The reality behind the Silicon Valley dream | Unlocked

00:00:00: I don't know when was the last day.

00:00:01: It took a day off.

00:00:02: it's probably been at least like eight or nine months that I didn't take a day of right?

00:00:06: I work every single day.

00:00:08: so for about six months to The great joy of my mom, uh i basically skipped all of My classes at EHL and I just coded in my room For you know something Like twelve to fourteen hours Every Single Day.

00:00:22: And I Was obsessed!

00:00:23: I'm A guy who out Of a Swiss Hospitality Business School went Out just code it on his own room, and then got a job in Silicon Valley at the startup as an engineer.

00:00:37: Welcome to Unlocked!

00:00:38: The podcast presented by SwissQuote giving voice to those who challenged the rules and reinvent their industries.

00:00:45: What does that really take?

00:00:46: To go from hospitality business school... ...to building a start-up in Silicon valley?

00:00:52: because we often see headlines funding rounds accelerators YC founders but very few people talk about what actually looks like day-to-day.

00:01:01: The pressure, the pivots...the uncertainty and reality behind a dream!

00:01:05: Our guest today is Oliviero Pinotti startup co-founder & part of Y Combinator one of most selective start up accelerators in the world.

00:01:14: Oliviero welcome to Unlocked.

00:01:16: thanks for having me.

00:01:17: yeah it's so nice Have you here?

00:01:19: And a pleasure.

00:01:20: Thank you for coming to the Swiss office, thank you so much.

00:01:23: before we dive into everything your building today I'd love to maybe go back for a second when For example You were realizing you didn't want more traditional career path.

00:01:33: i think it's interesting To start with people who don't know Who are.

00:01:36: Maybe you can introduce yourself

00:01:38: Absolutely!

00:01:39: My name is Pinotti Founder and engineer.

00:01:44: I am currently founder of Alfera.

00:01:46: We build AI workers for business kind of, you know replacing a lot of the jobs in typical business functions such as marketing customer support.

00:01:55: I've just completed.

00:01:56: The Y Combinator winter-twenty six batch

00:01:59: Amazing and you started at EHL which is not the most obvious path into AI and startups

00:02:06: indeed Yeah.

00:02:07: So maybe we can talk about that absolutely

00:02:09: so.

00:02:09: Well I've studied at DHL, graduated in twenty-twenty five.

00:02:14: Overall i really love my experience at DHl and it's a great school.

00:02:20: It is obviously very typical to see somebody like me where you know typically people from more typical engineering schools such as Stanford, MIT, EPFL right?

00:02:34: You know...I think ultimately different things, right?

00:02:40: So obviously not everything that I've learned at EHL like i directly apply in my job.

00:02:44: Um...I think at the HL have learned a lot about how to talk to people ,how to present yourself.

00:02:50: um.. How to make business pitch.

00:02:52: you know and often times this is very big differentiator In The Valley where perhaps You Have Very Strong Technical Talent but it Often Doesn't Know How To Perhaps Sell An Idea or Pitch It.

00:03:06: Or You Know Talk to people in a manner and you know talking two people is half the job of making your startup because if she just put it in her basement all day, he wouldn't get very much done.

00:03:16: So maybe too talk broadly about the topic up there.

00:03:20: why combinator?

00:03:21: I don't think that everybody knows what it is.

00:03:23: Can explain hundred

00:03:24: percent.

00:03:25: so my combinator is a start-up accelerator an venture capital fund where Apply online with a form that takes roughly thirty minutes to fill out about you, your co-founders and the startup that you're building.

00:03:43: And after that they invite for ten minute interview.

00:03:47: at end of this ten minute interviews decide or not.

00:03:50: if they accept into Y Combinator They give half million dollars For seven percent of company.

00:03:58: You basically get in.

00:04:00: one might say uh, let's say groups or startup accelerators.

00:04:07: there is that.

00:04:07: I think the acceptance rate right now is less than one percent at the current rates and it's just an amazing program.

00:04:13: It's really like you basically get to talk with partners.

