Ryan Breslow

Stripe's feeler strategy: copy anything tangential

Breslow claims Stripe keeps 'feelers out' on adjacent products (card issuing, subscription payments), makes sure tangential startups can't get off the ground, then rolls out its own competing product.

“So I've heard the same story from companies, you know, doing card issuing. I've heard the same stories from companies doing subscription payments, and then Stripe would roll out their own product next. So it's almost as if they have these feelers out, anything that's tangential, they make sure that it doesn't get off the ground. And then they go and build it.”

Come to Silicon Valley ready for war

Ryan Breslow, fresh off resigning as Bolt CEO, warns founders that building in Silicon Valley isn't sunshine and rainbows: powerful incumbents will play games to keep you from existing, and you need to be ready to fight.

“And so the most important thing I'm exposing here is if you're coming to Silicon Valley, you have an idea, you're quitting your job, putting a lot on the line, like, get ready for war. Like, it's, it's, it's serious. And there will be people who do not want you to exist, and you're going to need to be ready to battle that.”

A payments legend trashed Bolt, then poached its recruit for 3 hours

Breslow pitched a tier-1 Silicon Valley payments investor who spent the whole meeting explaining why Bolt couldn't be done, then spent three hours afterward trying to convince a Bolt recruit to join the firm's portfolio companies instead.

“And they spent the entire conversation telling me why this couldn't be done and that, you know, they actually got mad during the conversation. And then after the conversation, they saw one of the people on our team because we were recruiting top people, was at another company they were involved with, spent 3 hours trying to convince that person not to join us.”

Bagged groceries, dropped out of Stanford for crypto, then saw the checkout problem

Breslow's path: three years bagging groceries, a web dev agency, the Stanford Bitcoin Group in 2013, dropping out in 2014 for crypto, then realizing in 2015 nobody had solved online checkout — the insight that became Bolt.

“But about a year in, so mid-2015, I was like, wait a second, why has nobody solved this checkout problem? If you create a checkout and all the users who go through your checkout enroll in Shopper accounts, you could create the most powerful, important shopper network, payment network on the planet. And so like, this is a sight I couldn't unsee”

Good dudes is what you do privately, not what you say publicly

Asked whether the Collison brothers are 'good dudes,' Breslow draws a line between public reputation and private conduct, saying they don't meet his standard.

“they don't meet my standards for good dudes. And so, you know, good dudes is not what you say publicly, it's what you do privately.”

Breslow ran Bolt on a $40-60K salary for 5 years, never sold a share

Despite building a multibillion-dollar company, Breslow started at a $40K salary, never exceeded $60K for about five years, and went almost eight years without selling a single share so every dollar would maximize Bolt's outcome.

“and at Bolt, I start off at a $40K salary And for about 5 years, it never got higher than $60K. So I was living paycheck to paycheck. I wanted every dollar to maximize Bolt's outcome. And just recently, I sold a very tiny amount of shares just to kind of pay for some expenses. But up until a month ago, I hadn't sold a single share almost 8 years into the journey.”

Stack every tier-1 VC on your cap table to conflict them out of rivals

Shaan and Breslow describe Stripe's game-theory move: give every tier-1 firm a small stake so they're all shareholders, then those investors are conflicted out of backing competitors like Bolt.

“But you know, Stripe has like all the big names in Silicon Valley invested in them. All right, so they've intentionally put every single, you know, tier 1 firm on their cap table, and they've even stuffed them with small checks. They're like, everybody's on their cap table, right?”

Steal thisSpread small allocations to every top-tier fund so they become shareholders who can't back your competitors.

Stripe allegedly smothers anything in its periphery, then builds it

Breslow claims Stripe treats tangential companies (card issuing, subscription payments) as threats — discouraging investors, then rolling out competing products of its own.

“So I've heard the same story from companies, you know, doing card issuing. I've heard the same stories from companies doing subscription payments, and then Stripe would roll out their own product next. So it's almost as if they have these feelers out, anything that's tangential, they make sure that it doesn't get off the ground and then they go and build it.”

Build an investment bank that makes warm investor intros for startups

Breslow pitches a service that sanity-checks a founder's deck and blasts out warm investor intros — which he argues is 99.9% of YC's value, done better and more personally. He already does this informally for ~200 companies.

“I think someone needs to start an investment bank for early stage companies where they help introduce you to a bunch of investors. You know, they sanity check your deck and materials. They blast off a bunch of intros, which is 99.9% of the value that YC has, right? And they don't even do that. They don't even send personal intros. You're one of 400 companies, right?”

Steal thisCharge a few percent of capital raised plus a little equity to sanity-check decks and make warm, personal investor intros for early-stage founders.

Charge a few percent of capital raised plus a little equity for fundraising help

Breslow's pricing model for startup fundraising help: a few percent up to high single digits of the capital raised, plus a small slice of equity — far less than a banker's 7%.

“You maybe take a certain percent of the amount raised, right? And then maybe a little equity. So that's what I do for earlier stages. I take, you know, anywhere from a few percent to high single-digit percent of, of the capital raised. And then I would take a little bit of equity.”

Steal thisPrice fundraising help at a few-to-high-single-digit percent of capital raised plus a small equity slice.

Treat founders well and they refer other founders

Breslow's reputation-building rule for investors: treat founders exceptionally well and they refer more founders. Firms that hold this ethos forever — instead of forming an ego once they have a brand — build the next great firm.

“Well, the secret that I'd share with any investors is treat founders really well and they'll refer other founders, right? And so some do that early on, then they have a brand, and then they, you know, form an ego, right? And they forget how that brand was generated in the first place.”

Steal thisTreat every founder so well they refer the next one, and never let a brand turn into ego.

Build a public investing track record inside a DAO instead of courting LPs

Breslow argues a VC DAO lets an aspiring investor skip the five years of building LP relationships: invest publicly within the DAO, build a verifiable track record, and let that record attract capital.

“It's way easier because you don't have to spend 5 years building relationships with LPs. You can start a public track record investing within your DAO, and that track record will, you know, talk for itself and attract more and more capital.”

Steal thisSkip the LP grind: build a public, verifiable investing track record inside a DAO and let it attract capital.

Commerce decentralizes: a tidal wave of local purchasing platforms

Breslow predicts every industry decentralizes, with a coming tidal wave of purchasing platforms for buying from neighbors and locally — framing Bolt as the decentralized, headless successor to Amazon (phase 1) and Shopify (phase 2).

“I think every industry is getting decentralized. I think purchasing— you're going to see a tidal wave of purchasing platforms that help you purchase from your neighbors, purchase food locally.”