geopolitical constraints and solutions that need to be found to enable these transition, so it feels similar to how it did in the ‘90s. I think for me, the same type of feeling of an ecosystem being built and being part of something at the beginning of a big wave that's coming and that's quite exciting.
You've been investing at the start in a lot of different companies and now you’re saying that the climate tech wave as a whole is just beginning.
Yeah.
How do you see this field in the next 5-10 years? What do you think that space will look like?
I feel there's this first wave which is about Consciousness. It's waking up many people as we are being increasingly confronted with the reality of the coming years if we don't do anything. There's this big enthusiasm for climate tech coming from people from all kinds of walks of life, from corporate people to politicians, researchers and students. There's this common desire to improve things so that we can all survive on Earth. I mean, it's a big challenge for sure. It's very compelling for a lot of people who are trying to find meaning in their life.
This creates a lot of energy in trying to find solutions and they are solutions to be found in all kinds of industries and all kinds of supply chains across many different continents. So that creates a lot of opportunities to create great businesses. And that's why I think we're at the beginning of a big wave. Because creativity in entrepreneurship usually results in a lot of value being created. Not every company will be successful, but you have very smart people thinking – how do I contribute to solving the problem – and that usually leads to a lot of interesting projects taking off and hopefully the climate tech world and the large potential buyers of the solutions will make true on their commitment to reach NetZero at some point and to be carbon negative in the future. Either through partnerships or through buying these new products that are coming onto the market. There will be a lot of challenges in the way, as large corporations or consumers start to buy things but it's definitely underway. There's this consciousness that this is a critical problem for the coming years and that we need to structure the ecosystem around this so that there's enough financing for these companies to grow and there's enough buyers so that we can have exits and a brand new generation of technology solutions.
And that's very similar, I think, to what we saw in the ‘90s except for the .com crash that put a big stop to the growth of that industry. Thankfully we already had a failed start for climate tech with the clean tech wave of the late 2000s. Hopefully the potential is still there. It's really a fascinating time to be involved in climate tech because it involves so many different stakeholders like in the.com bubble time and also, in tech investing.
It's also a vastly complex problem. So no one is an expert at anything. There are many people who are developing models but there's no truth as to how Earth is going to evolve in the next few years. There are too many parameters. It’s just too complex of a model to have nothing but projections of what could happen and then you have a lot of economic uncertainty too.
There are a lot of things at stake for the future of the economy that depend on these different scenarios. So there’s a real question about what's going to happen. We'll see in the next few years how global temperatures evolve and all that, but we’ll also know more about the resilience and adaptability of our planet as conditions change, which will also create a lot of opportunities. I think for great businesses to actually assist in solving these problems we need to find interesting solutions for Venture Capital and other investors to invest in.
It sounds like it’s a very exciting time to be working in climate tech. But let’s take it back to the beginning for you. So as the CTO and co-founder of Eventbrite, what were some of the challenges that you experienced during the time in which you were growing the company to what it is today.
That was a very long period for me. It was 15 years of working and there were several different revolutions along the way. Mobile apps didn't exist when we started. The mobile phone wasn't a smartphone yet.
So we had to adapt to new technologies, to social networks and to mobile. We had a few big crises along the way. We had the financial crisis in 2008-2009. We started the company in 2006. It was in the very early days after our creation that we needed to raise our series A funding as VCs were stopping new venture investments in 2008. So we almost died at that point. That was a big hurdle which involved reducing the team size and optimizing everything so that we could survive. The business kept doing well during that crisis and, at the end of 2009, we were able to raise our series A funding from Sequoia. But it was one of these big existential threats that we had to overcome.
And I'm glad we did because the Covid pandemic was another crisis where we lost 90% of our revenue in one month because all the events were postponed. So this type of a giant earthquake in your life changes everything. You have to make big and difficult decisions very quickly like changing the size of the team or borrowing money. It's not great because rates crunch and you need to find liquidity very quickly. During the Covid pandemic, we had a lot of capital that was paid in advance to event organizers that was more than $300 million. We didn't have the cash to cover those. So that was a big existential threat again to our survival, but it's also through these crises that you build the strong foundations you need to build great companies. You build resilience, you build a mindset among the people who join after or before and especially among those who stay and go through these crises with you as they become much more bonded to the company when times are good.
So I learned a lot through these experiences and I think today, Eventbrite is a better run, more aligned company than maybe before Covid happened because we had to think through the question of why are we there? And how do we change the rules of the game for ourselves so that we can still be standing 10 years from now.
Yeah, every challenge is an opportunity,…
Exactly some companies die also during these kinds of processes.
True, but I heard that you started remote working at Eventbrite fairly early on, is that true?
