Noor: Alright, amazing. We have Kevin and Julia Hartz here today. Welcome to the pod. Thanks so much for, for joining. Thanks for. Okay, cool. So we're gonna jump right in. Um, I know you guys have been interviewed about your companies and all of your amazing professional work a million times, so this one's gonna be a little bit more personal.

Um, so can you start by taking us back to the beginning? How did you guys meet and, uh, how did, how did it become romantic? And then how did, uh, Eventbrite come out of it?

Kevin: We met in a wedding in Santa Barbara

Julia: 20 years ago.

Kevin: 20 years ago. Julia sat right down next to me on the aisle because she was giving a reading.

Uh, and I reassured her 'cause she was a little nervous about getting in front of, up in front of the whole crowd.

Julia: I wasn't sure if the reading was up at the podium and I hadn't, uh, hadn't memorized it. So, um, when I got up there and it was, I was really relieved. And then I came back down and Kevin, who was a complete stranger at the moment, turned to me and said, you did great.

I'm so proud of you. And I was like, who are you? And then when we walked out of the church, I remember thinking, oh, he's so nice. I'll, I'll probably never see him again. I was sort of in this emo phase, I'd just broken up with someone and was just kind of like depressed. And so at the wedding rehearsal, it was a huge wedding.

Um, I was standing with my, uh, I was working at MTV at the time and the bride was my boss. And I was standing with my cool kid, MTV crew and. Out of nowhere. Kevin shows up with like a tray of drinks. Um, and just like a golden retriever came into the group and started chatting everyone up. And then when we went to go sit down, um, he had already staked out where I had been placed, and it was at a table of a lot of his.

Classmates from Stanford. And so he moved everything strategically to move sort of the more maybe engaging successful classmates away from me. And of course, make sure that we were sitting next to each other and it was a hundred percent love at first, like mm-hmm.

Noor: Yeah. Amazing. So you guys got, you guys get married and, um, yeah.

Yeah. How, what was the conversation about like starting Eventbrite and having kids? How did all that go? Okay, so. We decided to

Julia: settle in San Francisco, but we did go, we did debate that for some time. Mm-hmm.

Noor: Yeah. So, okay, so basically, so it was never considered to be in LA and um, no. And were you always like, I'm gonna move to sf and then, yeah.

So how, how did, how did you guys get con, how did you get convinced to do Eventbrite rather than stay at MTV or do Yeah, I mean, I

Julia: was in really cool companies in Hollywood. I mean, MTVI worked on Jackass, the first movie and, or the first, uh, series and then the movie. And then I moved over to FX and I worked on Nip Tech, the Shield Rescue, me and some docuseries, uh, pilots with Morgan Spurlock.

So yeah, I had it made. But in the background, I was also watching Kevin build a company and also invest in companies and mm-hmm. I could see the writing on the wall, that disruption was coming and it was going to be, yeah, tech disrupting media. And we were really struggling because revenue, you know, as people were watching less commercials, ad revenue was falling.

So we were doing things like product placement deals, which is like hearkening back to the 1950s, and Kevin was showing me the first video on YouTube, so,

Noor: mm-hmm.

Julia: I just think like combination of factors. I'm from the Bay Area. I was madly in love, you know, Kevin's company was in San Francisco. I could see that if I wanted to be on the faster train of disruption, I should go be in tech.

Uh, and then, um, yeah, so like we decided to, to settle in San Francisco and I got a job at. Or I got an offer for a job at current tv, which was Al Gore and Joel Hyatt's, like sort of user like UGC new startup.

Kevin: Well, which was important because, yeah, super important. It seemed like, okay. That would be the way, you know, like, and, and you had good insights.

You were at MTV television, you were at fx, you were doing these unscripted. Series and things, and this is, you know, like the fu you know, the content that initially derived online was all like user generated content or jackass esque.

Noor: So then, so then, oh yeah, so, so how did you guys decide to start? Yeah.

