Blog•Nov 5, 2025
🧑🚀 New Interview, AI Surveillance & Google’s Space Compute
The post surveys a wave of AI‑related announcements, from China’s rollout of expanded surveillance systems to SAP’s launch of its RPT‑1 AI platform. It highlights Google’s experimental “space compute” project that runs AI models on satellites and notes Shopify’s sharp sales lift after embedding generative AI tools. The author also flags cultural pushback, citing Studio Ghibli’s protest against AI‑generated training data, and corporate caution, referencing Microsoft’s decision to avoid pursuing “conscious” AI. Overall, the piece underscores both the accelerating commercial deployment of AI and the growing ethical and strategic debates surrounding its use.
By Matthew Berman
Blog•Nov 5, 2025
The Compounding Startup
Kyle Poyar analyzes ChartMogul data to show that the rare SaaS startups that break the $20 million ARR barrier do so by continuously improving their revenue mix—raising ARPA, boosting expansion and retention—rather than relying on early‑stage momentum alone. The outliers double‑digit...
By Kyle Poyar
Blog•Nov 4, 2025
Dev Steps Down as CEO of MongoDB: The Beginning of the End of an Era?
MongoDB announced that long‑time CEO Dev Ittycheria will step down after 11 years, with former Cloudflare executive CJ Desai named as his successor. The transition comes as the company beat Q3 expectations, saw its stock rise and reported re‑accelerated growth,...
By SaaStr
Blog•Nov 4, 2025
Part 2 of How to Get the Most Out of Your Product Pass—And Welcome, Stripe Atlas, to the Bundle!
Lenny Rachitsky announces a 40% discount on Stripe Atlas for Insider subscribers, positioning it as a core component of his $15,546‑value product‑pass bundle that now costs $200‑$350 per year. He explains how Atlas streamlines incorporation, tax filings, and banking, making...
By Lenny Rachitsky
Blog•Nov 4, 2025
Your Seed Round Now Needs to Last 3+ Years: What 3,365 Startups Tell Us About the New Series A Timeline
Carta’s analysis of 3,365 U.S. startups shows the median time from seed to Series A has more than doubled, with 39% now taking three or more years—up from 19% in 2019. The shift reflects higher VC expectations, now demanding 5× growth...
By SaaStr
Blog•Nov 4, 2025
🧑🚀 AI Diplomacy, Trump Limits NVIDIA’s Chips, & $38B Compute Partnership
The post highlights three major AI developments: a $38 billion multi‑year compute partnership between OpenAI and AWS, President Trump’s restriction of NVIDIA’s Blackwell chips to U.S. firms, and Microsoft’s $15.2 billion AI investment in the UAE that tests U.S. export‑control policy. It...
By Matthew Berman
Blog•Nov 4, 2025
Part 2 of How to Get the Most Out of Your Product Pass—And Welcome, Stripe Atlas, to the Bundle!
In this second installment, Lenny Rachitsky outlines seven tools—Lovable, Bolt, Granola, ChatPRD, Superhuman, Raycast, and others—that streamline product prototyping, research, note‑taking, email handling, and workflow automation, helping builders work faster daily. He also announces a new insider perk: a 40%...
By Lenny Rachitsky
Blog•Nov 4, 2025
🧑🚀 THE SUBTLE ART OF NOT GETTING REPLACED
The post presents a hands‑on playbook titled “The Subtle Art of Not Getting Replaced,” aimed at turning readers into AI power users through practical, ready‑to‑apply examples. It outlines a consistent format for each AI use case—what it is, why it...
By Matthew Berman
Blog•Nov 3, 2025
AI Wins When It Does The GTM Work … People Won’t
Jason Lemkin reports that SaaStr’s AI‑driven SDR booked a six‑figure sponsor meeting at 6:02 PM on a Saturday, a task virtually no human rep would perform. He argues AI’s value lies in handling the low‑energy, time‑sensitive GTM work that humans avoid,...
