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Mark Suster on Maker Studios sale to Disney and his career as a VC

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• published: 08 Apr 2014
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Mark Suster has the monkey off his back. Nearly seven years into his career in venture capital, he's seen some amazing returns this year. AOL acquired Gravity for $90m. Apple picked up Burstly, the company behind Test Flight). Not least: Maker Studios sold to Disney for $500m. In this candid interview Mark goes long on both Maker - despite the popular perception that it was quickly running out of steam - and YouTube, even as it stands by its 55-45 revenue split with content creators. Who will be next out of the gate with video? His top picks are Amazon, followed by Twitter and Facebook in a tie. Plus, when to bootstrap, and a little history lesson on surviving hard times, informed by the financial crisis and Genghis Khan (no, really). Never miss an episode! Subscribe in iTunes: Audio (http://bit.ly/TwiStA) || Video (http://bit.ly/TwiStV) Follow on Twitter: @msuster @upfrontvc ============== Thanks to our sponsors. Click here to tweet your support (can edit before sending): http://ctt.ec/d0z7S Scott Walker at Walker Corporate Law. Scott loves startups and shows it, with fixed-fee pricing. Have a question? Email him directly, scott@walkercorporatelaw.com, and tell him Jason sent you. and by New Relic. Now with New Relic Insights. Ask real language questions to get really smart answers about your business. Sign up at http://newrelic.com/twist to try it out and get your free This Week in Startups tshirt! ============== Follow on Twitter: @jason @twiStartups Launch Ticker: http://launch.co Launch Festival: http://festival.launch.co Special thanks to the members of the TWiST Backchannel Program! Highlights: 00:33 - cold open 1:23 - intro 2:58 - MS: I've been a VC since 2007. Going on 7 years. I actually didn't write a check for a year and a half. 4:08 - JC: People don't remember exactly how bad it was. What's the effect on a VC? 5:30 - JC: what should be in that plan? 5:31 - MS: avoid fixed costs you can't get out of. What I like to tell people is raise money when it's available. 11:30 - Walker ad read - 13:20 - MS: First, people get caught on "are you losing money?" there's a tension between growth and profit. Investors only care about growth and margin. 14:25 - MS: At Maker we have 50 engineers. Do the math. The company was on a 9-figure revenue run rate. I believe it's the fastest company growing in LA. 16:40 - JC: Why sell the company if growing this well? 16:55 - MS: Here's a company that acquired Marvel, Pixar, etc. It owns some of the best assets in the world and when that company says "we've decided that shortform video is tremendously important to the future of the company," you take the call. 18:05 - JC: It felt like YouTube didn't want the MCNs to exist anymore. When you're an investor and you see YouTube stealing...what are board meetings like? 19:35 - MS: I look at it differently. YouTube bought Next New Networks. They want to serve creators directly. YouTube has no problem if 50% of our business is on YouTube. You need to fish where all the fish are, and they're all on YouTube. 22:40 - JC NewRelic ad read - 24:40 - JC: You sound magnanimous. You were frustrated with YouTube. 24:53 - MS: I'm always nuanced, so let me say I will invest more in YouTube. 26:05 - JC: Who would you most like to see get into the video business and take YouTube headon? 28:00 - JC: Don't you think they should have given a better deal to Maker than anyone off the street with a cat video? 28:15 - MS: I think one should get volume discounts....they'll hold their ground until they have competition. I believe it'll be here in the next 2 or 3 years. 29:28 - MS: The next obvious competitors are Twitter and Facebook in my mind. 30:04 - MS: Think about why video-based retail. [.....] If you put something in YouTube, it's in a YouTube wrapper. It's only a matter of time before that video is outside of its wrapper on FB or TWitter and they are going to sell the pre-roll. 31:28 - JC: Ellen. What impact would she, moving to Twitter's platform, have? 32:25 - MS: Not an if, it's a when. Competition is good for all of us. Competition drives innovation. Imagine a world in which there was only an iPhone and no Android. Apple is like China. 37:45 - MS: I would call the exits doubles. Gravity acquired by AOL. I would say I've had exits but Maker has returned significantly more than all the investments I've done in 5 years. 53:31 - MS: EntrepreneurShit. What I've tried to do is to give the realism of startups. 56:20 - MS: The job of the CEO is to be chief psychologist. People will fight. I've noticed with some of my companies in super stressful times that I've had to pull them out emotionally and lift them up. 57:33 - JC: What's the most common fight between co-founders? 1:00:52 - video question 1:01:35 - Should someone w/ a functional team, product, clients go to accelerator or funding? 1:02:40 - JC: What do you wish you'd known when you started? 1:09:33 - How much money does a VC make? 1:12:03 - close