Yeah, I mean my two co-founders were in San Francisco and I was in Paris at the time. I had spent a lot of time in San Francisco. I was very familiar with their work environment, but we had decided to live in France for a while. So I started working from France and we had a nice cycle with my co-founders where they would review my products changes during their day. Then I would make more changes during my day, their night, and we had this very efficient model for creating early stage prototypes that had a product market fit. That lasted for about a year and then we started building the team so I had to come back to San Francisco or spend more time there and then when we started expanding into Europe so I spent more time in Europe again.
So there was a lot of back and forth for me during these 15 years. It meant that I had to have very strong ties with the team and the company, but also truly leverage my European roots to grow the business in Europe.
Yes, it sounds like it was a good fit between you and the other co-founders.
Yeah, I was also the only technical person so it was easier this way.
Would you say that that's always been your superpower?
Yeah, I mean it was a nine hour time difference. It's not negligible. It requires making some sacrifices on personal time, but that was very worth it because we were working on an exciting project.
What would you say was the Eventbrite, or entrepreneurial mindset, that gets you through all of these different challenges?
I think experience about how to navigate challenges is a big one. We weren’t first timers, we didn't come out of university and do this, we had other entrepreneurial or corporate experience before starting Eventbrite. We were faced with challenges in terms of team building and career building and previously to funding the company so that gave us a lot of perspective on things and principles that we applied. We were very frugal about everything. We found solutions that are efficient. We didn't get scared by things like the server being down, we had that problem many times before and we knew that we had to find a solution but there was no need to panic. These types of first order principles guided us throughout the growth of the company. We had a few. My co-founder had founded another company before, so he had a lot of experience also in thinking about what the values are for the business and how do we translate that into daily actions for the teams.
It's all about building culture. An army of people that think like you and help you get excited about the business and want to build it to bigger and take it to the next step, whatever that is. I don't know if there really is a secret. There's just a lot of hard work and iterations and evolution within the team and evolution within ourselves as well as we grew from just being very hands-on to managing hundreds of people.
Yeah, so speak a bit to that transition of coming from what you did before Eventbrite, to becoming a CTO. What was that transition like?
I mean, I studied and started my career managing construction crews on construction sites. And I did this in a new country because I'm French and spent all my formative years and I studied and started work in the US. I would say until I went to University in France and then started working in the US I had to manage people who were coming from other countries and they had no overlap with me whatsoever. So you have to build trust in leadership. I think that's where I built my leadership skills that I used later on as a CTO. I had dozens of people on some construction sites that I needed to bond with and get to work. So there were a lot of learnings and I acquired a lot of interesting social skills. I would say that beyond what you learn in university and can only learn on the job.
So the transition from employee to CTO fortunately doesn't happen overnight. You have a lot of time to think through things as a founder about whether you want to be managing hundreds of people. Do you want to be a technical expert, or do you want to be a product expert? Everybody's motivations are different. So it’s important to be clear about what excites you every day. And remember what it is that you like to do. I think to find fulfillment you need to decide on which journey you're going to have at the company and then decide if you want to take on more responsibility.
You need to manage your duties and, if you're not good at managing, you need to learn how it works and there you have to find mentors. You have to find other people who have gone through that growth journey before in different companies. You can read a lot about that today. The internet is great for all kinds of resources. You can find coaches and you can get a lot of support but you have to realize that it’s OK if you don't know how to do this and be very clear about the things you don't know. That is of critical importance if you want to survive. We still require the most from people because we're growing so fast in this period that you have to have some reliance on the teams that you build to take ownership of their area because we don't have time to deal with every single part of the company. So it's all about hiring the right people and making sure they're reaching the goals and in that case anticipation is important – realizing what it's going to take to get to the next level both in terms of personal growth, but also in building the steps and maybe surrounding yourself with other people who can see the gaps that you have as a leader.
Yeah, so would you say and now that you're transitioning from CTO to investor? As a former founder is that putting you in good stead? You have all of these things that you've now learned and you're more comfortable with a certain level of uncertainty.
Starting a fund is a highly uncertain endeavor. You have to raise hundreds of millions to get to even the first closes before you can start to exist as a fund because that's when you can start investing. So there's a long period of time where you just sell the vision, the potential you think your fund has. It's all about the partners, what they've done in the past and what they're going to bring to their portfolio companies. So a big part of it is storytelling which can evolve a little bit between the time you start and the first close, but it's still much more about yourself than selling a proxy of yourself that is your products, so maybe that's the key difference you see.
LP's invest in you as a partner of the fund and that is a different exercise than a product that has a purpose for a specific set of users.
And it's not easy for people to sell themselves. It's another transition I have had to adapt to. I think about what I have to bring to this next wave of entrepreneurs and a lot of it is what I've learned building Eventbrite but also investing in all these companies and trying to help them along the way. I've done 75 Angel Investments so far and all of them have had different growth trajectories and different problems along the way to making my contribution back which I’m now using for the next wave of entrepreneurs. I think it is compelling and it is what allows us to raise the fund.
