saas.group: Scaling Bootstrapped SaaS via Acquisitions – with Tim Schumacher [398]

This is a machine-generated transcript.

[00:00:00] Omer: Tim, welcome to the show. Hello. So tell us about SaaS Group. What does the business do? Who's it for? What's the main problem that you are helping to solve?

[00:00:08] Tim: So SaaS group buys and operates lots of small and innovative independent SaaS products. So we're essentially like a holding company for SaaS products.

[00:00:19] We we offer founders an exit they deserve, give them financial freedom for their next adventures, and at the same time try to keep their companies in the Bootstrapper mindset, which made them strong in the first place. So today we operate 18 SaaS companies. In various different segments, online marketing, productivity and developer tools.

[00:00:40] Omer: Great. Can you give us a sense of the size of the business where you, in terms of revenue?

[00:00:45] Tim: I. So we're at about 60 million annual recurring revenue. We've been growing about a hundred percent from 22 to 23, and also trying to forecast strong growth for this year. A lot of the growth is through acquisitions, but we're still growing the business organically and we're 300 employees in 33 countries.

[00:01:02] Omer: Great. So you're, you're a global business. You yourself are based in Germany. The, the companies in your portfolio are, are they from, are they mostly European, US based? A mixture of everything.

[00:01:14] Tim: They're a mix of everything. We've got a lot of businesses in the US and Canada. We've got a few in Europe, Germany, Finland, Austria, the uk.

[00:01:25] We've, we've bought things everywhere. It's for us it's more important that we're comfortable with a products and where they sell to. Then we're actually, the entrepreneur sits. We've looked at great businesses in locations all over the world, but it's, it's more important what they do and whom they sell to.

[00:01:40] Omer: So the business was founded in 2018, but I, I think your, your, your story starts, well, the relevant part of your story here, I think starts when you founded a business called cdo, which I, I think most people will have heard of. Can you, can you tell us about that, like from the point of you founding that company to your, your journey in, in terms of getting to the point where you decided that.

[00:02:08] SaaS group was, you know, really the business that you were gonna focus on.

[00:02:11] Tim: Yeah, so I've, I've been an entrepreneur all my life. I started coding as a teenager, then coded websites and games for, sold them to, to others, finance my studies that way. And yeah, after graduation, then, then started cdo.com. And interestingly enough, a lot of entrepreneurs have bought a domain from CDO at some point.

[00:02:28] It's the, the world's largest domain marketplace. And of course, you know, buying domains, but also projects has always been kind of my DNAI ran, ran CDO for 10 years. IPod it at the German stock market. And then at some point left the company sold, sold my remaining shares, and and became an angel investor and also started a few other companies.

[00:02:48] For example, one of the companies is I, I used to run is the company behind Ad Block and Ad Block plus the big ad blocking companies. And that, that was one of my aha moments because Ad Block was not a product I developed, but it was a. A hobby project of a developer and I scaled it to also now a couple hundred people.

[00:03:09] And it's, it's, it's run by external management now, but I, I kind of realized that I was much better at scaling things than building something new. And I've, I've got a ton of respect for people who. Like can figure out something from nothing really. The zero to one phase building out an MVP starting for the first, kind of get the first customers and but then very often they struggle at a point when I'm like, okay, this is, this seems to be my sweet spot.

[00:03:36] And then after I, I I left, I was, I was approached by really talented founders who were really kind of the opposite of me. And they, they were builder, they, they were builders, like early builders. And I. Really, they didn't enjoy operating bigger ventures. And so I was like, wait a minute. You know, that's, that's actually something I, I could do.

[00:03:55] And I, I just started buying a few projects SaaS projects and one thing kind of came to the next one and I like, yeah. Improve them installed like basic operating structures into them. And it's, it wasn't rocket science, but it was just kind of one thing after the other. And and yeah, now, now we've got 18 projects and a decent sized business.

[00:04:17] But it was, it was kind of a step by step thing.

[00:04:20] Omer: Okay, great. So. In, in this interview, what we're gonna do is deep dive into SaaS Group. We're gonna talk about, you know, what's the criteria that you use to acquire companies what's your acquisition strategy and process look like? I know on your website you talk a lot about a founder friendly approach, so I want to dig into that and we have a lot of founders listening to this who will be interested in what that means.

