Insights Hub

Since I joined Octopus about a year and a half ago, I’m often asked: “How did you get into venture capital?” and “How did you get in without any banking or consulting experience?” I answer that the big reason I got

Earlier this year I joined the Octopus Ventures team as the portfolio talent manager. In short, I’m here to help our portfolio companies scale their teams to build successful businesses. I love early stage startups and beli

Recruitment demands that you know your own business to the core. Your recruitment briefs should be blueprints of your corporate DNA. Know yourself – your values, your mission, your objectives – inside out and you’ll k

As Larry Sonsini, our visiting Silicon Valley ‘founding father’ pointed out, going public is no longer the endgame for startups. It’s a tool along the way. On the other side of the fence, investors are looking for busin

First the bad news. Jeff Weiner, CEO of LinkedIn, stated, “most things you can’t control”. “However,” he added, “there’s one thing you can control — how you treat people.”

Jeff’s message w

It’s worth mentioning that every single one of our guest speakers — collectively responsible for creating $200bn of shareholder value — arrived on time. No rushed late entries, no buzzing phones, no bag-carrying fl

I’m optimistic of the timing of entry this year, as it is a more inviting time than ever to make the plunge. Why? There is a recent thawing of US regulatory impediments that stood in the way of Fintechs landing crucial na

Question the Questions is a new report from Octopus Ventures that provides a stress-tested guide to international expansion, powered by insights from over 100 European VC-backed businesses that expanded to the US. It trac

Should you expand abroad? 15: Hello Fresh link: https://www.hellofresh.com Should you enter the US? Is the timing right? 18: Y-Plan Link: https://checkout.timeout.com What milestones and timel

One good thing the past decade has brought is a shift in mental health awareness.  Mental health is now out and proud, and we are all talking about how it impacts all aspects of life, especially the workplace. But is it time

Octopus Venture Partner Pete Daffern has been a CEO three times over, and overseen US and EMEA operations for a handful of multi-billion dollar companies. In Parts 1 and 2, Pete outlined the key principles of his ‘Tech CEO

Aileen Ryan tells an anecdote that makes her colleagues at UltraSoC laugh. This Chief Strategy Officer, Chief Operating Officer and regular participant in marathons and endurance triathlons, has a 3 year old son. One day, at

“They say that scaling up is hard to do / Now I know I know that it’s true / Don’t say that this is the end, / Instead of scaling up I wish that we were starting up again…” OK, I’ve corrupted the lyrics from

Alastair, you keep returning to “hiring” as one of the most important ways you’ve addressed your company. Have you been successful in hiring the right talent at each of the company’s stages? If so, why do you think

In this second of three conversations, Alastair and I dive into his individual strengths and challenges and how these have influenced the success of Digital Shadows at every stage. Here, he describes how he balances his own k