Tom Milar — Turning Waste into Capital Building Circular Systems That Scale | FV Podcast Ep. 39

Tom Milar has spent over a decade building infrastructure for private companies — first through incorporation services out of Hong Kong and Las Vegas, and now through Eqvista, a valuation and equity management platform serving 23,000 startups. After a successful acquisition, Tom took five of his most important team members and set out to fix a problem he kept running into himself: founders were managing ownership and valuation off static PDFs and Excel sheets, working from data that was already months out of date by the time it landed. Eqvista's answer is a real-time valuation engine that now values $4 trillion in assets and gives founders, employees, and investors a live look at what their company is actually worth — like a stock ticker for private companies. 

This conversation matters because valuation sits underneath almost every consequential decision a founder makes — raising, hiring, issuing equity, planning an exit — and most founders are working with a number that's stale, opaque, or both. Tom brings a rare combination of product obsession and financial discipline to the table, having bootstrapped Eqvista to scale on roughly half a million dollars rather than chasing rounds. For any founder thinking about their cap table, their next raise, or how to give their team real liquidity, this episode is a clear-eyed look at where private markets are heading. 

Key Topics Covered 

• The problem with PDF valuations — Why the months-long lag between financials and a finished valuation report leaves founders making decisions on outdated numbers. 
• Real-time valuation at scale — How Eqvista's engine continuously values 20,000+ companies and the data behind a $4 trillion valuation engine. 
• Controlled tender offers and liquidity — How company-led tender offers let founders set the price and structure liquidity for employees and investors on their own terms. 
• Bootstrapped, product-led growth — Why a free cap table, paid valuations, and relentless customer support drove scale without heavy fundraising. 
• The most common cap table mistakes — What early founders get wrong with paid-up capital, adjusted cost base, and overcrowded cap tables. 

Key Insights 

1. Valuation is a byproduct, not the prize. Tom and Maxim align on the idea that a strong valuation flows from belief in the founder, the idea, and the market size — not the other way around. Founders who chase the number rather than the fundamentals are optimizing for the wrong thing. 
2. De-risk before you raise. Tom's view is that founders should build a product that works, reaches real revenue, and approaches profitability before going to investors — so capital becomes fuel for acceleration rather than a bet on whether the business works at all. He's openly skeptical of early-stage bridge rounds as a sign that the original plan stalled. 
3. The story behind the price is the product. What separates a defensible valuation from a guess is the ability to explain why the number is what it is. Eqvista's edge isn't just the figure it produces — it's the pricing narrative built on hundreds of billions in valued assets that auditors and shareholders can actually rely on. 

Links 

• Eqvista: https://eqvista.com/ 
• Tom Milar on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tomasmilar 
• Future Ventures Corp: https://ca.linkedin.com/company/future-ventures-corp 

About Tom Milar 

Tom Milar is the Founder and CEO of Eqvista, a platform for company valuation, equity management, and private-market liquidity serving 23,000 startups. Originally from the Czech Republic, he moved to Asia in 2009 and built incorporation-services businesses before launching Eqvista with a core team carried over from a prior successful exit. He is a product-first founder who scaled the company through bootstrapping, freemium adoption, and a real-time valuation engine that now values $4 trillion in assets. 

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:03

Welcome to the future ventures podcast on Scaling with Clarity. Today's guest is Thomas Miller, founder and CEO of Equivista, which serves 23,000 stand-ups and has built four trillion valuation. Just a sec, let me let me restart. This was running too fast at double speed, so I'm not sure why. Okay. Welcome to the Future Ventures podcast on Scaling with Clarity. Today's guest is Thomas Miller, founder and CEO of EQVista, which serves 23,000 startups and has built a four trillion valuation engine for an Equivista real-time company valuation, giving private companies continuous visibility into their value. EQVista is also launching a controlled tender offer solution to help companies manage employee and investor liquidity in a structured valuation-driven way by controlling participation, pricing, and transaction terms. In this episode, we talk about real-time valuation, private market pricing, liquidity solutions, and the infrastructure being built for the next generation of private markets. Thomas, welcome to the stage.