Okay, go ahead. Offered

Julia: It was super low and it gave Kevin kind of the opportunity to help me think about alternatives, which was like, you go work on someone else's startup and get paid less than you're worth. Or we can build something, something together. Yeah. And you can make no money.

Noor: Mm-hmm. Offer

Julia: and we can put all of our savings into it and maybe lose all of our money.

Noor: Mm-hmm. And

Julia: bootstrapping a company and nor I have tried, I should probably go to like hypnosis therapy or something to try to get that. I don't remember saying yes to that plan. Truly, I don't remember the moment that, like I said, that's a good plan 'cause I am way less, less risk tolerant than Kevin. And yeah, I could always say the worst thing and then like reverse engineer how to, how to like avoid it.

Do you remember how you convince me?

Kevin: I mean, I was like just a happy puppy dog. I was so excited. I became the first, um, developer on top of PayPal with my business partner, Alan Braverman, and we built a remittance business and, you know, it was really kind of cooking and it was so, it, you know, it was just so exciting.

And so I was just like phenomenally. Like, it just seemed like a secret. You know, Peter Teal always says like, what do you know that others don't? And at this period, you know, in the mid two thousands, like the belief that was a waste of time, that it was a silly fraud. Um. Was was kind of pervasive and yet like we were seeing these businesses take off and so I just, you know, was so excited about it and hopefully she felt that enthusiasm.

I. Um, and I, you know, I always see myself as a lousy salesperson, but uh, just any kind of authentic behavior she can pick up on and, and so she hopefully knew, um, it was

Noor: So, it was your infectious enthusiasm that went her over? Yeah, I would say it was infectious optimism and it

Julia: was like, yeah, this, like the way I describe.

Kevin is like, he is missing the chip that says, this might not go so well or this might not work out. And so I think every great entrepreneur and inventor has some similarity of that. Yeah. Or that attribute. And so, you know, I think it was a really pivotal moment in my life. It was the most pivotal moment and I

Noor: think that, uh.

So how long was that after you guys got married that you guys made this big leap together?

Julia: We long been married. Yeah. I think the most pivotal moment in my life is meeting Kevin for sure. But then like

Noor: the second order

Julia: effect is like when I made the decision to come up and then when we decided to work on it.

But you know, you never know if something's gonna work out or be big and I just was like, I had no idea what I, what we were doing. So this was um, summer of 2005? Yeah, we got married in summer of 2006. So we officially launched Eventbrite in January of 2006. And then we got married, and I just remember there were three or two of us, one of our co-founders was virtual.

We were in this tiny windowless phone closet in Petro Hill, and I had this, we literally had saw horses and plywood desks. Mm-hmm. Uh, and I had like wedding invites that were like stacked over my head.

Noor: Mm-hmm.

Julia: Googling how to run a successful search engine marketing campaign, you know, to, like, I was marketing, customer support and finance.

Kevin was product. And Reno, our, our third co-founder was, uh, engineering and

Kevin: Renault was in Paris, which was pretty cool. Yeah,

Julia: it was great.

Kevin: Yeah. Give us like around the, around the clock. Around clock. Yeah. 'cause he was eight hours and nine hours ahead.

Julia: It was a magical time. Yeah. I mean, and so we got married in June of 2006.

Mm-hmm. And then a year and a half later, we, we were

Kevin: our favorite guests at the wedding.

Julia: Oh. The DePetris for sure.

Kevin: We can't tell that story. Okay.

Noor: So then what was the conversation about having kids? Like, were you guys both wanting to have them at the same time? Different times? Yeah. How are you thinking about juggling it with a startup?

How did that, how did that decision go?

Julia: I can say definitively, we did not overthink kids in startup. Okay. Like it was. I feel like we were so lucky to not have that hanging over our heads like, oh my God, how are we gonna do a startup and have kids? It was like, we are gonna have babies and we're gonna build this company, and they're very parallel experiences.