So what does the team look like within your new fund – Slate Venture Capital?
We took a lot of time to think about the team structure and finding the right people. It took us a couple of years between the initial idea to make a fund. We have the best team now to go after this opportunity. So we have two tech founders, an ex-partner from McKinsey who's done a lot of sustainability work and then a venture investor from a large french fund.
We know it's a long-term game in Venture. So we spent a lot of time figuring out if we really liked each other. We agreed on many things fundamentally when it came to the fund. I would say that what we focus on is the why, we're driven by the mission that’s what unites us. We want to have an impact based on our best experiences and the same impact on something that's critically important for Earth in the next few years so that the Omission phase was maybe a bit longer than for startups because we're signing up for 10, 15, 20 years. And that's a tough decision to make for anyone.
But now we have a very complementary team that was something we really wanted to have when building a business. We know it is very complicated. So having someone who understands how we had to grow and build teams and products and knowing what the end market looks like for these potential businesses. That's why having an ex-partner from McKinsey who's done a lot of work for corporations for private equity and infrastructure funds was very important for us. What is the exit potential for these businesses and which relationships should they build along the way? How do we reach out to the right people at the right time to accelerate the impact of these climate solutions?
And that's really what unites and why we decided to focus on the early growth, the series A and B when the companies are already scaling commercially because until then it's just an idea. Alright, it's a promise and we have to help them realize that promise and bring those solutions to market. That's the only way the climate will get better.
And how do you assess the deal flow for this sector? How does that work?
It’s very similar to having any other fund. We want to invest in hardware and software. So we're looking at all the subverticals of climate tech but we looked at 60 of them and we picked 13 that we felt were the most right for innovation and venture compatible innovation. I would say where the cap is is limited, But still the impact is quite significant. So we try to assess the appetite for the industry for the solutions and the ease of integration in the supply chains. And then the potential exit scenario for the different businesses and how we would get them to generate large revenues meaning large impact on climate. All these solutions will have sustainability goals built in, either the communication goals or improvement of water consumption or something equally impactful at the core of their business models.
Could you tell us more about your investment focus and thesis?
I mean we're looking at innovations or deployment of existing technology. To achieve the goals set for 2050, we need 50% of the solutions for climate to come from technology that either doesn't exist yet or is in the lab currently, so they'll need to be deployed and those will probably be looked at first because those could create very interesting businesses and have the biggest impact.
But there's also a lot of technologies that just need to be deployed in the real world. They can do great things for climate, but until everybody has one in their backyard and they know the impact is not being realized. So I think there's a lot of opportunities for great businesses to be created that have a big impact but don't require groundbreaking innovation.
We'll look at both. I think there’s a very interesting scaling of impact that can happen with both models that can save or reduce emissions by significant amounts. And that's really what's going to drive us in terms of decision making for Investments. What is the true impact of the technology and the business at scale?
And are there specific verticals or geographic areas that you are most interested in?
I think we're very focused on Europe. That's where there's the biggest gap, especially for funds. So that's where we're going to be starting and focusing a big part of our investments. We'll still have pockets for the rest of the world, but we'll focus on the EU, UK and Switzerland first.
Where do you see the most innovation happening?
This is a significant deal flow for sure. We've looked at both the US and European markets in great detail and there are the same number of companies just with less financing available. So oftentimes as you reach maturity, you'll need to look outside of Europe to raise your next round which I don't think should be the case. We have enough of the commitments and the capital available to have European funds that are funding this European growth curve for climate tech. And I hope we can build the leader in this space.
Last question now, so you said in another interview that you've been investing since 2014 but more aggressively from 2020. So what would you say are the biggest opportunities for investors right now, especially given how tough last year was for Venture Capital? How do you see this year unfolding?
We know France where I'm based. Last year, the biggest category of investment was in climate tech. About 35% of the deals were in climate tech. So I think we're right on target. We're in the right place at the right time with the right type of fund.
And that's where I think the biggest opportunity is. Otherwise, I wouldn't launch a fund in this space. I think AI is also very exciting. It's one that’s high on the hype curve but definitely has a lot of potential for two real groundbreaking applications in every sector of the world's Industries, so I would probably invest in AI if I wasn't doing climate investment just because it's so promising and can bring 10x better experiences in so many areas. The power of analysis that these models have is quite impressive. So there's a lot that can be done with those.
So you would say that now is the time to invest in climate tech?
Yeah, I think we need to go back to the real world and have to find great solutions for living in the most sustainable world. Find solutions. Our dependence on fossil fuels has to come to an end and we have to find alternatives that will ensure the longevity of our species, which is an important mission that all of us need to fight for.
