Cloud/SaaS
Commerce
Artificial Intelligence
IPO/M&A
Season 2
Ep
1

Klaviyo’s Andrew Bialecki on proving a tech startup can be built anywhere

A conversation with the CEO and Co-Founder of Klaviyo

Host
Ping Li
also available on
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When Klaviyo became a public company in 2023, we celebrated a moment over a decade in the making. In this episode of Spotlight On, Andrew Bialecki shares learnings from Klaviyo’s unique growth story, from the diligence that came from bootstrapping to the 'unfair advantage' gained by scaling a startup outside a typical tech hub. 

Klaviyo is an intelligent marketing automation platform. Under Andrew’s leadership, Klaviyo has grown to support over 143,000 brands. The discussion covers how a startup changes during various stages of growth and offers an open look into the evolving nature of the CEO role—from the earliest stages to operating as a public company. 

Conversation highlights:

  • 00:00 – Background and Klaviyo’s founding story
  • 06:03 – Reflecting on the hustle it took to gain early customers
  • 10:27 – Challenges & benefits of bootstrapping, what Andrew would do differently today
  • 18:36 – Launching in Boston and learnings for startups building outside of a tech hub
  • 22:47 – Building enduring partnerships like Klaviyo x Shopify
  • 27:20 – How Klaviyo stays ahead by being a customer of their own products.
  • 32:54 – Benchmarks Andrew looked for during the pre-IPO journey
  • 35:53 – Klaviyo AI, and the impact Andrew sees from the technology in the future
  • 41:00 – Advice for the challenges a founder faces as their roles change and evolve

Featured: Andrew Bialecki, CEO and Co-Founder of Klaviyo and Ping Li, Partner at Accel

Learn more about Accel’s relationship with Klaviyo:

Watch more episodes from this season:

Access Spotlight On Season 1 episodes here.

episode host

Ping Li

Ping Li joined Accel in 2004 and focuses on investing in business software applications and cloud native technology platforms. Learn more about his expertise.

focus

Cloud/SaaS, Enterprise IT, Security

Based in

Bay Area

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