So it was, it was great. I mean. You know, I got like big, I gained 90 pounds. I was ate a lot of burritos from Dos Pines. No, I didn't. Ah, DOPs Remember more than

Kevin: you remember young. No.

Julia: Yeah, yeah I do. And I would like take a nap. We had these dog beds that our friend, like had an, our friend had a

Kevin: D two C dog bed startup.

Julia: And so he gave us dog beds. We didn't have a dog. We'd put 'em, we'd like stack 'em up and it would be our nap area. And so I would nap in the office on these dog beds. And I was, I mean, I was a whale. Like I was, I was, I was really big and, and so, uh, and so it was just a really sweet time. It was just, you know, very sort of.

I, I wouldn't call it like provincial, but it was very simple.

Kevin: Well, part of it was that we, you know, I mean you had come off like the man working for the Man Fox. Um, and I had come off Zoom, which was, you know, zoom was pretty hardcore. We were, all of a sudden the world became like heavily regulated and, um.

The business turned out to be hyper capital in intensive from so many different perspectives of fraud and uh, having to like have money licenses in 35 states and all this sort of stuff. And I. Um, I kind of got, I didn't get shoved out the door. I got gently walked out the door, um, by

Julia: the scruff

Kevin: of your neck, by the scruff of my neck.

But on the next company I was like, we're gonna, you know, we're gonna do this our way and we're going to, you know, we're gonna get a family business. And so it was, yeah, you and me and our little baby Rene, no Rene's, our CTO, he's a badass. Uh, and, and so we, we had just run it on a shoestring. We said like, let's do it in a non-capital intensive way.

Because you know, the tendency is like, everyone wants you to spend money so you out and raise more money and oh, spend more money. You know, like, invest here, invest there, do these things. And so we just ran it really lean and so it felt like a, a family business. So it's like, let's have a family, let's have a baby.

Julia: We spent less than a quarter of a million dollars in the first two years. So that's, wow. That's how lean it was. And you know, adding Emma to the mix was just like bringing another teammate in. We made the, I think, implicit decision. I don't think it was explicit, but I think we just both adopted the idea that our family and our company would be one in the same, and that there would be no boundaries.

We get the question so often. How did you turn off? Eventbrite and like, you know, how'd you stop? And it's like, we never stopped talking about Eventbrite. Even to this day. It's part of our lexicon, it's part of our connection. And I think that's really wonderful. Like, we'd go to bed talking about it, we'd wake up talking about it.

And you know, I think having, having a baby allowed us though to like balance things. Because prior to Emma, all we did was work and then post Emma. We felt this like really noble mission to like not work around her all the time. Like we brought her into the office and she was a part of things, but we also knew that when we came home we wanted to be just with her.

So that started to like sort order some things. Mm-hmm. I know Peter Thiel gave Kevin the advice of like, outsource your non-core competencies. And I said, that's totally fine as long as you're not outsourcing them to me. And so we started to like build this life that sort of like had us both equally off the hook for certain things.

Um, you know, but also equally responsible for certain things. So I'm not, I'm not more involved with the children than Kevin is, but I also don't know where the paper towels are kept in our house.

Kevin: I don't know how to wash the dishes.

Noor: So what did you guys, uh, start doing as your rituals as a couple to sort of stay connected? You have. Um, you know, it's a big transition of having kids, a big transition of responsibility of a startup. What were, did you guys start having rituals or did they sort of change over time?

Kevin: Yeah, we're big fans of date night,

Noor: date night.

It

Kevin: was always Thursday evening. Yeah. You know, we'd have like Julia's mom come over. I. Just some periods of time where you, the two of you can be alone and maybe away from it all.

Julia: We don't do that anymore. We need to reinstate date night.

Kevin: Yeah. I was, I keep telling you that

Julia: I know I, uh, I would be so tired that I'd be like falling asleep in the soup.

And I remember after having our second, uh, daughter, Mave. I mean, we were so precious about date night that the first week after we had her, we went on date night and I was just like, completely, you know, I think I had a glass of wine and I was like, mm-hmm. Wasted. Um, so I think carving out that time to just be together alone, uh, yeah.