By SaaStr
Blog•Nov 3, 2025
The Top 10 Mistakes I See In The VP of Sales Hiring Process
The post lists the ten most common errors founders make when hiring a VP of Sales, emphasizing that a successful hire must deeply understand the product, be willing to sell and close deals themselves, and bring a ready pipeline of...
By Jason Lemkin
Blog•Nov 3, 2025
How to Price Your AI-First Product: The Death of SaaS Pricing and the Rise of Transactional Models with Defy Ventures’...
Medha Agarwal of Defy VC warned that traditional seat‑based SaaS pricing is being eclipsed by transactional models as AI‑first products can replace or augment labor, allowing companies to sell into larger labor budgets. Transactional pricing—either input‑ or output‑based—captures more value...
By SaaStr
Blog•Nov 3, 2025
“Vibe Analysis”: How Faire’s Data Team Uses AI to Investigate Conversion Drops, Analyze Experiment Results, and Convert Raw Data Into...
In this episode, Faire’s data team members Tim Trueman and Alexa Cerf demonstrate how they use AI‑powered tools—such as Cursor, ChatGPT Deep Research, and Model Context Protocols—to quickly diagnose conversion drops, evaluate experiment outcomes, and turn raw data into polished,...
By Lenny Rachitsky
Blog•Nov 2, 2025
👾 Live From Dreamforce: Marc Benioff on AI's Promise and Limits
At Dreamforce 2025, Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff balanced optimism about AI’s transformative potential with a realistic appraisal of its current limits, emphasizing that AI augments rather than replaces human work. He highlighted Salesforce’s concrete AI deployment—matching human‑agent satisfaction while reshaping...
By Matthew Berman
Blog•Nov 2, 2025
Nasdaq Reaches Another ATH. Nvidia Tops $5T. But Navan’s IPO and JAMF’s $2B Exit Show B2B Still Isn’t Easy.
Nasdaq reached a new all‑time high and Nvidia topped a $5 trillion market cap, underscoring the AI‑driven rally in public markets. Yet the week’s two B2B SaaS exits—Navan’s IPO at a $4.7 billion valuation (7.7× 2024 revenue) after a 20% opening‑day drop,...
By SaaStr
Blog•Nov 2, 2025
Traffic Is No Longer a Reliable Growth Metric
Kyle Poyar argues that raw traffic is becoming a misleading growth metric as AI‑driven search, especially ChatGPT, delivers far higher‑intent leads that convert six times faster than Google. He shares seven insights from Webflow’s VP of Growth, including the need...
By Kyle Poyar
Blog•Nov 1, 2025
AI App of the Week: Assistant UI – The React Library That’s Eating the AI Chat Interface Market
Assistant UI, a TypeScript/React library backed by Y Combinator, has become the de‑facto standard for AI chat interfaces, pulling in over 200,000 monthly downloads and adoption by firms such as LangChain, Athena Intelligence, and Stack AI. The library offers composable...
By SaaStr
Blog•Nov 1, 2025
Why The Top Quartile in Venture Is Brutal Today: When “Doing Great” Isn’t Enough to Raise Money
SaaS founder Jason Lemkin reports that SaaStr’s AI‑driven pitch‑deck analyzer, after reviewing over 1,600 decks, shows a stark shift in VC expectations for companies with $2‑10 million ARR. While a 200% YoY growth rate at $3 M ARR once guaranteed a Series A,...
By SaaStr
Blog•Nov 1, 2025
Wayback Machine Joint
Automattic is collaborating with the Internet Archive to launch a WordPress plugin that automatically redirects users to archived versions of pages that have gone offline, mitigating link rot. The tool detects broken links, fetches a snapshot from the Wayback Machine,...
By Matt Mullenweg
Blog•Oct 31, 2025
VCs: Want More Dealflow? Sign Up for SaaStr’s AI Dealflow
SaaStr has launched an AI‑driven deal‑flow platform that lets founders upload their pitch decks directly to a centralized hub. In its first weeks the service has collected more than 1,542 decks and performed over 556,387 AI‑generated startup valuations. The platform...