SPEAKER_03 1:21

Awesome. Thank you so much. What a great intro. Thank you so much.

SPEAKER_00 1:33

And uh I would love to be able to dig in into your origin story before we dive into like kind of like why do you decide to build EQ Vista as well as the other companies and kind of like what problems do you see uh pertaining to private companies um and why do you decide to solve them? Uh let's let's start with the origin.

SPEAKER_03 1:56

Yeah, yeah, the origin. Um you know, we we have um uh originally um back in 2010, we uh we had a company, or we still had a company, uh Startup R based out of Hong Kong. And later on, Ink Paradise uh out of Las Vegas, um incorporation service providers. So we would help um founders to start out, LLCs, uh C Corps, and um uh limited companies um in uh in Hong Kong under the company ordinance. And um, you know, we were kind of uh annoyed with uh with the PDFs, and the PDF still rule the world. Um I think we can get to that later. The PDF uh reports mostly on the um evaluation side, so you get an evaluation in the PDF. Um and going back to your question, the PDF uh was annoying, even though you know six six years ago, um a lot of startups would still maintain um uh ownership in the in the PDF, then Excel sheet, and uh we had uh uh multiple successful companies before we had a very successful acquisition. And I was like, you know what, let's actually take the most important people with me and uh build a Quista. So that's how we that's how we started. So Jacob, marketing, uh marketing, our CTO, um, and a few other folks who joined us. Uh Colin, obviously, Colin, he's behind uh the practice, the abolition practice. And that's how we were uh star, but that's how we started, you know, but there's a reason why we are successful. So we took uh five team members from the previous from the previous company and built built a crystal.

SPEAKER_00 3:53

Got it. And what problem do you see in the market besides kind of the PDF, the static information, um, and what drove you to uh to to start a company?

SPEAKER_03 4:05

You know, um six six six years later, um obviously we had um great success in um equity management, we have a great access in uh valuations, so we do now between five to eight trillion uh billion dollars in client asset valuations. Um and the problem what we are solving now is that uh mostly um founders rely on static static static PDF. And um think about it, Maxim. You are you are founder, CEO, um it's um uh October. Um you decide to make to process uh or to get a your valuation value of the company, right? Um you ask your accountant, the accountant gives you uh uh last quarter financial, which is you know, let's say June. Um and then it takes usually one month if you are not prepared well, to get us all the documents because we can process the valuation within a few days or in a few hours. It depends on the complexity or um the urgency. Yeah, and uh the evolution report um that we issued the evaluation report in November, and that relies on uh June uh June June data. So all of a sudden you are four or five months later. Your revenue has shift, uh, the market is different, uh, and the PDF says the evolution date as of today, as of let's say November 1st, but the data are from uh uh June. Yes.

SPEAKER_00 5:49

So you have uh the first half of the year, but you're doing evaluations. Yeah, yeah, agree.

SPEAKER_03 5:55

Yes, so that's that's that's the problem because you know I can skip uh I can skip uh the equity um management or administration problem, but that is that has been already solved, you know. Um there is uh there is uh us, uh a few other players, and uh luckily we figure out that uh the valuation is uh something we are really proud of. Um we give it we give it for free. Um uh the cup table. We charge only for the um for the report for the valuation. And uh that's that's how we see the market. Um cup table, it's called commodity evaluation, that's the added value. PDF, it's outdated, and uh what we believe in is a real-time stock price. Um, so why why not to launch uh stock price um in real time? Yeah, so that was the original idea behind it.

SPEAKER_00 6:54

So, Tom, I mean, I'm I'm in love with the idea. Like, I like as as we we work with a ton of companies. So, for context, future ventures is a boutique capital advisory firm. So, by nature, we raise money for companies. Um and so in our context, one of the common conversations is around valuation. Um, and so valuation is really um uh a key element, not the primary element, but a key element behind how successful is company raising money. The first one is really fundable, idea belief, market size, all things, but like the valuation is is a byproduct of this. And so um when it comes to valuations, a lot of it is based on things that are not necessarily available in in markets. You can pull your benchmark information. I'm curious as to what kind of information are you piping in in order to drive the valuation? And and me as a CPA, somebody that like was trying to do valuation. I'm not a CBV, but trained to do evaluations. Like, I'm like, okay, what level of assurance comes with the valuations that have been provided?