[00:04:45] And I wanna talk about the, the future plans that you have, what companies you plan to acquire, and just generally your insights on. I. You know, how you see the, the market and, and sort of industry trends around m and a in the, in the SaaS space. And, and I think my hope is by the end of this interview, we're gonna get to a point where founders who are listening to this are gonna have a clearer idea of, number one, whether selling to SaaS group or, you know, a similar type of, you know, organization makes sense for them.

[00:05:14] And secondly. How to make sure that their SaaS company can stand out as an attractive acquisition target. So I think with that sort of set as the, what we, you know, the goal for what we were trying to achieve. Let's dive into, like, just generally, what's, what's your criteria when you are looking for potential acquisition targets for SaaS Group?

[00:05:37] Tim: So fir first of all, we look at the size of the business. We like to acquire businesses between one and 10 million in a RR. We obviously like to have growing businesses. We also like profitable businesses. Sometimes we've done turnaround businesses where there there've been VCs, for example, who've kind of abandoned the company or founders who just couldn't get the company profitable.

[00:05:59] But in the majority we've been focusing on already profitable companies. So with a, with a, with a very healthy bootstrapper mindset. Then topic wise, we're, we're looking at general topics. So we're not going into super niche vertical businesses which we don't understand, but we go, we try to go into, into general productivity tools, developer tools online marketing tools, those sorts of things.

[00:06:23] And yeah, then customer base should be in. The US or North America and Western Europe that tends to be the market we understand best, but the, the location and the origin of the business can literally be anywhere in the world. And those are pretty much the main criteria. I mean, then it kind of, we, we drill down into lots and lots of criteria.

[00:06:44] We obviously do a thorough D and everything, but, but kind of that sums up the, the main things.

[00:06:49] Omer: Okay. So a business between, you said one in 10 million in a RR. And obviously the, the other signs just in terms of making sure that it's a healthy business, it's a growing business or at least has the potential to, to grow with the right, you know, kind of focus and, and investment.

[00:07:09] I know there's, from looking at your website, there was, there was a bunch of information about the importance of. Cultural fit and values, you know, that's not necessarily something, you know, we hear a lot about when we're talking about acquisitions. So as, can, can you just tell us about that?

[00:07:27] Tim: Yeah, so, so I mean, at, at the end of the day, we're acquiring people more than anything else.

[00:07:33] A team sometimes, including the founder by, by the way, we're. We're pretty agnostic whether the founder stays on board. We've had cases where the founder is like, Hey, I'm burned out. Here are the keys. I'm gonna be out in four weeks. And we've cases, we have cases where the founder is still with us after two, three years.

[00:07:53] And both are great cases. Obviously the latter is better. We love to work with founders, but at the same time, we totally understand if people just don't wanna do it anymore. It kind of has an influence on price, but, but it goes either ways. But regardless of the founder, founders build a culture and we, we will, and we want to work with the people there and, and we just wanna.

[00:08:12] Have people who fit, who, who are autonomous independent, that's, we're a remote company. And so people should work autonomously and independent. Who are, who have a, a can-do attitude. Also, a bit of a humble attitude of yeah, just just good people to work with and, and so that, that we think that actually.

[00:08:31] We can work with them many years to come. And of course, some, some cultures change a little bit after the acquisition. But, but overall it's, it is really important that, that it fits to our culture because otherwise there's, there's kind of a conflict in the making.

[00:08:45] Omer: And does the business have to be bootstrapped to be a potential acquisition for you?

[00:08:49] Tim: No, we, we, we really have a knack for bootstrap founders. We really think that those businesses are usually super healthy. They're very lean and we, we prefer them, but we've had. Quite a few cases, especially in the last two years when some, some companies got, got a lot of VC funding. At some point the VCs are like, this is not gonna be a unicorn.

[00:09:13] We are gonna sell it on a dime on the dollar. Or also we've had two cases which were an insolvency in bankruptcy and and we took them outta bankruptcy and got them nice and profitable again. And they're running really well now. And and tucking along,

[00:09:29] Omer: how do you find these companies?

[00:09:30] Is it. Is it mostly inbound or are you going out there and, and sort of searching for them?

[00:09:35] Tim: It's, it's more and more inbound. In the beginning it was only outbound because nobody knew us. I've written tons of emails myself, hundreds if not thousands of emails. Now we're doing a lot of outreach.