Is really important. And then, um, dividing and conquering, I mean, today. It's like running a small nation.

Noor: Mm-hmm.

Julia: And so we're the members of the cabinet and we've got constituents and we need to ensure they are always looking at ways that they can like overthrow the power in the nation. Yeah. So we have to like stay really connected about like what decisions we're making, why.

What are our principles? What are we saying yes to? What are we saying no to? And then having a lot of trust, like we assume the best from each other in terms of parenting because, you know, there's just, I mean, I'm fast forwarding, but like we're in like the preteen and teen era. It's, it is a full on, it's a full contact sport,

Kevin: but nor listeners don't understand where we are right now.

I in, you know, like 2016 ish. Had to step out of Eventbrite. I was the CEO for that first stretch. And then Julia took off, took off, took over after then as CEO and I became this, you know, so-called chairman. And we joke that it's like you get all the title that sounds like you're important, but you don't have to do any work at all.

So, you know, we're not as sort of, we're not, you know, in the same flow. And that's, you know, I can't imagine like, if. Any couples are working together, just really cherish that. Um, because it was, I mean, we talk about date night, but the reality is, is like being together 24 7 was such a special thing. You're like going through this life experience together nonstop.

Um. You know, in sync. Mm-hmm. Feeling the same like as exhilaration and going through the brutal hardships and pain and you know, and now that's kind of all gone. So I find it a little sad. I find it sad. Yeah.

Julia: Yeah. I have a hard time

Kevin: adjusting to it.

Julia: I think like for us, it's harder to not work together than to work together.

Right? Hmm. The premise of our entire, like being together was working together and so, yeah. Um, it's been way more challenging to not work together in like a daily capacity. It's so adorable. Yeah. I mean, I think our, our girls really think about Eventbrite as something that mommy and daddy built and that Yeah.

You know, mommy is the boss of mm-hmm. And that works well in our family because we have girls. I love it. And we are feminist girls and they're

Kevin: like society. They're like, daddy, you should do something with your life. You know, look what done, like, daddy, what do you do? Like,

Noor: that's not true. Yeah,

Kevin: no, it's totally true.

They're like. Uh,

Noor: they're not impressed by like a start investing. Why not? That's pretty cool.

Kevin: They just, it

Noor: doesn't

Kevin: syn the same way as like the whole CEO Eventbrite thing because like. Before starting Astar and after Eventbrite, I went and worked with Peter and Luke and Kenny and the whole team at, at Founders Fund for just like about two years before starting Astar.

And we would drop, I would get dropped off. It was in Letterman, um, on the way to Mave school. And you know, Maeve's like. All she knew is there was a Starbucks there. And so she, for a couple years thought I worked at Starbucks.

Noor: I worked at Starbucks.

Kevin: And then she'd be like, my mom is the of event. Right. And my dad works at Starbucks.

Julia: I forgot about that. That was so funny. It's true. That was so funny because he used to take her there all the time. I

Kevin: know. I take her there. It was also, you know, George Lucas manages the building. Yeah. And Lucasfilm still has some. Stuff there. And so I would take her to the like Star Wars store and she would poop her diaper.

Like it was like the best thing in the world. Like it had all the best merch you can imagine.

Noor: Oh my God, that's amazing. All right, so switching gears a bit to Orchid, um, why did you guys invest in orchid?

Kevin: We invest in people we invested in. No. Um, yeah, I mean, we remember like meeting you, we remember. Um, you know, we always ask about backgrounds.

We always ask about like life story and so on. And, um, you know, you had us right there. It's, it's enthralling, um, who you are and where you came from. And then, I mean, obviously the vision, um, what you're doing it, it's so exciting and it, and it just feels like this. Big major leap forward. Like we had made an investment, I don't, over 10 years ago in a, um, in, um, Balaji and his brother's ji's, uh, startup.