SPEAKER_03 8:09

You know, uh where should I start? Um we have uh multiple, we have multiple uh ways how to get the evaluation and that's uh that's also the problem, right? Um so we have a 4.90 evaluation, they they they they they try to um uh value the stock, the common stocks for founders and employees, then um, then you have um uh preferred stocks that's between the investors, right? That's that's usual that's usually the the fair market value. Um that's actually where we would like to establish the the common common price, um uh the real time, the real-time valuation. So what goes in really depends on the formula. We we have done over um $300 billion in clients' assets uh valued. Um so we have fine-tuned all the models so well. Uh we understand um what type of uh formulas we should we should use, um uh for what type of company. Um also um the timing is also important. Um and uh um obviously the asset. Um so there's multiple multiple ways to look at it. Um most importantly, we have a uh a huge data set. Again, 300 billion dollars in clients' assets. As of now, our uh real-time, real-time valuation. Um, so you get a stock ticker as you would be privately uh traded company.

SPEAKER_00 9:49

Um when you log into your own company profile, like the employees, the founders, they get okay, got it. So this is mark-to-market, fair market value for the company based on comparative information.

SPEAKER_03 9:58

Yes, yes. So we have uh so we have uh so we have uh we have uh uh uh mobile app, you can check the value daily as a as a shareholder. Um meaning founder, um employee, or even investors, you can see the value of the asset. Um uh so yeah, um and and because of all the experiences we have built or we have gained over the years, yeah. Uh we were able to actually build an engine, and as of now, the engine calculates uh valuation for uh 20,000 companies. Uh so you fine-tune um almost every every every hour. Uh so it's all learns what's what's physical, what's not. Um uh and the value is four trillion dollars. So we build the largest uh valuation engine um on the on the on the on the market. So um that's our that's our story in terms of uh how we can uh solve solve the inaccuracy problem. Uh the next level is how to deliver how we deliver the pricing, discovery of the pricing um to uh um shareholders. Um the transparency is the next uh next level. So that's that's what we are trying to uh to trying to work on. And uh we believe that um um the best way uh the best the the best user is always um um yourself, right? You can start using it yourself, the tool that's uh that's always you know whatever you build and you are the first client, that's that's always the best. So our approach, our approach now is to launch um um it's to launch um uh control tender offer. Um so we will help actually founders or companies to sell uh stocks uh on uh on the um on the on our platform.

SPEAKER_00 12:03

Like a like a secondary? Uh yes, yes, like a like a secondary. Yes.

SPEAKER_03 12:07

So the first like the first phase, it's uh controlled, controlled and the offer, and the difference between the secondaries as you as you know them versus controlled tender offer secondaries. Um let's say um I'm your employee and uh I have 10,000 stocks, um, fully tested. Um and uh I would like to sell them on the secondary market. So I go to one of those uh uh Forge Global or Equity Zen. Um and uh I try to sell um the stocks and uh get uh get a get a liquidity or cash.

SPEAKER_00 12:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 12:48

So that's that's that's that's the typical way. But then we have a controlled uh tender offer. And the controlled tender offer is something where the company, founder, CEO, CFO step step in and uh establish the price. And because of our engine, the equipment company evolution, we can uh we can build um or we can tell the story, the pricing story better than better than anybody better than anybody else. So that's our that's our philosophy: transparency, pricing discovery, um, and uh control tender offer.

SPEAKER_00 13:25

Makes sense. I mean, what I like about the control tender offer is that this is driven by the company. Quite often you have employees with fully vested options that that feel a bit uh um um handcuffed in terms of what it can do because the company itself or the founder or whoever controls the company has to agree to something being done from a liquidity perspective.