[00:09:46] Like for example, we have a a SaaS podcast ourself SaaS Unbound by my colleague Anna. We also yeah, we do a ton of social media. My, my colleague Derek Di SalMar, he's, he's doing like just a, a lot on SaaS metrics and stuff and has tens of thousands of followers on that. So, so we've got a decent sized origination team now.

[00:10:06] And also a lot of founders recommend us. It's a lot of word, word in mouth because doing an acquisition right, and in a founder-friendly way is, is something we really try hard. It mostly works, it doesn't always work. It's hard to acquire companies, but those things go around and, and founders recommend us.

[00:10:23] And so we're, we're getting more and more inbound.

[00:10:25] Omer: I also wanna talk about what type of support do you provide? These companies once you've acquired them, because from what I understand, you, you, you still give them a lot of autonomy to continue running as a standalone business. As you mentioned earlier, the founder may decide to stay on or they may leave.

[00:10:47] And you know, you, you've obviously got. You know, this, this expertise, you know, which is getting better, better at, at taking these businesses and, and helping them to scale. So. Along with that autonomy, what type of, you know, support are you providing those businesses to help them succeed?

[00:11:10] Tim: Yeah, that's a, that's a great question.

[00:11:11] And, and exactly that, that balance between autonomy on the one side and support on the other side is something which we really try to try to. Perfect over the years. So yeah, first of all, I think the default mode is autonomy. We, we, we trust founders, we trust the teams. We also want to keep those companies independently.

[00:11:31] We don't change the name. We, we don't destroy their culture. We yeah, we, we want, we wanna build a community of lots of independent SaaS companies. 'cause we really also believe that. That small is beautiful. But at the same time we also see that every founder has a strength in something. And with every strength there's a weakness.

[00:11:50] So, for example, we have a lot of founders who are really strong in product and technology. They've built beautiful products, but we've come across sites which have a beautiful product. But like on the website, it's almost impossible to find any documentation find a sign up button. So they're very simple things.

[00:12:07] We sometimes improve. Just make the website proper. And, and then start, do some marketing. And those, there, there we've really kind of, we've pretty perfect processes for, for, for marketing for bi, for onboarding for lots of different topic and, and then also all the things which really nobody loves to do.

[00:12:25] Finance HR administration, those sorts of things. Those we usually just do centrally by default. And nobody minds. And also this way we can really use that as, as a, a value add. So there are a couple of processes which really centrally run all the time, but the majority is, is autonomy by default.

[00:12:44] And then the. The founders or the, the leaders of the brand, they kind of, they pick the services we offer, almost like in a restaurant menu. They're like, okay, I want a pay per click specialist to, to, to make my Google campaign super efficient and I want to have a bi specialist to really do all those dashboards, super, pretty and so on.

[00:13:02] And, and then some other things they just do in-house.

[00:13:06] Omer: Got it. Great. So it's kind of like. You know, they, they're, as you, they're a standalone, autonomous business, but at the same time, they're part of a larger company and able to leverage the. The in-house, you know, expertise or that kind of infrastructure that you've built to kind of just basically be more, even more efficient, I guess.

[00:13:28] Right? With the way they, they grow their business. So let's talk about the the acquisition process. So you said, you know, these days most of you know, these leads you're getting are inbound. What happens, what are the main steps involved in, in doing an acquisition?

[00:13:44] Tim: Yeah, so. The, the first step is the founder deciding that he or she wants to get acquired.

[00:13:50] And as as simple as that sounds, that that step can take years. And, and also sometimes we approach a founder. It's like, Hey, you know, have you ever thought of selling your company and could we be the right ones? And then that thinking process starts and it might not be the right time, and it can take years until the founder's ready.

[00:14:10] And in other cases, for example, we're approached, the founder is like, Hey, I've made up my mind. I wanna sell either directly or I've even hired a broker. Then it's kind of, that's when the process starts. But it really, there's, there is this big part before, before someone needs to make up the mind if, if it's the right strategy.

[00:14:26] And I think, we'll, we'll touch upon that later. What, when is an acquisition, right? Like an acquisition? Of course, selling a company is a huge, is a huge step. It's equally big as sell as, as starting a company. And when like the, the question on when, when someone really wants to sell the company is. Yeah.

[00:14:47] Is, is Magnifi fold? Is there multiple reasons and everything, but like, kind of thinking is Okay. The, the, the, the real process starts when the founder made up the mind and then it's really Okay. It first starts with I. W with an, with a very, very basic overview of the company. Like the first, first call we exchange some ideas see what we, we, we always wanna know why the founder wants to sell, and obviously we wanna have some basic information about the business.