And so we had a little bit of a background, you know, in DNA, you know, kind of pretesting and so on, and you were like pushing the limits, like nowhere, no one else. And I loved when I would talk to somebody in the industry and they'd all tell us like. That's crazy. Don't do that. That's not gonna work. And of course I'm like, this is gonna work.

Noor: Oh, that's amazing. Um, so then what piqued your interest in actually using orchid? Oh,

Kevin: oh, well, we're gonna have two babies.

Noor: Mm-hmm.

Kevin: And we are so excited. Um. We think that babies are the new luxury. Good. No, I'm just kidding.

Julia: My God. Okay, lemme take it.

Kevin: Okay. Oh boy.

Julia: Oh boy. Drinking margarita. Um, we, uh, you know, I think that after having two kids and building a company, so Eventbrite is 17. Uh, Emma is 15 and Eva is teenagers. Okay. 11. Yeah, we're all two teenagers. We're all preteens and teens. Um, yeah. I think one of the greatest privileges of our lives is, has been, well, the greatest privilege of our lives has been being parents and we've loved raising the girls.

And, you know, I think. I think oftentimes people think that they have to choose between professional success or per personal fulfillment, and I think we've done a really good job of balancing both. And I think like, just to speak for myself, I've always felt like the kids are getting on my train. Like I'm not stopping the train.

I'm not, you know, jumping the rails like you get on my train and let's go. So we've done our, I think a really good job of incorporating the kids into our lives and being with them. I mean, I think I can count probably on like. Maybe two hands at a foot. How many nights a year I'm away from the girls. And that's a combination of being really disciplined around travel and then also taking them everywhere.

And so I just think we shared that, that grounding principle of including them in our lives. And you know, we kind of reached the stage where you go through. So like really intense years, but it's really fast and I, I don't think anybody talks about how fast it goes. I mean, a lot. Okay. A lot of people talk about how fast it goes, but truly it's like you go in the steep climb of like parenthood because you have to adjust to being a parent and being responsible for another human being.

And then it like levels out really quickly. And I think it was in the leveling out where we were like, what? Are we done? Like, was that, was that it? Mm-hmm. And you know, Kevin had, again, a really prophetic question for me, which was, what else are we gonna do? And it's sort of like, you know, thinking about like starting a company, having professional success, being, being like living in this age and having so much privilege.

Like truly, what else are we gonna do? And I just got it. It was like one question that completely opened me up to the possibility of expanding our family. And you know, I think we'd watched a lot of our friends around us go through this journey and kind of had been like, you know, spectators and I don't think we'd ever imagined that it could be us.

And so. Once again, Kevin pitched a concept that I, you know, I, I was like, you're right. And, uh, and I think, can I use the roofies again? Yeah, exactly. You've like, snapped your fingers and I agree. And then we've been on the journey ever since. And I think, you know, I think it's taken us by surprise how difficult it's been.

Like how, how it hasn't gone quickly. But at the same time, I don't think you can rush these things. And so, um. You know, we're really excited because we plan to double our girl squad. Mm-hmm. And, um, I feel really honored and privileged to be able to do that. I mean, it's such a, it's such a huge, to go back to your joke about luxury, it's, it's such a huge luxury in life to be able to do that.

Wow.

Noor: Yeah. And

Julia: it's also brought up a lot of questions from people who love us. Right. Like, why would you do that? You have like two kids, you're on your way to empty nest. Why would you possibly bring more chaos and effort and work into your lives? And I just think it's, it's very personal choice, but I think that we feel really, um, we feel really lucky to have such a strong village around us.

And we know that we stay, we're really grounded by family. So

Kevin: I just kind of think back to. Yes, like amazing periods of Julie and I like building the business together, but there's such sweet intermingled parts of Emma in my arms as just a little baby. Like what a sweet baby. And looking in her sweet eyes and who she became and how she's grown up.