SPEAKER_03 13:47

Yes, yes, and that's that's that's the whole philosophy, right? And uh now um again the the the incumbents they they build a platform. Uh and I don't think that the that that approach is right, and especially the the the pricing, um, and that's what we have actually uh figured out. And uh that's our focus.

SPEAKER_00 14:13

Makes sense. Makes sense. Um back to the to the valuation. Is is the valuation something that the auditors for these firms rely on? Uh is this something they can say, well, if the valuation is prepared by a third party, we can place a great great amount of reliance on it. As such, this number is something we can actually use for um finish reporting.

SPEAKER_03 14:34

Yeah, yeah, that's that's that's the whole that's the whole that's the whole goal. So yes.

SPEAKER_00 14:40

How did you um yeah, go ahead.

SPEAKER_03 14:43

Yeah, that's that's that's the whole purpose because again, um you have um uh you have a secondary price, uh multiple platforms, you have uh you have a form line evaluation uh price, then you have uh preferred stocks, right? Uh some investors will even know uh put uh put on the on the on the on the price on the price on the on the on the market uh different uh um stock price for the pro for the for the companies. And uh yeah, so that's that's that's the reason we think that the transparency, the pricing transparency is uh is important.

SPEAKER_00 15:23

100%. Um now our podcast is called Scaling with Clarity. So the most common question that that we have from Found is like, how do I go about scaling? You've built a significant customer base with 24,000 companies on it, and obviously there's a multitude of users under each company. How do you go about growing uh the company from zero to one, from one to ten?

SPEAKER_03 15:49

Um you know, I think uh the the physical the product is always very important. So you focus on uh uh building a really reliable, reliable product. So what we did right is that uh we all allow clients to build the cap table, the equity of issue stocks themselves. They don't need uh a third party, or they don't even need us. So and we don't sell hard uh on that on that uh freemium, freedom um package. Then um and we have an enterprise again, very reasonable, uh two dollars per shareholder, do you do yourself, and then we have uh intentionally called um package 49A, 49A valuation. It's a package, is that that's the name of the package where we offer um um valuation and the free uh equity equity management with a few compliance and reporting uh um features. So mostly uh all the tax tax uh stoppance um and uh reporting um and different type of uh fine machine model, like foreign um like uh um exit scenarios you can you can see who gets what based on the on the round um you have raised over the years. Um so that's the exit or waterfall analysis. That's that's probably the most common most common name you uh you might you might know that one round modeling, that's another cool feature. So again, you can model different rounds. Um yeah, so we give this uh all this feature for for free and we charge us for the for the evaluation. That's actually where our expertise is. Um got it. And um uh the scaling uh team later, um we had an amazing product, um, amazing support. So you know it's uh it's it's not a typical typical um um startup where you raise plenty of money because we haven't raised money uh much. Um uh actually it was just half a half million dollars. Um and uh this is the reason that's the reason why I think uh we scaled well uh because the product is just you know for low price and uh the customer and the product is excellent.

SPEAKER_00 18:13

So you started off with with an amazing product, so we started off with product like growth, um and and and then from there on, how do you I mean 24,000 customers, that's a significant number of customers. How do you just tell it from there?

SPEAKER_03 18:28

We have uh uh a lot of them are on uh on the freemium, so we okay um we we convert them later later on. But the the thing is that uh um we are software company, right? And uh most most of our competitors, they they don't offer, they waste a lot of money. They don't they didn't offer uh freemium. Um and uh I'm not I don't I don't blame them, but I'm always very uh uh close to uh uh cancel the freedom. There's actually a huge uh huge uh um uh opposition in my company to uh really close the freemium and start making making money or at least to charge 50 cents uh something or something. Right. Uh investors also don't like it, right? Like investors love to see the uh the revenue right away and retention. But uh again, you know, um I always really like the the freemium, the freemium uh part, you know, where you can test the product, have a minimal, mini, minimum viable product, test it, play with it, um save money, especially for early stage companies to save money. It's extremely extremely extremely important. And uh obviously we we actually are also very uh large knowledge database, so we have uh over uh 3,000 uh um websites um where we cover different topics and uh uh that's also very very beneficial. So yeah, so all these little things you know are very important. And uh and the disadvantage for us is that um um we have um we have not raised any money, right? Like very minimum. Oh bootstrap. Yes, bootstrap.