[00:15:15] And then we usually can make up our mind within one or two hours one or two hour call, whether this is a business that. Fits for us or not. If it doesn't fit, we'd be like, Hey, this is not for us. We might point the founder to a few different directions, but generally that's, that's where the conversation ends for us.

[00:15:32] But if we then take it further, of course we, we learn more about the company. There are multiple calls with different people. We're looking at some data. And then kind of the first big inflection point is when we when we give an indication of what we're pay, willing to pay. So that's, that's called an indicative offer.

[00:15:48] And at, at, at some point. Then usually a week or two later, this leads into, into a letter of intent. So a non-binding non-binding term sheet. And, and there are different ways on how people view those term sheets. There's some acquirers who basically, I'm just gonna put down a term sheet and then I'm gonna start my dd.

[00:16:05] For us, a term sheet is a bit like a handshake agreement, is like if I don't find any. Real problems in your company. So literally like dead bodies in this, in, in your basement. Then then we gonna move, move ahead. So a term sheet is really, is, is is quite a big step for us. And then after term sheet and, and now from kind of the first contact to the term sheet, we're now maybe f four weeks or something.

[00:16:30] We are pretty fast, but it still takes a little bit of time. We're then in the DD phase and DD stands for due diligence. We look at everything, we look at the technology, we look at the, the people, we look at some financial and legal stuff. And, and we continue to interact with the founder quite a bit.

[00:16:46] In, in, in the meantime, we're drafting a contract, probably another four weeks, sometimes six weeks. And that's, that's when we then close the deal. So the whole process from kind of initial. Contact to closing is, is usually around three months, but it can be shorter. We've done things in six weeks, but it can also drag on for months if, if there're stumbling blocks.

[00:17:08] Omer: Got it. Okay. And, you know, I think it's, it can be a, a very difficult time for founders not knowing whether this thing is gonna happen or not. I, I think it's. I, I'm, I'm curious whether the way that you approach the term sheets helps reassure people a little bit as opposed to, you know, kind of doing it the other way around in terms of, well, let's go through this first and then we'll decide if we're gonna go through this or not.

[00:17:39] You're kind of doing it a little bit differently.

[00:17:41] Tim: Yeah, that's right. Yeah, we try to be very open and transparent with everything and why we're doing things. And also we're not like, we're not finance people. We, we, we obviously have financial professionals on the team, but we're all operators.

[00:17:55] And I think that's, we approach things a bit differently. Also, we're trying. To work as little as possible with lawyers. Sure they're important at some point along the route, but a lot of things are just kind of like two human beings who wanna continue to work with oth with, with each other doing certain things and you just, yeah, you don't need a lot of legal complexity when selling a small SaaS business.

[00:18:16] So we, we wanna keep things simple and personal and really that's, that's what we mean by founder friendly.

[00:18:23] Omer: And then how do you think about. Valuation and the way you structure deals and you know, is there a sort of a ballpark, sort of multiple that typically plays out with the types of companies that you're acquiring?

[00:18:36] Tim: Yeah. Well that's, that's always kind of one of the first questions. It's also one of the hardest because it can be like, we've paid multiples of. Zero point something for an acquisition on a RR and we've all the way up to 10 x on, on a RR majority kind of in the two to three times a RR region. For small SaaS businesses, but it depends on a lot of factors, profitability, growth, status of the business, and, and then also on the structure.

[00:19:06] So really kind of price and structure are really, they kind of go hand in hand because if the founder, the, the, the main, the main lever in designing a structure is. Is the earnout, and if so, basically if founder says, I am gonna be willing to stay on board for two or three years, I believe in my plans.

[00:19:25] I'm gonna bring this business together with you to the next level, and I'm willing to put my money where my mouth is, then we can pay much higher prices than if founder is, okay, give me cash and I'm gonna be out in four weeks. And we are basically. On our own to figure everything out. And, and so the is is like, is a huge range.

[00:19:46] And and of course sometimes founders read about multiples somewhere in the press or even compare with public multiples, and then it becomes kind of difficult to realign this. But it's a conversation like everything else. And sometimes also people need to shop around and then see that actually our valuation is good.

[00:20:03] And it's, it's a, it's a long process. And it's also new for most founders. I mean, we do this all the time, but for most founders, it's the first time they're doing this. They sometimes have an advisor, but even that, it's still themselves doing it for the first time.