00:04:18: so every week You have something called office hours So you speak one-to-one With a partner who is typically himself A start up founder Who has either built a large company Or was One of very early employees At a large Company.

00:04:32: And then you get to be basically with about another hundred or a hundred and fifty companies who are other startup founders, all usually very exceptional.

00:04:43: Very hardworking people.

00:04:45: You guys go together in the program of three months... ...and try to make the most amount of progress humanly possible within three months.

00:04:56: At the end of it typically do fund raise for AC Drount.

00:04:59: not always but typically.

00:05:01: That's amazing!

00:05:02: How did you end up in this Y Combinator?

00:05:05: Or how did you start building things first.

00:05:07: Yeah, exactly so well.

00:05:08: I was at my last year in EHL and but what i should say is At AT&T I built My First startup.

00:05:16: it Was a tutoring marketplace for connecting students And tutors In Switzerland inside universities because I was myself giving math to drinks.

00:05:26: I really liked Maths you know, what if we could expand as well?

00:05:32: If I could do this at a larger scale.

00:05:35: And back then i didn't know anything!

00:05:37: What YC was?

00:05:38: they didn't Know what startups were.

00:05:39: so just like you know cobbled up something together build Like the first very scrappy platform and eventually grew.

00:05:46: it grew It grew and You know I learned A lot...I started Hiring.

00:05:51: some of my friends You know did a Lot Of mistakes certainly a lot of backups to be frank.

00:06:00: eventually I stopped that company and you know some friends of mine were like, well why don't you learn how to code?

00:06:05: Why don't You Learn How To

00:06:06: Code?".

00:06:06: And i think GPD had just come out at the point.

00:06:10: And I was like sure let's do it!

00:06:12: So for about six months uh...to The Great Joy Of My Mom..I basically skipped all my classes at EHL ..and I just coded in my room For something like twelve to fourteen hours every single day ...And I Was Obsessed.

00:06:28: but I was having so much fun because I really like engineering somehow, and I think latent passion in me was kind of discovered.

00:06:38: And so I was just obsessed with it.

00:06:40: Every time we learned something new would be a hit of dopamine right?

00:06:44: It's so hooked to it!

00:06:45: I didn't want stop.

00:06:46: So i did that for you know six months at the end there were relatively capable and started doing some competitions...I won one of biggest hackathons in Switzerland And eventually, and this was probably a pivotal point I got hired by this company called StackSync which is also a company backed by Y Combinator as one of their first engineers.

00:07:14: From there it really catalyzed for me so that I learned how to build engineering at scale.

00:07:19: you know what it means to really build an important infrastructure... ...and so on.

00:07:26: There i learnt alot certainly And I think that was kind of the catalyzer for me.

00:07:30: I did it for about a year and half, eventually left them to start my own thing... ...and lo and behold!

00:07:37: A couple months later why come either myself?

00:07:42: First of all congratulations.

00:07:43: i think It's also coming from a Swiss school then going to

00:07:48: U.S.,

00:07:50: getting recognized because thats something you have

00:07:53: a

00:07:53: lot of competition

00:07:55: at the beginning.

00:07:58: When you meet all of these engineers who have done engineering schools, maybe I'm not too part to them because they did fancy degrees and masters in this or bachelor's.

00:08:09: And i am a guy from a business school in Switzerland right?

00:08:15: So at the beginning there were certainly some foam and feeling like...I had to prove myself for sure!

00:08:23: For long time I felt insecure about that.

00:08:27: But then as I build impressive stuff, you become really secure about yourself.

00:08:32: You're like okay i know my stuff now... ...I can look at them eye-to-eye and so yeah

00:08:39: but how did you go from idea first version?

00:08:42: And something that people actually use because nowadays especially with cloud code everything they do with AI feel a bit lost sometimes.

00:08:51: Look it's the best time in history to make start up No doubt.

00:08:57: And the spirit which you can build now is unparalleled, but there's still always one problem... ...which is what to build for whom and solving which problems?

00:09:07: This is always the hardest thing!