By SaaStr
Blog•Oct 31, 2025
Last Call: November AI Engineering Cohort Closes in 48 Hours
Louis‑François Bouchard’s October 31 note warns that enrollment for the November Full‑Stack AI Engineering cohort closes in 48 hours, with a live kickoff on November 2. The program, priced at $349 (one‑time) after a free preview, promises a production‑ready GenAI playbook previously...
By Louis Bouchard
Blog•Oct 31, 2025
Why Pay for Remote Video Production
The article makes the case that remote video production—often available for under $5,000—delivers a strategic asset rather than just a raw video file, encompassing professional planning, executive coaching, high‑quality production, and full post‑production services. It contrasts this with in‑house Zoom...
By A. Lee Judge
Blog•Oct 31, 2025
AI Won’t Show Your Business If You Hide Your Pricing—Here’s Why
The article warns that businesses that omit pricing on their websites risk being invisible to AI-driven search tools like ChatGPT and Gemini. When users query AI for services—such as hiring a PR agency focused on influencers, Substacks, and local press—the...
By Christopher S. Penn
Blog•Oct 31, 2025
Who’s Just Crushing It in SaaS Today: Palantir, Rubrik, Figma, Klaviyo, Snowflake and Shopify
Seven public SaaS firms—Palantir, Rubrik, Figma, Klaviyo, Snowflake, and Shopify—are each growing ARR faster than 30% while surpassing the $1 billion threshold. Palantir accelerated to 48% YoY growth at $4 billion ARR, earning a 107× price‑to‑ARR multiple, while Rubrik’s subscription ARR rose...
By SaaStr
Blog•Oct 30, 2025
JAMF Goes Private for $2.2 Billion. That’s 3.3x ARR. Why B2B Can Be a Long, Hard Road
Private‑equity firm Francisco Partners agreed to acquire JAMF for $2.2 billion, a 50% premium to its recent share price but less than half the $4.6 billion market cap the company commanded on its 2020 IPO. The deal values JAMF at roughly 3.1×...
By SaaStr
Blog•Oct 30, 2025
The Great VC Reshuffle: OpenAI’s $500B Restructuring, A16z’s $10B Mega-Fund, and Why Two-Thirds of Series B Investments Fail
OpenAI completed a landmark restructuring into a public‑benefit corporation, separating its for‑profit arm valued at roughly $500 billion and leaving CEO Sam Altman with no equity while Microsoft’s $13 billion stake positions it for a near‑10× return. Andreessen Horowitz announced a $10 billion...
By SaaStr
Blog•Oct 30, 2025
Why Hope Is a Leadership Strategy
On the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast, psychologist Dr. Julia Garcia presented her Five Habits of Hope framework, arguing that hope is a learnable set of habits—reframing adversity, processing emotions, building community, taking emotional risks, and practicing release—that leaders can teach...
By John Jantsch
Blog•Oct 30, 2025
What To Expect From a New VP of Customer Success in The First 30-60-90 Days
The article outlines a 30‑60‑90 day plan for a new VP of Customer Success, emphasizing immediate customer engagement, internal alignment, and data analysis in the first month. In weeks 31‑60, the focus shifts to refining onboarding, establishing health scores, piloting...
By SaaStr
Blog•Oct 30, 2025
$555B of Cloud Spend
Microsoft and Google reported surging AI-driven cloud demand, with combined remaining performance obligations and capex commitments swelling to roughly $555 billion as both ramp data-center builds and GPU capacity. Microsoft’s commercial RPO topped nearly $400 billion and Google’s backlog hit...
By Tomasz Tunguz
Blog•Oct 29, 2025
👾 Formula 1's Unexpected Edge: Why Racing Matters More as Cars Drive Themselves
As autonomous driving advances, Formula 1 is experiencing a counterintuitive boom by leaning into human drama and high‑performance spectacle rather than technical obsolescence. F1 has modernized operations—shifting to a hybrid broadcast model that halved on‑site staff and leveraging partners like...
By Matthew Berman
Blog•Oct 29, 2025
Why Marketers Are Getting Kicked Off Reddit (And How to Survive)
Marketers are increasingly being expelled from Reddit as moderators and communities crack down on overt promotion, vote manipulation and inauthentic participation. The article details common infractions—undisclosed affiliations, repurposed ad copy and short-term engagement tactics—and offers survival strategies such as following...