SPEAKER_00 20:29

Nice. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 20:31

And um that's actually a huge advantage for us because every single uh team member understands that uh um we have to we have to we have to actually work.

SPEAKER_01 20:48

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 20:49

Uh we don't hide, we have to work. Customer support is customer support or customer success. We answer the emails uh within few few few minutes, few hours, you know, we have available. Um and all these all these little things, right? Like we have an amazing link, LinkedIn, we have amazing blogs, we have amazing um uh customer uh spotlights. So um all this all this play amazing role in our uh in our uh success. And most recently, um going back to uh control tender offer, uh, I know exactly what to do and how to make uh uh customers happy. Um I know I know it's a cliche, right? But uh the the the the the pricing telly sto t telling story, it's uh uh Maxim is just so so important, you know, to to uh uh to really back the reason why the uh stock stock price is what do you would you would you suggest it, right? It's not guessing isn't

SPEAKER_00 22:00

is not uh data staking it's uh it's 300 billion dollars uh experience which we practically converted to uh this massive engine where we constantly value 4 trillion dollars uh the model learns um all the yeah and uh uh i think that's that's that's our next thing that's amazing um what's the what what are the features that they're most in demand like uh and and are the things that uh customers are looking for kind of like what lies on the product roadmap ahead and what are the features uh that that you build out that the people just like oh my gosh i can't wait to put my hands on uh you know uh i think it would be the type of control kind of offer um we are in a very boring industry right it's just super boring finance in general it's boring you know i think i think i would be more excited if i would be uh uh building um the topic would be more exciting i'm excited actually very much about the price of discovery but uh but the topic would be more exciting if you if you build uh space shuttle right um we have actually a few clients who are building a space shuttle um uh but uh uh i think it would be it would be the liquidity program you know that's that's where i'm i'm for a couple couple months i'm pitching as as we are building the feature or the product um or even though it's it's a company itself actually um uh as i'm as we are building it and pitching this idea to different people and they are really excited like extremely extremely excited because the liquidity is very important especially for those stakeholders uh but again everybody was chasing and is chasing um um the liquidity right but the money is never is never a problem right it's uh it's it's never a problem the problem is how you solve the problem and uh how can you actually price the stocks and I believe that we are you know the the the the company which which can handle that pretty much for sure um tom yeah you you you you mentioned that like uh one of the key differentiation uh factors for for equivistre is customer service um tell me how you have organized team it are you are you guys working as a federated team across the world in order to be able to provide coverage across different time zones are people based out of Hong Kong are people based out of San Francisco kind of like how is the the company itself organized?