00:09:10: I think here comes a skill of like this.

00:09:14: we've learned very well at Wycomator.

00:09:19: our partner was Gustav Alstromer.

00:09:22: He built company called Haysan which was one of the precursor to WhatsApp and later he built.

00:09:29: He really pushed us so much towards doing customer interviews, which is something I didn't know how to do before.

00:09:38: And this is one of hardest things.

00:09:42: You will see startup founders who go super enthusiastic about their idea like hey!

00:09:46: This my product.

00:09:47: Let me pitch you that.

00:09:51: And then they will be, you know.

00:09:52: They go to a customer and like oh this is really interesting do you want to buy it?

00:09:55: You know...and This is typically called the mom test.

00:09:58: right because when you got your mommy pictures she would always say Oh!

00:10:01: This is beautiful It's fantastic absolutely I wanna buy it you know..And these are what most people if you go them in picture thing that we'll tell you Right.

00:10:09: so you need to get very smart at asking The right questions and you also need to do this Very fast.

00:10:14: So one thing That i think really lacking that we have in Europe, but it's the sense of urgency.

00:10:22: And this is what I think one of most important things why she teaches you right?

00:10:26: The reason they put together with other two hundred people and three months because they wanna pressure to do stuff fast or on a crunch.

00:10:37: otherwise its like oh yeah i can take my time but startups work only when they're done very fast, right?

00:10:48: You need like fast growth.

00:10:49: Fast iteration is where the best things happen actually and it's also what you learn the most.

00:10:56: And maybe talking about AI because as you said nowadays you can build code very quickly.

00:11:03: It's the best time to do code.

00:11:05: As I've already mentioned that the idea of solving issues or problems with people are the main thing.

00:11:14: Where exactly do you position yourself nowadays with all this?

00:11:17: I think, so there's two points to that.

00:11:22: If we talk about somebody who works at one of the big AI labs such as Anthropic or OpenAI they'll almost surely tell us it is over for them guys if your engineer is over and their job is done... You know i don't think its true because if you're an engineer thats still really valuable People who still go to university and study computer science, talking from somebody that didn't do it.

00:11:48: But the reason is... First of all you always need some sort understanding.

00:11:54: AI does things a certain manner but there are millions in the way it proposes to you.

00:11:59: It's not always the correct manner.

00:12:02: Engineering is more than just writing code syntax And then engineering teaches your way to think Right?

00:12:11: And that way to think is like structured with rules and, this is generally good for building a company.

00:12:17: So you still thing people who study engineering always have an upper hand or work as engineer will always have the upper-hand in it.

00:12:27: what certainly needs more is speed of execution going out talking.

00:12:36: I knew so many engineers who would be like, you know stuck in their basement and working on something for months never showing it to anybody.

00:12:43: I myself am guilty of that certain times but really get the most amount of progress when do a minimal amount engineering input.

00:12:54: put out talk about it learn then build

00:12:58: And before talking about company you built Alfeira when people hear AI start up in Silicon Valley, they imagine something very glamorous and luxurious.

00:13:10: What does your daily reality actually look like?

00:13:13: Well the answer is hard here because it depends a lot from each person's experience you know but also... People are building all kinds of crazy stuff nowadays right?

00:13:23: I had one of my batch mates at YC's literary building hotels on

00:13:28: The Moon.

00:13:31: Okay, and here I am building my little nice AI company in this guy's literally going on the moon right um but The reality is that?

00:13:40: Building in San Francisco.

00:13:41: Is an in second valley general.

00:13:43: it's.

00:13:44: It's amazing for so many reasons.

00:13:46: i mean you still have to do a lot of hard work.

00:13:48: Right at end of the day its like.

00:13:49: you know You need to sit at your like into sit at Your desk code and talk to customers.

00:13:55: That's the only thing you need to do, so what it really looks like is pretty much two or three dudes sitting in their apartment sometimes with AC or without depending on how much money they have from investors either doing sales calls or writing code.

00:14:11: that's pretty much the only two things that matter to them day-in, day out seven days a week going out, founder splurging right?