[00:20:17] Omer: So talking about founders and going through it, the, for the first time you, you know, looking on your website, you, you talk about a, a founder friendly approach.

[00:20:28] So I think you've, you've, you've kind of touched on. What some of that means, but just, you know, just tell me like how you think about that. What does that mean to you and why is that important?

[00:20:41] Tim: Yeah, so we, we believe a founder friendly approach is important because at the end of the day, price isn't everything.

[00:20:47] Yes, sure. If, if someone offers a crazy price, then most founders are willing to sell to anybody but you, for one thing, you want to. You want to usually continue to build your business for a little while at least. You also want your people, the employees you hired to be with someone who treats them well.

[00:21:06] And also to understand what they're doing. There are a lot of financial acquirers in the market who really, they've got some. People who can just do financial modeling, but at the end of the day, they've never run a business. We've run a lot of businesses, we've scaled businesses to, to hundreds of people and done this multiple times.

[00:21:27] And so I think a lot of people can really see the values that, that we gotta essentially take their baby. And like if you start a company, this is like your baby. So we're gonna take their baby and take it to the next level. And. They see that we've done it a few times. We've also failed. I mean, it doesn't work all the time.

[00:21:44] We've had a few businesses where it didn't work, but in the overwhelming majority it worked. And, and people can see that. And and then they relate to that because most people are operators and founders. And also the bootstrap our mindset. We're not this type of people who are like, Hey, you know, we are gonna build a unicorn out of that.

[00:21:59] And. And, and do some crazy stuff, but we actually just continue this, this very sustainable, bootstrap our mindset which made a lot of companies strong in the first place. And I think that resonates with people.

[00:22:12] Omer: So you, you, you talked about there are some founders who will be like, okay, I just wanna sell the company and, and you know, I'm, I'm outta here.

[00:22:18] And other founders who decide to stay on and, and continue the journey with, with your, your help and support, what are, what are some of the common. Challenges that you've seen, you know, maybe founders have during this transition and, and how do you help them through that?

[00:22:36] Tim: Yeah, so it's, it's a tough decision for founders.

[00:22:40] A lot of founders have built this business for 10 years and that's, it's their life. It's also they've all their eggs in, in one basket. Like 90, 90% of their net worth or sometimes 99% of their net worth is this one company. So of course, especially during the, the, the transaction process, they're very afraid of screwing this up.

[00:23:02] They're afraid that something goes wrong, and rightly so because it's, it's, it's, it's their main net worth. It can relax quite a bit once the transaction is over. And that, for example, can go both ways. We've seen people who relax a little too much. And then sometimes it's better if, if someone who is new and hungry takes over.

[00:23:19] But we've also seen a lot of founders who are then willing to make a little bit bolder bets because they've, they've secured a few million behind the firewall and they're like, okay. I actually can now grow this and I can be more relaxed because it's not it's not their main their main net worth anymore.

[00:23:35] And and that actually like injects a lot of creativity and, and positive risk taking. And yeah, and, and some of them have a lot of fun also in different roles. So sometimes we take the administrative side away. Some founders actually love to stay in their company. They just don't want to deal with managing people with salary reviews, with financial stuff.

[00:23:57] They just wanna build their products and we can actually free them from a lot of the administrative side. And and that, that of course is, is something a lot of people appreciate, especially some of those early builders.

[00:24:09] Omer: So you have 18 companies in your portfolio today. What are your plans for the next year?

[00:24:19] Like how many acquisitions are you hoping to do? Where are you planning to take the business?

[00:24:24] Tim: Yeah, so we're trying to grow the business by currently about seven or eight acquisitions every year. But also growing this number every year. So we're trying to grow. About two thirds by acquisitions and one thirds organically.

[00:24:39] That means the, our level of about 50 million last year means we need to acquire. Yeah. If we wanna double the business needs to, we need to acquire about 30 million of a RR. And that's no small feat that, that's a couple of companies and then I think we just wanna grow this business.

[00:24:56] The, the, the great thing is that it's a, it's quite a scalable thing because we've got processes and we've got those central teams and. The actual business is still run very independently, and people like this, they, they run it like their own startup. And I've talked a lot about the founders and them continuing, but also we've got a lot of great people who would not become founders in the first place.

