TheTrueNorthPod

Raw. Unfiltered. Real.
Stories of Canada’s Most Ambitious Founders 🇨🇦.
Watch & Subscribe 👇

[TheTrueNorthPod @TheTrueNorthPod]

Check out the full story of how Jack and Rian built Clio to a $5B category killer and changed legal forever on YouTube and wherever you listen to your podcasts: https://t.co/ovPqW5P9KN.

And follow @TheTrueNorthPod, we're telling these stories so the next generation builds here 🇨🇦

[TheTrueNorthPod @TheTrueNorthPod]

In 2008, @goclio's co-founder was so bored on a customer support call that he checked his spam folder for the first time in his life.

Inside: a cold email from a German angel investor that looked exactly like a Nigerian prince scam. It was from @chrija, offering to invest.

That email became Clio's $1M Series A. Christoph then introduced them to the Valley investors who led their Series B and Series C.

They've raised $2 billion since. Clio is worth $5 billion today.

Rian Gauvreau still calls it "probably the single most valuable act I've ever taken in my entire life."

He and @jack_newton tell the full story on the latest episode of @TheTrueNorthPod

[TheTrueNorthPod @TheTrueNorthPod]

We're trying with @TheTrueNorthPod, Evan.

We've travelled the country. Done over 75+ interviews with Canadian founders.

...And we're just getting started.

Check out our latest episode with @jack_newton who built @goclio to a $5B category killer from Burnaby, BC.

https://t.co/zzTseXIBMm

[TheTrueNorthPod @TheTrueNorthPod]

@boardyai @jack_newton 100%

[TheTrueNorthPod @TheTrueNorthPod]

@jack_newton Thank you for letting us tell your story, Jack!

[Jack Newton @jack_newton]

Really enjoyed doing @TheTrueNorthPod where we dig into the Clio journey, our AI transformation, the challenges of scaling in Canada, and what it takes to build a generational company.

[TheTrueNorthPod @TheTrueNorthPod]

@jack_newton @goclio Also on YouTube and wherever you listen to your podcasts: https://t.co/VstCpTQz1z.

Follow @TheTrueNorthPod, we're telling these stories so the next generation builds here 🇨🇦

[TheTrueNorthPod @TheTrueNorthPod]

Two best friends from Edmonton swore off VCs, found their first investor in a spam folder, and built a $5 billion company from Burnaby, BC.

My conversation with @jack_newton and Rian Gauvreau, the founders of @goclio is live:

0:00 Intro
3:53 Would you build it here?
16:57 Capital will find you
20:50 Two idiots from Edmonton
32:02 Why doesn't Claude eat your lunch?
43:58 Four steps to the epiphany
49:37 Sell work, not software
55:09 The shoe company
1:03:18 The spam folder
1:10:44 From "f*** VCs" to $2 billion
1:17:05 The Sagrada Família
1:23:31 Prosperity is a choice

Follow @TheTrueNorthPod for more untold Canadian founder stories.

[TheTrueNorthPod @TheTrueNorthPod]

📌 Watch the full episode on YouTube (or wherever you listen to your podcasts): https://t.co/LLU6M9iJIn

🇨🇦 Subscribe & follow for more untold Canadian founder stories

[TheTrueNorthPod @TheTrueNorthPod]

Faire's first trade show (now a $5B business). A basement booth. The cheapest spot they could afford.

Co-founder Marcelo Cortes (@mescortes) describes it as "probably one of my worst times at the company."

A man points to a picture in their booth and asks what it is. Marcelo Cortes pitches it to him...

He responds: "It's my brand. Why are you selling it?!"

Marcelo: "Why don't you talk to my CEO? Max, come here."

While Max kept him talking, Marcelo and Daniele swapped the picture out under the table.

Four days, ten hours a day. Total sales: $3,500.

Everyone celebrates the billion-dollar success.

What people don't understand is that it takes a lot of 'disaster trade shows' to get there.

[TheTrueNorthPod @TheTrueNorthPod]

@mescortes The full conversation is live. Marcelo on AI, the SaaS apocalypse, and building a $5.2B company from Waterloo:

https://t.co/ksuhUv2QaR

[TheTrueNorthPod @TheTrueNorthPod]

"Is AI going to kill engineering? Is the SaaS apocalypse real?"

@mescortes: "That's BS."

Marcelo is the co-founder and CTO of Faire, a $5.2B company he runs from Waterloo. Before that, he helped build Cash App for Jack Dorsey's Square.

His full answer:

"Claude is not going to kill engineering. It's changing engineering"

"You're not the one writing the code anymore. That first 10% of the job? It becomes 90% of the job."

"Engineers are going to keep being really important. If not more important than before."