00:14:19: There are occasions but If you work in San Francisco, there is this culture of nine-nine-six.

00:14:26: Nine a.m to nine

00:14:27: p.m.,

00:14:28: six days a week and that's the reality for all of us.

00:14:31: I certainly did it sometimes...I even did it seven days per week And i know many people who do that on regular basis For months at end.

00:14:38: So its good in certain ways In the sense obviously in San Fransisco You have so much more capital..so much more opportunity So much more serendipity The surface era for luck.

00:14:51: You can definitely get more capital, so it's all better.

00:14:56: But at the end of day you still need to sit in your room or office whatever that is and get this stuff

00:15:02: done.".

00:15:04: And maybe talk about a company now.

00:15:06: finally because you talked about how you built it?

00:15:10: What's Alphera?

00:15:11: Absolutely!

00:15:11: So during YC what happened was We did a bunch of pivots, actually.

00:15:18: So this is something that not so many people talk about right?

00:15:21: You know, many people in Saigon Valley have the... Many people who look at Saigon valley have the idea That you just woke up one morning and I thought of these genius ideas And then i started like coding.

00:15:30: it came to life and became a millionaire.

00:15:33: Right!

00:15:33: This isn't really how it works.

00:15:35: Before that..I did alot of pvots.

00:15:40: A lot were agent infrastructure At point because worked quite a bit in hospitality, I even did the hospitality startup.

00:15:50: And then eventually something happened which was obviously usually good time to make it start up like there's been very big change into technology In about February of this year and twenty six Anthropic released an AI model called Opus.

00:16:06: four point six.

00:16:09: Something else came out open claw.

00:16:11: For those who are less familiar Open Claw is a technology to build AI agents, which is really powerful.

00:16:18: Not only can it respond to you in a chat like ChargeGPT but it can take actions create spreadsheets browse the web their way as humans do so basically almost be at same level of human capability on computer and was first time this ever possible.

00:16:35: I had been working already on agent infrastructure before In the past, this was just not possible.

00:16:44: The technology wasn't there and when that came out during YC I was like well... This is stuff i've been waiting for!

00:16:54: And at that moment.. ...I decided it would be what I wanted to work on.

00:17:01: So we did a bunch of customer interviews again.

00:17:06: We built our product in three or four days Days and nights of sleepless, red bulls non-stop.

00:17:16: We created a whole video for our launch in two days.

00:17:19: it was a mess but somehow we got it done And we launched it.

00:17:27: The YC brand is really strong.

00:17:29: So you know... In today's something like three hundred thousand impressions on social media A lot good inbound came from that.

00:17:39: Now, to talk a little bit about the company.

00:17:40: So what we build is basically AI workers or AI employees that can basically strongly augment a person in their job Or some degree entirely replace them.

00:17:54: And here were typically targeting business functions across marketing customer support sales operations finance you know?

00:18:01: Typically office positions right and We've started doing that for your not been over month now.

00:18:09: We've now built the platform and we're about to launch very soon.

00:18:14: And yeah?

00:18:14: That's really cool, but then do you use Open Claw in that process... Yes exactly

00:18:18: so absolutely!

00:18:19: So our whole infrastructure is build around open claw which I strongly believe it has the strongest technology for building agents right now.

00:18:28: There are a lot of talks on this in The Valley Right Now and there are competitors Hermes coming out And we are essentially also building a whole infrastructure to help you deploy these insecure cloud computers.

00:18:40: Because I have big problem with OpenCloud is that it's pretty insecure in its basic configuration, right?

00:18:46: So you probably have read headlines of open clouds.

00:18:48: did my entire database or has deleted the my entire documentation, so what we build?

00:18:55: this kind enterprise layer allows you to deploy employees and your company safely inside their own sandboxed computers And we basically build knowledge across your company.

00:19:05: So these agents are really smart and they know everything about you, about Swiss code for example.

00:19:11: They know what's your job is?

00:19:13: What systems do interact with or people who interact With...and it can make you ten X. if not some jobs may be fifty times more productive.