And then to have that again with Maeve, like I'm so excited to do it again and again and again, and. Um, yeah, I, I can't wait. I, people like, I don't understand people that say like, oh, this age is so bad, and they tell you every age, every 18 months how bad it's gonna be, and every 18 months it's like, just unbelievably wonderful and thoughtful.

Yeah. So, um, I mean, I just can't imagine anything more lovely.

Noor: Yeah. That's amazing. Basically, you just loved being parrot so much that you're like, okay, let's like take the leap to, um, to do it again. So could you walk through the steps of like, what, what it was, what was it like working with Orchid?

Deciding to work with Orchid was

Julia: pretty straightforward because of who you are and what you've built. But you know, I think deciding to. Really be intelligent about the choices that we're making and, um, be ethical and be mindful of what science can bring, uh, is really important. I mean, we just, we just like had sex and made our first two, you know, that was like, there was no, I.

No, I heard that's how it's done. No. Um, but this has been quite a different journey and so, you know, I think that we wanted to,

Kevin: we went the IVF route.

Julia: Yeah. We wanted to make sure that we were being thoughtful and intentional and careful about the decisions we were making. And, you know, we're not spring chickens, so you wanted to be.

Sure. And I think that's what Orca brought us, was the confidence that if we moved forward, it would be, it would result in a really responsible outcome. Um, you know, and, and the assuredness that we needed to, to know that we could move forward. Because I think no matter what journey you're on, whether it's, you know, a more modern science back journey or.

A biological journey. It is. There's so much uncertainty and, um, you know, for me, like I. I think I'd really taken for granted how easy it was to have our first two. Um, unfortunately I suffered a miscarriage with our third and that was a real big setback for me and you know, for us as a family, um,

Kevin: we always expected a third and then

Julia: yeah,

Kevin: it didn't happen and we just kind of went cold for a long period of time.

Julia: And so this is us not giving up. Right. And you know, I think part of that is our optimism around the future and the need for, um, us to make, or the assuredness that we can make great humans. Um, but also, you know, the fact that we have like the orchids of the world to help us through this. I mean, we have never been through this before.

Right?

Noor: Yeah. Can you tell us anything that was, um, unique or remarkable about working with Orchid? Well, I think

Julia: that working with Orchid gave us the confidence to move forward and gave us the clarity around the things that we really care about. I think it was really exceptional that we could add in to the process.

Things that, you know, were relevant to our family history and things that, you know, we would want to consider, and so we move forward now. With so much more confidence mm-hmm. Than I think we, we would have, especially being older parents.

Kevin: Especially being older parents. Um, yeah, orchid just, just, um, gave us confidence that we can be parents again.

And, um, it was something that, you know, before you just thought was, was all over and, but it wasn't for us. Like we, we. Wanted, um, these girls to come into our lives and be something meaningful. Um, so it's, it's really profoundly impactful.

Noor: How do you guys feel, um, after having worked with Orchid? Like basically, you know, you guys were, had this, um, you know, cool decision about having more kids.

There was like, you know, the whole process. Now that you're on the other side of, you know, looking at your reports, how do you guys feel?

Kevin: Well, listen, it's, it's early in this field of. Um, you know, from all the different aspects of IVF and, um, and other testing and, and so on. But Orchid was really that like shining light of stability and comfort and ease that so many other attributes of this are so difficult.

And, uh, really orchid just, you know, made it. Made it something that was comfortable, that gave us confidence, uh, that was really a, a wonderful part of the experience and gave us great insights.

Noor: What do you think you guys are gonna do differently about parenting these new kids? How has your like philosophy on parenting changed how you guys think about the

Julia: next thing?

Well, I think divorce this phenomenon lately where people feel like their lives have to make this huge change in order to have kids. And you know, I think probably people who have waited longer to have kids are legitimately going to have to make bigger life changes. Uh. I also think it's important to realize that, you know, you don't have to stop your life or stop the train for the kids to, to thrive.