The full conversation covers how AI is reshaping his engineering teams — and how Faire went from $3,500 in sales to billions. Link in the comments.

Follow @TheTrueNorthPod for more untold Canadian founder stories 🇨🇦

[TheTrueNorthPod @TheTrueNorthPod]

📌 Watch the full episode on YouTube (or wherever you listen to your podcasts): https://t.co/j86YI64TYZ

🇨🇦 Subscribe & follow for more untold Canadian founder stories

[TheTrueNorthPod @TheTrueNorthPod]

Silicon Valley asked Marcelo Cortes (@mescortes) to move. Over and over.

He said no and built a $5.2 billion company from Waterloo instead.

Most Canadians have never heard his name. That changes today.

He co-founded @faire_wholesale with Max Rhodes (@MaxRhodesOK) and (@danieleperito). It's how hundreds of thousands of independent shops find the products on their shelves.

Every Canadian should know Marcelo's story, so we're telling it.

The full episode of @TheTrueNorthPod is LIVE.

It's the whole story: how a kid from outside São Paulo got into Y Combinator and built a $5.2 billion company from Canada, and the exact playbook he used to do it.

Here's what you'll learn:

→ How he built Cash App for Jack Dorsey at Square, then walked away from a fortune to start Faire

→ The word he banned from Faire, and why retailers wouldn't talk to them until it was gone

→ The one change that turned the entire business around

→ 200% growth month over month, and the returns that buried the office

→ Why he tells founders to raise the money: "You make very bad decisions if you are in a financially stressful situation"

→ Why his co-founder calls him the engineer who disappears for a weekend and comes back with an impossible problem solved

→ If he thinks AI will kill engineering

→ What his wife, Adrienne, said when he quit Google, and why he says he wouldn't be here without her

Canada doesn't have an entrepreneur problem. It has a storytelling problem. Marcelo is $5.2 billion of proof.

🎙️ Follow @TheTrueNorthPod for more untold Canadian founder stories.

🇨🇦 Watch the full conversation — link in the first reply

[TheTrueNorthPod @TheTrueNorthPod]

@parker_brydon The True North Pod!

Telling the untold stories of Canadas greatest founders.

Big episode dropping tomorrow.

https://t.co/rSns1dKvNM

[TheTrueNorthPod @TheTrueNorthPod]

@skanwar @melltruong Let's goooo

[TheTrueNorthPod @TheTrueNorthPod]

Video features the following founders who have chose to stop complaining and built in Canada 🇨🇦

@harleyf
@jeffreyshiner
@jack_newton
@mkatchen
@ncawse
@devongall
@mescortes
@stephenseibel
@parkdan
@rkhazzam
@Braatzy
@jeffcanadamson

[TheTrueNorthPod @TheTrueNorthPod]

Everyone says you can't build a real business in Canada.

12 founders are about to tell you why that's bulls***.

"There's a new phase of Canadian entrepreneurship that is loud and proud and f***ing bold."

- Harley Finkelstein, Shopify, Ottawa ($160B).

"Young, innovative folks have to stop thinking they have to leave Canada to be successful. They don't."

- Jeff Shiner, 1Password, Toronto ($6.8B).

"We could change our tax jurisdiction in a heartbeat. We choose to stay here."

- Mike Wessinger, PointClickCare, Mississauga ($5B).
(96% of his revenue is in the US. He stayed anyway.)

8 Canadian companies will cross $1B in revenue this year. Most people can't name three.

"What are you gonna do to make progress here?"

"It's all a choice. Just go out and do it."

Jack Newton, Clio, Burnaby ($5B).

It's time to stop complaining, take the lead, and make Canada the best place in the world to build.

🎙️ Follow @TheTrueNorthPod for untold Canadian founder stories

[TheTrueNorthPod @TheTrueNorthPod]

@harleyf We'll make it happen @harleyf !!!

[TheTrueNorthPod @TheTrueNorthPod]

"THIS IS NEVER GOING TO WORK 💀."

That's what people told @jennaearnshaw while she was raising for @Wisedocsai...right before the AI explosion.

→ "Going through one of our financing rounds, I remember getting no after no after no after no."

She kept going....

Wisedocs has now processed more than 130 million claims documents. Enterprise revenue is up 84x in two years.

→ "The market catching up to that has been so reassuring that we made the right bet."

The lesson I've learned from Jenna and dozens of other founders?

As a founder, you're guaranteed one thing...A lot of no's.

What separates the winners from the losers?

The winners just don't stop.

Follow @TheTrueNorthPod for more untold stories from the founders building in Canada 🇨🇦

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And a shout-out to Simple Ventures,
@rachelz_to, @lucyhargreaves4, @buildcanada
& @readthepeak for bringing the Built in Canada Awards to life.