00:19:22: Yeah its interesting.

00:19:23: I always hear that the security with open claw is very important and also the cost because I think it's something to discuss.

00:19:33: Because different APIs, different AIs you use can also cause a lot

00:19:38: of... We're working on that as well.

00:19:40: there are some things we work in which is basically routing systems.

00:19:43: so often times when using entropic models which typically most expensive ones what were creating was a routing system where depending upon difficulty or task DI will choose the appropriate model for that, right?

00:19:56: For writing an email you don't typically need Anthropic.

00:19:58: You can also use a cheaper model.

00:20:01: and what has been the most challenging moment so far?

00:20:06: well pivot hell as they call it in second value which is the moment when she know you try to pay but until kind of like land on something is really hard period I have to say because pivoting is almost change of identity.

00:20:18: i think cause depending upon the company industry working your must become different person Right?

00:20:25: When we're doing this hospitality startup, you know I had to become a hospitality person which is totally different from building agenting infrastructure.

00:20:32: We were talking very different kinds of people.

00:20:35: so it's always the struggle i would say and you'll always feel kind of this sense of confusion in direction.

00:20:42: that's pretty hard.

00:20:44: what's really hard also when maybe fundraising can be very hard concluded a fund raise, luckily.

00:20:55: And it can be very hard process right?

00:20:57: So you have to go through a lot of calls and get a lot knows.

00:21:00: then try understand why certain investors said no one thing about fundraising.

00:21:08: which many people also don't see is that often times when we got know from an investor they might give some reasoning for that but the reason is complete box.

00:21:17: They just tell something that sounds reasonable enough but they won't piss you off because what if later, become an interesting investment.

00:21:24: They want to get back and I don't wanna go on your bedside.

00:21:27: so it's often times is very hard cause we cannot even get real feedback right?

00:21:33: So...

00:21:34: It was a start up at some point in still has the mindset of startup nowadays.

00:21:43: One of the biggest validation points for any startup today is getting into the right ecosystem and you entered one of the most selective ones, as you said.

00:21:52: What does it take to get in?

00:21:54: I guess that's a question a lot now.

00:21:58: so going into YC what you need are very basics ASU A co-founder an idea That pretty much all it takes.

00:22:07: That's pretty much it, right?

00:22:08: So the great thing about YC is that really like they take at a very early stage.

00:22:12: Like some people don't even have an idea when they get in Right now.

00:22:16: of course It's not the same case for everybody and often as a European you have to work A bit harder than maybe somebody from America just because obviously They need to try.

00:22:29: You need to have some sort of, you know, profiles can be regarded as exceptional because obviously there's, what?

00:22:35: Twenty, thirty or forty thousand applications.

00:22:37: Every single batch and they only have to choose about two hundred of them.

00:22:41: so you need to either have done something impressive which is maybe say at an interesting university like some interesting research Or early entrepreneurship it very interesting or if you work at another YC startup that's also regarded as an impressive accomplishment, really anything.

00:22:59: A lot of people perhaps think like oh I need to study at Stanford for MIT but i did none of those things right?

00:23:05: But they're not in university and industry yet.

00:23:10: I managed to get in because when I was eighteen then one of the early engineers worked on a good start-up.

00:23:19: And what is important about it isn't the idea itself Right?

00:23:23: Because nobody can tell what's a good idea.

00:23:26: What's important in the application is also two things, one that you show you've done a lot of progress right?

00:23:31: um they want to see people who execute on this stuff right now.

00:23:35: just make plans or yeah and then this is typical in Europe right In Europe we like We'd Like To Make A Lot Of Plans And You Know Like Plan A Lot And Make The Strategy This And That.

00:23:46: But In Silicon Valley They're Very Like.

00:23:47: Okay Just Do It.

00:23:49: Action Produces Information.

00:23:52: The more action you take and the progress that you do, the better your application will be.

00:23:56: And then forward it in startup right?

00:24:00: That was one of my questions.