SPEAKER_03 24:48

Yeah so uh how it's organized so we have uh um you know I I uh I moved to uh Asia 2010 2009 um and uh um I'm I'm from Europe myself so we have a global team um but the headquarters obviously San Francisco uh we have a we have uh uh key people in Monterey California that's actually uh that's actually where our uh colleague is um based he's the one who's actually a better he actually leads the revenue team um and customer um support or uh revenue team in in in uh in uh in a general in general so our clients are 95 percent in the United States so the uh so the the the the the the zones uh we have a few a few clients from let's say israel uh uk uh german or Singapore but uh but uh most mostly mostly united states so we and we cover that pretty much well yeah and and i are you uh if if if it's the US is it fair to say that a lot of those companies are technology companies or all of them technology companies okay yes yes technology mostly technology mostly tech companies um but we also have a soft drink company or as I said like uh heavy tech company pharmaceutical company so the agnostic um um so we can cover anybody who's uh uh interested in uh managing and um uh and issuing stocks got it got it have you um have you noticed any kind of cultural differences is in in terms of how founders from different regions think about ownership dilution or investor alignment I thought that you're gonna ask uh uh how people run business you know uh cultural yes that's what I was expecting the question yes um you can ask another question too I can ask them that question too probably not I won't be uh hate it for that uh uh no as a as a as a as a as a European I think um where about in Europe are you from Tom? Uh check Czech Republic Czech Czech Czech Republic okay okay um so European uh no no no actually from small small small town one and a half hours from uh Brno north north uh uh from Vienna one and a half hours north from Vienna in the town called Tiburno Br and B R N L um Brno Yeah that's that's where that we have a guy we have a Grand Prix um Grant Pri there so that's probably nice the motor motorbikes. Yeah so I mean the Czech Republic is an amazing country for for those that haven't visited I mean between Karlovari Praga uh Cheshky Burujovit said like there's just amazing places to explore yeah I agree yes yes yes I go but that's just the weather sucks you know otherwise it's probably still still still live there you have you don't see a sun yeah you don't see a sun for six six six months that's the whole that's the whole Europe yeah yeah yeah yeah we are not north we are not north like Scandinavian countries yeah yeah but uh but uh you know that's why we are here in California or in Nevada um the sun is uh pretty much guaranteed you know and uh yeah so we were talking about kind of like difference cultural differences yeah so go going going back to cultural differences you you know what I think um the the the Europe it's um you know I'm not gonna um I'm not gonna um cover the political scene there but uh I think they're just super slow you know yeah just super slow like and uh uh in anything uh we uh love to uh we like actually uh pragmatism right like we we used to be pragmatic but uh we have an abundance um the the life in Europe is such uh such such ease it's it's way easier than United States the market is much smaller uh but it's definitely easier to build a company but um um so we don't have um we don't have a really great uh legal system where uh we can easily distribute stocks uh to founders so the legal and the tax system it's kind of confused um so that's why I think the ownership uh uh it's uh very uh very weird um similar to Asia you know like um 99 percent of Asia um woke up in uh in uh capitalism just a couple couple of weeks ago you know um uh it's uh well it's uh I'm just trying to use a phrase where I'm trying to explain that you know the capitalism is still not fully developed in Asia right and the ownership uh it's a big big chunk of the capitalism um and uh until we figure out how to contribute to the state when you sell something you know the capital gains um and uh different type of uh uh ownership in different uh in different uh vehicles um I don't think we we will have as as big success as uh in the in the United States that's why most of the most of the VC firms and even the Asian uh VC firms require uh startups to incorporate company in Delaware or uh mostly Delaware um and uh what we have in the United States it's um in the United States it's uh it's a free money free flow um and uh the the system it's it's it's hard to hard to populate um replicate you know it's uh it's gonna take it's gonna take the countries uh forever um uh but uh yeah so that's that's the biggest uh that's the biggest biggest difference um the ownership and uh and how the legislat legislators uh think of uh ownership in a company's or even though simple thing as options um they cannot comprehend uh what it even means uh options we live in 2026 and uh and the European Parliament I don't think fully understands how to how to handle that and uh and um issue issue the um all this all this um uh legal legal uh framework to all all countries um and how to how how to actually set up set set it up you know at least at least in Spain or in Czech Republic um so that's that's that's uh uh that's why why most of the most of the companies set up a company in it in Delaware yeah as a C Corp. As a C Corp exactly yes and uh that's why they distribute the stocks out of the C Corp rather than from you know all these crazy names we have in Europe uh for uh limited company or C Corp.