By Christopher S. Penn
Blog•Oct 29, 2025
If Your CRO, CCO or CPO Doesn’t Meet With Customers Their First Week On The Job … Move On. ...
SaaStr founder Jason Lemkin warns that a newly hired CRO, CCO or CPO must meet with customers in their first week, or the company should apologize for the mis‑hire and let them go. He says skipping direct customer interaction signals...
By SaaStr
Blog•Oct 29, 2025
5 Interesting Learnings From MongoDB at $2.4 Billion in ARR
MongoDB reported $2.4 billion in ARR, with revenue growth rebounding to 24% and its stock up about 45% year‑to‑date. Seventy percent of Atlas ARR now comes from customers that use at least one additional platform capability, and those multi‑product users generate...
By SaaStr
Blog•Oct 29, 2025
🧑🚀 AGI Partnerships, NVIDIA Announcements & OpenAI’s $135B Shift
OpenAI completed a legal recapitalization into a public-benefit for-profit structure that gives Microsoft a roughly 27% stake valued at about $135 billion while a controlling non‑profit foundation holds 26%, a move that unlocked $30 billion from SoftBank and includes a...
By Matthew Berman
Blog•Oct 29, 2025
What’s Working in GTM Right Now
Surveying 195 software GTM leaders, the inaugural 2025 State of B2B GTM report finds companies juggling heavy channel experimentation—an average of five core GTM channels plus 5.5 experiments—while inbound (23%), outbound (19%) and account‑based GTM (18%) remain the most common...
By Kyle Poyar
Blog•Oct 29, 2025
Sabbaticals Keep Our Attrition at Bay
37signals says offering a six-week sabbatical every three years has been a simple, effective tool to curb churn in an industry where average tenure is about 18 months. The company reports the policy — in place for roughly 15 years...
By David Heinemeier Hansson
Blog•Oct 29, 2025
AI Product Liability: The Light-Touch Law with Heavyweight Impact
The Center for Humane Technology argues that applying traditional product liability to AI — treating chatbots and companion apps as products, not services — is a practical, innovation‑friendly way to force safer design, create legal accountability, and mitigate mounting harms...
By Tristan Harris
Blog•Oct 28, 2025
From Zero to Eight Figures in 18 Months: Decagon CEO’s Playbook for AI-Native SaaS Growth. And Why They Partnered With...
Decagon, founded in late 2023, scaled to eight‑figure ARR in roughly 18 months by selling AI customer‑service agents to major enterprises including Hertz and Chime, claiming roughly $800K in annual savings for every $250K spent. Backed by Accel at Series...
By Jason Lemkin
Blog•Oct 28, 2025
AI in Tech Isn’t So Much About Laying Off Humans. It’s About AI Backfills
Jason Lemkin explains that SaaStr has replaced departing employees with AI agents as a routine backfill, not as a cost‑cutting layoff, and now runs over 20 agents covering sales, marketing, support, RevOps and operations. He notes that AI agents require...
By SaaStr
Blog•Oct 28, 2025
The Brutal Truth About Series B: Only 1 in 3 Deals Even Double Investors’ Money, Per Latest Carta Data
Carta’s analysis of 547 U.S. startups that raised primary Series B rounds in 2018 shows that only about one‑third of those investments doubled investors’ money, while 66% delivered two‑times or less – including 38.6% that are now worth the same or...
By SaaStr
Blog•Oct 27, 2025
The Human Side of AI Branding
On the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast, brand strategist Mark Kingsley argued that AI is reshaping branding by amplifying both strengths and shortcomings: it can scale ethical, human-centered brand behavior or accelerate commoditization if firms merely chase algorithms. Kingsley—author of Brands...
By John Jantsch
Blog•Oct 27, 2025
Import AI 433: AI Auditors; Robot Dreams; and Software for Helping an AI Run a Lab
Researchers unveiled two advances that could accelerate AI-driven physical science and robotics: Ctrl‑World, a controllable generative world model initialized from a 1.5B Stable‑Video‑Diffusion model, lets robots “dream” simulated environments to evaluate and improve policies—post‑training on Ctrl‑World synthetic data raised instruction‑following...