They want to be with you and, and, and you can bring them on your journey. So I think, um, I think we definitely will keep that, uh, concept. I think we will. We've got a, uh, growing list of things, of feedback from our first cohort, uh, of things we shouldn't do Yes. Or should do. Uh, including

Noor: less

Julia: feedback for management, less screen time, so they're advocating for less screen time for their little sisters.

Uh, okay.

Kevin: Earlier exposure to Taylor.

Julia: Early exposure to Taylor Swift. Um, okay. I let our 15-year-old know that I don't do playgrounds, public play. Mm-hmm. Like they, I'm socially anxious. Gabby does, they're a little bit Jeremy. Yeah. So we kind of know our, our spots Same parent. Yeah. And our, and our superpowers.

Um, but, you know, I think that, we'll that, that we probably, here's the benefit of having a second cohort of kids is that. Even despite the ever-changing landscape of the world, you get, you get a really strong sense of what matters and what doesn't. Mm-hmm. And you know, our kids aren't fully grown yet, the first cohort, but we really can understand like what moments mattered for us to be there.

Kevin: Well, both are more mature than I am. Yeah.

Julia: And also like. What we don't need to get wrapped around the axle about True. So I don't think that we'll be like more mellow parents, but I think we'll be more confident.

Noor: What do you guys feel like you do differently, uh, than other Par Oh,

Julia: oh my God. Oh my God. We have dinner with our children five, six nights out of the week.

Mm-hmm.

Kevin: Dinner time is precious, sacred. We have a phone basket that you have to put your phone into. Then we sit down at dinner. I. And sometimes no one talks to each other the entire time. But

Julia: doesn't matter. We're

Kevin: at dinner together.

Julia: We're at dinner together, mother. So I mean, those, those two little girls are gonna like pull up in their high chairs as soon as they can sit up.

Mm-hmm. And they'll be at dinner every night. And I think it's just such a wonderful tradition, but I think it's getting, it gets lost with like activities and you know, all that stuff. So we're gonna preserve that.

Noor: And I'm gonna switch to a few, uh, work questions. Um, so the first one is for Julia. Um, what is the life of a public company, CEO?

Like, how is it, uh, the same or like incredibly different than the early days with the window lists office in Viro?

Julia: I. Uh, I try not to, um, dwell on the differences of a public and private company. I think that it's just the company. Mm-hmm. So I don't think that my life is much different other than the like, quarterly earnings reports, um, which I love because I love transparency and I love sort of like holding yourself accountable to what you say you're going to do.

Um, but I would say that being the CEO of a company, any company. In 2023 is a special challenge. It's just a lot going on, and I think coming out of a pandemic and grappling with a number of, of both social issues and international crises at the same time, it's just like, it's like a, like a very. Difficult day-to-day grind.

Noor: Kevin, for you. So from working with Peter and Founders Fund, um, do you, do you subscribe that, uh, every great company has to have a secret that they believe in, that nobody else does? Uh, why or why not? And then what does a star believe that other funds don't?

Kevin: Love that question. That is such a good question.

I absolutely do. Because every company that starts that's truly, truly great is like running against the grain. You know, they notice something that that's happening that others aren't, and they jump on it. The best companies, the best founders really, you know, see something happening that's so intriguing and.

Inspiring to them and they see the opportunity to go after it and that that really is the basis of that, that question. So those are the, you know, the businesses that are enduring over time, and I think you had another. Second.

Noor: Yeah, I was just wondering, do you think that AP applies to Astar as a fund?

Right? So you agree that great companies have a, have a secret that they, uh, believe that no one else does. Um, do you think it's the same for funds too? So for, for you guys that Astar, is there something about investing that, uh, Astar believes that other funds don't? And if so, what? Is it

Kevin: funny that you asked that?

Because I was like, I was like broken for so long because I'm like, oh, we're just another like douchey. Fund, like the world needs another fund. There's like four bazillion funds in the world. And the reality is, is that, um, funds don't have to differentiate like companies. Um, the funds that have and really have done it well.