SPEAKER_00 32:31

You know um so yeah makes sense everybody uh everybody everybody everybody in Europe when you set up a C corp thinks that uh you are a corporation massive massive corporation uh you know and you're gonna have a hundred millions of dollars um yeah of revenue or you already have right which is not true and which is not really important that what's important is just to you know set up a company where you can distribute wealth among people who helped you to uh launch the company you know and that's go and scale yeah agree that's to go and scale exactly um in in working with so many different companies uh what are the most common captable mistakes that early founders make have you kind of built trends and patterns in terms of what you observe because you said you have 3000 top leadership pieces that they're sitting behind um the login screen um so the the largest uh mistake yeah um I think just they don't really start issuing the stocks the way as they shouldn't as they should um and they don't pay up the capital you know so um so the first thing if you if you if you really think that um you can um be successful with your company so the first thing if you issue stocks make sure that um uh whatever the value um is you pay and you have a receipt where you've transferred money from your uh uh personal account to the company yeah so that's that's very important especially if you really are going to sell the company for dozens or hundreds of million dollars so you can you can have the proof that uh you put purchase the stocks because otherwise you're gonna get uh into trouble so that's probably the largest mistake and and can can you just double click on this i mean like for for for our listeners and viewers the the paid up capital is essentially becomes your adjusted cost base or the ACB and so between ACB and the fair market value the delta is what's uh tax this capital gains but why why is this a mistake that that that is being made because you know if you didn't pay if you didn't pay uh the capital right uh then you know what's your purchasing price you know and purchasing price really if it's if it's really if it's really back in you know 2017 or 16 when you started the company then uh you might be penalized for um you know for just bromly accounting of wrongly accounts uh bookkeeping and all these all these things so yeah so from accounting perspective you if you if there was no consideration provided for the shares that somebody receives the shares are deemed to be received at fair market value at the time so in this case if it was 2007 let's say the shares were worth a hundred dollars this is a consideration that you essentially you receive for free because you don't pay any money for it and so as a result if you get taxed on the zero to a hundred because that's like and you typically that happens immediately depending on kind of like every country or every jurisdiction has different tax laws and then you pay the capital gains on top of on top of the kind of the incremental growth since you acquired the the the shares that's right thank you yeah um in your experience what separates a healthy cap table from one that's highly dysfunctional too many investors too many investors yeah isn't this what every subsequent round tries to uh accomplish to just kind of simplify the cap table or get the number of investors down you know i'm a I'm a product founder so um I am mostly with a team so that's why we're able to scale the company without uh external capital um but uh I have a I have a many friends they tap amazing storytellers but uh very terrible in uh in uh execution and making a making a fun of them um uh obviously still still still humbled but uh um uh it's it's a tragedy not no let's be serious um it's it's it's a it's a it's a tragedy where you just basically have uh so many um arounds and you don't believe her um I think that's the biggest cap table mistake after not paying not paying the capital anyway um so I can be also critical towards myself yes um fundraising was never my big thing I never really liked it um but uh uh I think uh the product it's far better and once you are 100% sure that it works and you have you know six seven eight ten million dollars revenue yes go out and raise as much as as much money as you want yes yeah you have a team you have uh six different departments you don't have to be on on in the company on a daily basis trying to figure out why the button on the website doesn't work or why the why why the code uh just you know creeping out why that employee didn't come to work you know so once you have 50 60 employees the company is scaling uh it makes money it's it it was at least profitable for a couple months so you can say to to investors like hey look this is you know this is why we were in the best shape and this is the reason why we went down because we were hiring more people we were scaling we had more uh products uh bigger products more products um so that that that in my in my opinion makes so much sense right it's it is it painful yes okay massive pain right but uh um at least you will not waste uh your time you know um because at the end of the day you raised uh $10 million sit round uh congratulations um very jealous um but uh you are not gonna pay yourself six seven hundred thousand dollars right um you know you're gonna you're gonna end up with you know $150 $200 $25000 uh salary and uh if the product is not strong again so that's why I'm always keen on product you're gonna you're gonna lose four months four years five years of your lifetime um uh presumably that you work on the company for two years another two years before you burn the capital so you're at four four years right and um what's what's gonna happen is that you will have to run to uh investors for bridge bridge uh uh which is which is in my opinion I have no idea why that why the term even exists um for early stage early stage companies uh you know once the company has a 15 20 million dollars already yes bridge probably makes sense because you know something can happen um but for early stage um going from 10 million dollars to six seven million dollars round like uh uh seat extension or a extension you know I I I'm sure I'm sure that that that even I would love to be on this on these meetings you know with investors because I don't know what I was what I would say can be a fun conversation um and and I mean the you kind of uh hint in the some of the colour mistakes everybody's in love with with fundraising or like uh fundraising success or raising money evaluation uh but very few founders think like you in terms of hey go prove it out go de risk it then go if if you're looking for money then go to the investors and ask them for for money a lot of people love the idea of like oh look look at the check I raised instead of like well I built a company that's a dragon it's scalable it's breaks even it's profitable now I just need the money to stand on the gas pedal and accelerate rather than like let me go approve tomorrow or like what works but doesn't work.