By Jack Clark
Blog•Oct 27, 2025
The Change Economy with Bonfire Ventures’ Brett Queener: Why Your Product Must Ship Every 30 Days or Die
Bonfire Ventures partner Brett Queener warns that AI‑driven “agentic” software forces a new SaaS playbook: companies must ship major product updates roughly every 30 days or risk being outcompeted. He advises starting small with demos and rapid trials, embedding continual...
By SaaStr
Blog•Oct 27, 2025
“Cursor Is a Much Better Product Manager than I Ever Was”: How This PM Uses AI for PRDs, Jira Tickets,...
Dennis Yang, Chime’s principal product manager for generative AI, says he uses Cursor as a no‑code product‑management hub to generate PRDs, push documentation to Confluence/Notion, create Jira tickets, and automate status reports and comment replies. His workflow leverages Model Context...
By Lenny Rachitsky
Blog•Oct 26, 2025
SaaStr AI App of the Week: Higgsfield — The Video AI Platform That’s Crushing It Where Everyone Else Is Still...
Higgsfield, a mobile‑first AI video and image platform, is gaining rapid traction with a “click‑to‑video” UX that eliminates prompting and produces cinematic short clips via curated presets. The startup has attracted over 11 million users and 1.2 billion social impressions...
By SaaStr
Blog•Oct 26, 2025
5 Tips For Pitching VCs for The Very First TIme
Veteran founder Jason Lemkin offers practical advice for first‑time founders pitching VCs: rehearse with experienced founders, craft a compelling opener that highlights your top growth metrics, be candid about weaknesses without leading with them, and deliver a strong product demo....
By SaaStr
Blog•Oct 26, 2025
🧠 Community Wisdom: Diagnosing Early-Stage Churn, Automating Cross-Department Release Comms, Paying for UserTesting.com, Integrating Prototypes Into Your Product Development Process,...
The Community Wisdom newsletter roundup highlights practical product and growth tactics from a members-only Slack community, including diagnosing early-stage churn, automating cross-department release communications, budgeting for UserTesting.com, and integrating prototypes into development workflows. Contributors shared actionable diagnostics and process templates...
By Lenny Rachitsky
![11 Marketing Myths [Part 1]](/cdn-cgi/image/width=1200,quality=75,format=auto,fit=cover/https://annhandley.com/ah/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/unnamed.jpg)
Blog•Oct 24, 2025
11 Marketing Myths [Part 1]
Ann Handley’s MythBusters: Marketing Edition (Part 1) debunks five common marketing misconceptions, arguing social media—while “rented land”—is valuable for awareness, small audiences can be powerful for personal brands, and email success hinges on relationship and growth metrics rather than click‑throughs....
By Ann Handley
Blog•Oct 24, 2025
Scaling to $3B: How Clio Built a Vertical SaaS Powerhouse with AI and Innovation with CEO Jack Newton
Clio has grown over 17 years from the first cloud practice‑management tool for lawyers into a $3 billion vertical‑SaaS platform with about $300 million in ARR, 1,500 employees and a $900 million Series F. The company built a multi‑product stack...
By SaaStr
Blog•Oct 24, 2025
🧑🚀 AI Glasses, Quantum Breakthroughs & Microsoft’s Mico
Microsoft unveiled Mico, a customizable, voice‑first AI avatar for Copilot aimed at more human‑like, trustworthy interactions, part of a broader push to embed assistants across products. Google reported a major quantum milestone: its Quantum Echoes algorithm ran a molecular simulation...
By Matthew Berman
Blog•Oct 23, 2025
Stop Asking Your Guest Speakers to Do Your Marketing for You
Marketing leaders should stop relying on guest speakers to drive signups and treat them as content partners rather than unpaid acquisition channels. SparkToro recounts that its most successful webinars—like a GA4 session that drew 2,647 signups—succeeded because the host did...
By Rand Fishkin