And I'll point to the obvious two. One is Y Combinator that Jessica and Paul came up with A brilliant means to. Collect these, this young talent and help it launch into, in, you know, into space and it's work to this day. The other I would attribute to Peter, um, with Founder's Fund at a time when we would just naturally rip and replace the founder and put in a so-called professional, CEO, Peter said No, and that was the rise of the era of Steve Jobs.

It was the rise of the era of Mark Zuckerberg. And that was truly differentiated. That was harder to keep. 'cause everyone then kind of shifted in like, Hey, we're founded first two, but you know, granted to Peter and Kenny and Luke for, for doing that. Um, so my response around Astar and what we're doing is we're just trying to find those misfits, those, you know, people that are not kind of.

Following the typical thing, and they're out there so there can be more funds than ever, and that's the case right now. But they're not, what what's not happening is people are not, like, investors are not finding those companies and they're not seeking out those. Founders, they're truly, truly, truly kind of breaking all the rules and doing things in, in such a different way.

And that's always gonna be unique.

Noor: It's always gonna be rare and unusual. Yeah. Okay. Julia, for you, can you talk about some of the problems at Eventbrite and maybe your call for startups of like, Hey, I really wish there was like a company or product that would solve, you know, this problem for, uh, me personally or, you know, from the exposure you have to other, um.

To other, um, companies like this company needs to exist. Like, can someone go build it?

Julia: Yeah. You know, I think that that the, um, propensity to overcomplicate organizations is one that's a, just a kind of. Natural gravitational pull to any company that's growing out of startup to scale up to, you know, a, an established company.

So I'd love to see, uh, a company arise where it can, you know, quickly audit the complexities in your organization and effectively and automatically generate simplicity. That's including everything from your tech stack to the vendors that you choose to work with, to the org design of like, why are we making decisions around org design?

I'm sure there's much greater insight that will help us, you know, achieve a better outcome for the business and the company, um, other than like human based decision making on org design. Um, so I just think like that solving the complication factor in organizational design and the way that companies operate.

Uh, would be a huge boon.

Noor: What is, uh, maybe your piece of advice for people who are on the fence about having kids? For, for people who are kind of in the, in that, in that phase of, oh, I don't know if it's gonna, you know, change my life too much or I don't know if I can handle the stress or the, the tiredness of it.

What's your, um, your words of advice there?

Julia: Just jump in like you got here. Somehow to this point in your life, right? So you're capable, you're smart, you're adaptable. Like that shouldn't, you know, there should be no reason why you can't embrace the experience of parenthood. And I tend to think that people in general overthink it.

Mm-hmm. I'm pretty sure that one of our main jobs as humans on this planet is to procreate and I. Respect and, you know, honor those who decide not to, but to want to, but not sure if you can do it. That's just underestimating your own ability. So, you know, I think life is so much more fun with kids.

Obviously I'm biased because I have them, um, and it's hard, but it's also rewarding.

Kevin: You are right on.

Julia: Thanks, dude.

Kevin: Our only job in life is to appropriate. What else are we here for? Like, that's what we were created for. We were born, we evolve, we appropriate, we die, but we live on in our offspring.

Julia: Yeah, and I think it's just a, it's just a wonderful way to really balance out your life.

Kevin: The one thing that's interesting, like I've always wanted, I've always, in speaking with my grandparents or. Others that have like gone through the experience of raising children through adulthood and college and beyond is that they have always missed that time or wish they could cherish it more. And I just don't see why I would ever want it to stop.

And how could you not want more of helping to grow and shape these wonderful human beings?

Noor: Yeah. Well this is amazing because you guys are um, you know, such an inspiring power couple. I think a lot of people look up to you guys as you know, this is the couple that has it all that's able to have these amazing kids and this amazing companies and investing stuff.

So, um, yeah, thanks so much for taking the time to tell us about how you did it and how you guys are gonna do it again. And, um, yeah, it was such amazing to have you. Thanks so much for your time guys.

Julia: Thank you. Thank you Nora.

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