00:24:03: after what's really difference between building in Europe and Silicon Valley?

00:24:07: You said It

00:24:09: is profoundly different.

00:24:12: I think the main problem with Europe Is there all this like planning and thinking, right?

00:24:19: I think really you should try to think less often times than just take action.

00:24:24: You know especially if you do business school your train-to-think like a consultant oftentimes where they're gonna make this plan.

00:24:30: on paper it sounds really well.

00:24:33: then go out and find that oh the customers don't want these fancy things.

00:24:37: spent three months building turns of actually wanted other thing which was much simpler would have taken week to build.

00:24:46: So I think, you know being very empirical is very important.

00:24:50: and the other thing obviously in Europe we're unfortunately pretty risk adverse.

00:24:55: And so also another thing about Europe.

00:24:57: it's that We have this mentality of You need permission right?

00:25:01: Oh!

00:25:01: You cannot be an engineer unless you have these Bachelors and master degree in computer science Right or...you can't do a startup Unless like X amount of experience building The same things at Google right or stuff like that, which is complete box.

00:25:17: I mean i'm a guy who out of a Swiss hospitality business school went out just coding on his own room and got a job in Silicon Valley at the startup as an engineer.

00:25:30: so it's entirely possible.

00:25:33: you need to believe that stuff is possible.

00:25:37: settle for like what people say or think, oh this is the way to do it.

00:25:42: This is a path to take.

00:25:43: no It's not and you just need to like Take stuff in your hands And I have to always ask permission

00:25:51: Do you thing that Europe still has something?

00:25:54: To play there?

00:25:55: because of course very different than the US.

00:25:58: but maybe There are some things especially now with AI where can actually go beyond What you've been taught.

00:26:06: but also there is another background here that potentially.

00:26:08: There's not in the US.

00:26:10: So I think here, you know It's also somewhat of a geopolitical question because obviously The current two main players in AI or America and China Or Singapore?

00:26:19: You could say where you know A lot of Chinese companies are based who are like the biggest player.

00:26:23: yeah We don't really have.

00:26:25: i mean we have mistral.

00:26:26: In France we're perfectly.

00:26:28: we don't have a lot Of ai labs for really producing high-level good models, unfortunately.

00:26:36: So I think that Europe has to spend a lot more money in that and it has to spent a lot of energy.

00:26:41: obviously nuclear plants certainly because you need lots of energy and water to be able power these massive data centers for training AI models.

00:26:49: And Billings infrastructure is ultimately going decide who wins the race.

00:26:53: now what i think is that europe has a lot super intelligent young people with an exceptional education or incredibly technical competence.

00:27:05: However, they are taught from the very beginning that you know their biggest aspiration in life is to become well but it's totally fine right.

00:27:15: by the way being I don't a senior head of engineering at Google for example and its amazing career.

00:27:21: if your want add thats what should pursue Right?

00:27:24: But It shouldn´t be limiting belief.

00:27:25: oh this is top i can reach cause it isn't.

00:27:30: Unless we teach this, unless you don't have to ask permission for everything and always follow a certain path.

00:27:37: Then it's hard from an entire perspective.

00:27:40: then obviously raising capital here is much harder.

00:27:43: there is no denying that because investors are just so much more risk adverse sometimes.

00:27:51: actually I do have good amount of European investors now but only Many of the investors I talked to are very forward and they've worked with US companies, right?

00:28:02: Oftentimes some... It has happened to me.

00:28:05: I'm talking to some European investors who appreciate it have asked me what's your financial projections for next year when there is not even a product?

00:28:13: so that stuff has to change.

00:28:17: With all that everything you do now how did you define success then?

00:28:22: You know i had the privilege which is probably seen as one of the most influential people in a startup world.

00:28:31: And we've talked at the original YC office, in Mountain Viewing California and you know that thing he keeps saying... The most important for startups growth.

00:28:41: so can see if your start-up is doing really well.

00:28:43: If you're consistently growing every week typically an arrange between five to ten percent.

00:28:49: it's very good growth Week To Week right?