SPEAKER_03 41:15

Yes Maximus absolutely absolutely right but uh you know and um so so I can actually destroy Mula just said uh um um everybody everybody has their own journey right um but not everybody is um uh a scientist right and not and everyone can really um handle so many uh different things um so uh unrational in multiple ways um and what doesn't really make sense uh I'm not proposing that uh that idea so uh there can be exceptions right um uh exceptions but uh I think it's it's uh it's better to be safe uh agree it always yeah are are are farmers becoming too dependent on fundraising as a validation mechanism I agree I agree at a certain point yes yes I agree I agree but but but but again we we live in digital digital world and I think that you can leave a massive foot footprint on building amazing logo amazing websites amazing product amazing customer care amazing um uh reviews to your clients yeah um uh you know the way how you present yourself the way how you uh build LinkedIn the way how you build build X X um the way how you build the the PDF uh presentation right there's a thousand thousand ways the way how you charge clients um uh there's a thousand ways how to how to do it for sure um from your perspective based on kind of like working with a whole bunch of companies what makes a company truly investable beyond the pitch tech like I I kind of get a sense that you are somebody that lives that believes in revenue believes in liquidity believes in growth skills like uh believes in de-risking but kind of like walk me through your thinking as to if you if you were writing the check what would you like to see it's just probably it comes from the from from the philosophy right it's uh um it's either the idea right make a hundred investments and hope that uh uh one is gonna sell for you know uh thousand thousand thousand thousand multiples but that's i don't see the difference between between this and um and uh and the casino you know so yeah there's there's not really because you know everybody after after investing in airbnb or oh i knew i knew it this was exceptional team yeah but what about the other 99 you invested you do so what did you what is um yes you know i don't think i don't think uh i don't think that's that's the that's the right approach again i'm not investor um um but then then there's uh revenue revenue start with exceptional product um so um just one last question tom um what's the greatest advice anybody has given you or you can choose between like what's the kindest thing somebody has ever done for you um just go and do it just go and do it like the Nike slogan just do it but just just go and do it yeah I think you can listen uh different podcasts and uh different smart people right but uh if you really if you really you know study the successful people I don't think there's just one way how people got uh uh successful so you know in the in a sport I love hockey um so just get just play your games believe your games you know that's that's that's what you do that's what you go what what why you're here what what how that's the reason why you got that far and uh you know uh just go and do it don't don't listen I think that's uh that's the most important thing because you know once you get distracted with uh different uh different uh uh opinions I don't think that you know you will get fired yeah you know obviously you need to pivot fast you need to change fast um uh pivot necessary but uh just believing in you you know I think that's the most important thing you know because nobody's gonna wake up tomorrow at 4 a.m and stay at until 1 a.m you know if it's it's it's you so don't get discouraged for sure and if I can continue on the hockey analogy um I live in Oberta where the Elmton Olive play we have the Calgary flames as well but the great Wayne Gretzky has a saying that like you have to skate to where the pack is going north not to where the pack has been so you always have to look out to the future like what's growing what's what's trending like what's what's shaping industry.

SPEAKER_00 47:06

Tom it it's been an absolute pleasure having you on the pod um thank you so much um and uh and and for for sharing your insights but also sharing your story in terms of how you went about scaling eq vista as well as the the value that it drives for founders thank you thank you for having me my pleasure