[00:25:20] Sometimes people just also have financial constraints. They need a, a, a certain amount of salary and then running one of our brands actually gives them. Both. They give them, gives them the financial freedom with a normal salary, but kind of the autonomy almost of a founder. And, and they're doing a great job because it's actually, yeah, it's, it's a very interesting thing to run.

[00:25:42] And maybe at some point they go, go out and do their own stuff or they continue to run bigger and bigger companies within SaaS group. But it's overall just, just, it's much more interesting for a lot of people than just being some, some little piece in a, in a, in a large corporate.

[00:25:59] Omer: Do you have any advice for founders, early stage founders who are, you know, looking to, to build a, a sellable business?

[00:26:10] Maybe they are, you know, in already a seven figure a RR business. Maybe they, they feel they're, they're close to that. What, what advice would you offer them if they're thinking about, you know, potentially selling the business?

[00:26:26] Tim: Yeah, great question. So first, first of all, I think they should continue to build a good business because the most important thing is just the good business, healthy growth, making your customers happy at the end of the day.

[00:26:37] But then of course there are a few specific things which you can do to. Increase your chances, your sellability of a business. A few things is just kind of keeping your house in order, you know, making sure numbers are, are there. You've got proper tax advisors everything is sorted. So basically taking a data room and.

[00:26:57] And you can, you can just Google data room and get a list of things, what a potential acquirer would ask. And you're basically should ask yourself, do I have that information ready? And that gives you a good idea where you might have holes and you could start working on that. And actually, it's not for the acquirers, actually just for making your business better.

[00:27:16] It's things like I, employee contracts. That's simple, but for example, IP assignments, just to name one simple thing we see all the time is like a lot of people have freelancers and that's great. But sometimes just there's IP isn't properly assigned that what the freelancers do is is owned by the company.

[00:27:37] And so, you know, it's just sometimes just a few pieces of paper. And so there are little things like that which can just improve the sellability of the business. And maybe one last thing, it's trying to make yourself redundant as a founder is if you have that one person. Who could technically become your successor and you really groom that person, then you're already going a big step towards making the business more independent from yourself as a person.

[00:28:04] Because a tough thing is if, if we see a business and we're basically you like, okay, this business is like 100% dependent on that founder and if the founder goes away, we have a real problem that. That is a challenging thing in a business. So it's much better if there's a, a group of people or at least one person who in addition to the founder can really understand everything and, and could run the chop.

[00:28:29] Omer: Before we sort of wrap up, is there anything else that you think that we haven't covered that you feel like we should share with, with the audience before we, we wrap up?

[00:28:39] Tim: Yeah, maybe, maybe in terms of acquisitions, I think the, the, the biggest questions founders should ask themselves is kind of the why.

[00:28:45] Why do I wanna sell? Is it the right thing to do right now? Should I wait a little bit and kind of really dig into kind of the inner motivation? Is it to get some money behind the firewall? Is it sometimes it's very understandable things, Hey, I need some money to, for example, get a house for my family. But in other cases really also, especially if there are two or three founders really discussing among the founders is like, who wants to sell?

[00:29:11] Who doesn't want to sell? Because also that can differ from one to the other one, and it doesn't need to be. The right pro, the, the right thing for one founder, which is good for the other one. And just really be open and, and transparent and think about the why before you kind of go into the details.

[00:29:30] That, that would probably be my biggest advice.

[00:29:32] Omer: Yeah. Yeah. That's great. And, and as you said, it's, it's from your experience for with many founders, it's not a. It's, it's a question that can take a long time to answer and, and feel confident about that you made the right decision.

[00:29:45] Tim: And that's okay. It's, that's, it's not an easy decision.

[00:29:48] It's like starting a company and leaving your job, for example. That's also not a decision you take lightly, lightly. So I think take your time.

[00:29:56] Omer: Alright let's wrap up. We're gonna get onto the lightning round. I've got seven quick fire questions for you. So you ready? Yep. What's one of the best pieces of business advice you've received?

[00:30:05] Tim: Don't, don't listen to business advice. Actually it's one of my, one of what my professor always said in first year University. They kind of said if the consultants and bankers who give you all that advice knew what they're doing, they, they wouldn't be sitting there.

[00:30:20] Omer: What book would you recommend to our audience and why?

[00:30:22] Tim: I would recommend the Ministry of the Future? It's a novel, it's kind of a mix of a novel and, fact-based book is about climate change. This is kind of my other passion product project outside of SaaS. The SaaS world is, is climate technology. So all the tech software, but also non-software, things that can help help us get away our addiction from fossil fuels and, and, and protect the climate.