00:28:52: It's real hard to achieve also If your startup is growing at that rate, and you can keep it up consistently.

00:28:58: You know what I mean?

00:28:59: Also because if the growth is well eventually this compounds... ...and get to really large amounts then you're creating value ultimately

00:29:08: And everything goes well in next five or ten years.

00:29:11: First of all where do you see yourself In those years?

00:29:16: Do want build something after that?

00:29:18: Or how was the future

00:29:20: for you?

00:29:21: I really love what i do and building stuff for yourself, it's so good.

00:29:31: It makes you feel like... You've done something for somebody right?

00:29:36: And its the best feeling!

00:29:39: I think.. I probably see myself somewhere between the US & Europe Right?

00:29:43: I still have a very strong connection to Europe.

00:29:47: actually to see Europe grow in this and you know I'll probably also play my part in making Europe grow at some point, in time.

00:29:56: once again more experience.

00:29:58: Um...I certainly see myself building more companies right?

00:30:01: It's not gonna be my last company

00:30:03: um..and

00:30:05: i hope it keeps growing and i hope we keep building amazing things.

00:30:08: And behind the founder and start-up and ambition there is also a human side of journey.

00:30:12: yeah

00:30:13: uh....And

00:30:14: think that if u don't like what your doing then u said ur world obsessed with.

00:30:18: uh, ai it's very interesting and you have to be interested.

00:30:22: I think that's a hundred percent nowadays.

00:30:24: the human side is You know A very large part of this right like.

00:30:28: you need to be a hundred per cent on it And you need work at like.

00:30:33: rates are not common right here in Europe?

00:30:36: you'll Be you will be taught that okay.

00:30:39: so your job at nine finish at like sixteen then you up the weekend then you have the facilities.

00:30:45: I don't know when was the last day, i took a day off.

00:30:48: It's probably in at least like eight or nine months that it didn't take a day of right?

00:30:52: I work every single day and to make a startup work That is minimum required And some people would be like oh this excessive.

00:31:00: you know studies will say Oh but we only need four days a week blah blah.

00:31:04: You know In...that not my empirical experience Right?

00:31:08: Um..it doesn't work for some people also For life.

00:31:12: if your have kid its pretty hard.

00:31:14: I've known some people who have gone through YC and had a kid during Y Combinator, which i think is extremely bold to say the least.

00:31:24: So this human side it's really important.

00:31:25: you need to be one hundred percent in on what you do.

00:31:27: You don't even know if they love it or else It's not gonna work.

00:31:31: And maybe If you go back To your first project What would you Do?

00:31:35: Maybe differently after going to y Combinators?

00:31:38: Oh

00:31:38: so much.

00:31:39: oh my god.

00:31:40: um...I will hire less People.

00:31:42: I would probably wait to build it and become a better engineer first.

00:31:46: That will just make me so much faster, like building product and shipping stuff very much faster.

00:31:50: It'll be more bold in going into talking with people you know?

00:31:54: Something that we did during the batch at YC... At one point were doing a pivoting towards hospitality.

00:32:00: So our partner told us well guys don't build anything Just make a landing page which takes couple of hours And then go out.

00:32:09: talk to people Don't build single line code.

00:32:13: we did that and so, you know We wanted to talk two hotel managers in Hotel owners in San Francisco.

00:32:18: So what we did is?

00:32:20: we just looked up You know fifteen hotels in San Fransisco.

00:32:26: I dressed up In a suit and everything And I busy went up to them.

00:32:30: and you know I told him I was a hotel owner from Italy and That I wanted to talked to the hotel owner hotel manager To ask advice about their current tech stack and what they do to kind of interview them.

00:32:43: And what we did is, We just showed up called do them in person which was something I probably haven't done before and within a week i got you know something like ten fifteen meetings...and I learned so much.

00:32:56: oh my god!

00:32:57: I learned So Much Like Before.

00:32:58: maybe it would have taken me You Know Maybe A month or two months To learn all that stuff We're learning In a Week Right?

00:33:04: Learning That In One Week Compressing All Of These Learnings At The Same Time Allowed Me To A-See the Patterns Very Clearly Right?

00:33:11: And understand what was not a problem at all.

00:33:13: At the beginning we had very clear thesis, oh this is... Not a problem though!

00:33:16: Like..not even anything.

00:33:18: and later on we understood what industry it really like and in end of day you realize that most people are just happy to help you.

00:33:26: right?

00:33:28: You always have think What's the worst case so they're gonna say Yeah I cannot see the general manager.

00:33:32: So okay well too bad Just walk out go into next hotel Being more bold Going talking with people And ultimately, all of this is like packaged into having higher agency.

00:33:44: She's like take the thing do it execute see what result is.

00:33:49: if someone listening is thinking about launching their startup maybe coding in their rooms What would you tell them?

00:33:56: build a landing page first?

00:33:59: Build a scrappy landing page which explains roughly what your idea Is.

00:34:04: be somewhat vague about.

00:34:06: Don't specifically think about specific features you want to do.

00:34:10: Just make something roughly in the space or category that you wanna work for, right?

00:34:17: In which it's somewhat of a vague product and then try to find five-to-ten people to talk to who would be relevant... People know about the industry will be relevant customers And we can really simply going on LinkedIn and typing position, type of company or name a big company in specific industry.

00:34:45: This is the game of numbers so you probably have to send something between three hundred to five hundred messages to get about like ten-to-twenty quality meetings.

00:34:54: Get those meetings put them all into one or two weeks.

00:34:57: In this one or Two Weeks You ask series super uninterested questions and you try to really learn about their job super in depth.

00:35:07: And at the end of those two weeks, look at all what you learned?

00:35:11: Then make an idea that point your so much smarter about it.

00:35:15: if you've in this two week's likely learnt inside about an industry has some people taking years from right massive alpha on that industry can actually now go and build a thing and pitch it to those same people or, you know different people.

00:35:31: And potentially get your first paying

00:35:33: customers.".

00:35:34: The idea is try to keep coding as little as possible.

00:35:39: code the least amount to get out the most amounts of sales always right?

00:35:44: Never build anything that hasn't been validated Or for which You have not found a person who said oh I will pay you For That.

00:35:52: At the end of day you want To Get People Who Say Oh i Will Pay You For That Thing Right Now.

00:35:57: It Can Give You Like A Credit Card On The Spot Right.

00:36:01: And that's the most important thing, getting like real commitment and not like oh yeah I think this is you know potential thesis.

00:36:07: now i build these things then push it out.

00:36:09: nobody wants this

00:36:10: right?

00:36:12: This is the most imporant thing.

00:36:13: Well Olivier thankyou so much for sharing all of that.

00:36:16: Thankyou Igor!

00:36:16: It was very interesting to see your young and passionate about.

00:36:23: In a way, everybody can do it.

00:36:25: I mean if they have the... Everybody

00:36:27: can do that!

00:36:28: I'm the living proof of that right?

00:36:30: You know nobody who went from you know..I grew up in a small town in the south of Italy and i want to study business management in Switzerland at very prestigious school obviously And then made my way into engineering second vice.

00:36:44: so If your listening this you can't do too.

00:36:48: Thankyou so much.

00:36:49: perfect advice.

00:36:50: if someone wants to reach out or see any of your content.

00:36:54: Absolutely,

00:36:55: so you can find me on LinkedIn, Olivero Pianti Or if you want try my product we're launching very soon.

00:37:02: it's called alfaira.ai.

00:37:06: We'll put that in the description anyways.

00:37:08: and for anyone who is interested in AI SwissQuote is also into tech And we love talking about tech with techies as we say.

00:37:18: So thankyou again for coming.

00:37:21: You've been listening to Unlocked, the podcast presented by SwissQuote.

00:37:23: If you enjoyed this episode subscribe leave five star.

00:37:27: that's really something very helpful if you leave a nice comment and discover more conversations with founders amazing people like Olivero builders innovators across our platform And see you in the next episode.

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