[00:30:48] And that's a great book because it's also, it's it's a science fiction book and, it's just a lot of, it's fun to read, also scary to read, very well written. And also very educative ministry of the future. Highly recommended.

[00:30:59] Omer: Great. And that the other business you referred to, that's World Fund?

[00:31:03] Tim: That's World fund. It's a climate fund.

[00:31:05] Omer: Great. What's one attribute or characteristic in your mind of a successful founder?

[00:31:10] Tim: Stamina. Just, just continuing and, yeah. Being there and. That's that's already 50% of things.

[00:31:19] Omer: What's your favorite personal productivity tool or habit?

[00:31:23] Tim: It's using Gmail signatures as as, as a hack for email templates.

[00:31:27] I get a lot of emails with all sorts of things. For example, like, Hey, I wanna sell my SaaS company. And then, i, I just have a few templates for that, and I just put them as signatures into Gmail. I know there are also a lot of other better tools, but that's always the simplest thing and it basically just takes me one click to answer and it, it improves my email messaging time by like.

[00:31:48] 50% or something.

[00:31:49] Omer: What's a new or crazy business idea you'd love to pursue if you had the time?

[00:31:53] Tim: So I hope someone takes this idea because I don't have time for it, but I, I, looking for someone for a true kind of 50 50 or one third, one third, one third office sharing. And I don't mean WeWork or any of that because I, I've never liked WeWork, but what I like is, I like, and most companies like having their own office.

[00:32:12] But they don't use it all the time. And if they would have just kind of, there would be trusted partners to share it with. You still have your own office, but there's one group which comes Monday, Tuesday, the other one, Wednesday, Thursday, and so on. I think that would be great.

[00:32:26] Omer: Yeah. Yeah. I It's happening more and more these days right.

[00:32:28] With, with businesses going hybrid that it's like, I, I dunno, you know, how, how the logistics of, of many of those. But yeah, it does seem like. There's a, a lot of excess capacity there that hasn't been tapped into. What's a interesting or fun fact about you that most people don't know?

[00:32:45] Tim: Yeah. One fun fact, the first company I founded, so cita.com holds an official Guinness World record.

[00:32:52] Omer: A Guinness World Record. For what?

[00:32:53] Tim: For selling the, the most expensive domain name ever. And it was sex.com.

[00:32:59] Omer: Wow. How much did that sell for?

[00:33:02] Tim: I think it was like 50 million or something. I don't even remember. I hope we still hold the, I mean, that was like 10 years ago. I hope not someone surpassed them, but I think it's still in the Guinness World Record.

[00:33:13] I.

[00:33:14] Omer: And finally, what's one of your most important passions outside of your work?

[00:33:17] Tim: Yeah. I touched upon it in the book question. It's, it's climate action. So it's including my climate tech, vc. And I think software is great. That's kind of what I do well, and what I know. But I think, you know, in terms of what, what we need to solve as humanity.

[00:33:30] I think software, we're on a pretty good path to solve it, to digitalize the world, but we need to solve this decarbonization and, getting away from fossil fuels and a lot of few other things. And and, and that I think is, is is is something I also wanna contribute to. And also I think, by the way, SaaS companies can do that by getting the right servers, green servers, green power becoming efficient not flying too much, those sort of things.

[00:33:54] But yeah. Overall, I think that's, that's probably my biggest passion out outside of software.

[00:33:59] Omer: So if you want to check out SaaS Group, they can go to SaaS Group, and if folks want to get in touch with you, what's the best way for them to do that?

[00:34:08] Tim: Email. Is Tim at SaaS Group? Very simple. Or also LinkedIn, of course.

[00:34:13] Just connect me also using the Tim at SaaS group email when you connect via LinkedIn.

[00:34:19] Omer: Awesome. Well, Tim, thank you so much for joining me and educating us on, on, on, on your business and, hopefully whether founders, you know, choose to at someday come and, you know, get acquired by SaaS Group or you know, go another route.

[00:34:35] Hopefully, I hope we've, we've done enough to educate them a bit more and be able to move forward a bit with a bit more confidence. So, so thank you for doing that. I appreciate your time.

[00:34:44] Tim: Thank you very much for having me on the show.

[00:34:46] Omer: My pleasure. Cheers.