[00:00:00] Adam Fisher: That move from Flash to HTML, they literally said to one million users, “Fuck you, because we're not going to support you anymore.”

‍

I told myself, “Adam, you've reached that point in life and in your career where if you can't exercise your freedom to speak your mind and to deal with some pushback, then what's it all for?”

‍

[00:00:16] Michael Eisenberg:

Does it hurt you to lose money when you lose?

‍

[00:00:18] Adam Fisher:

‍

It's less about losing money, and much more about extinguishing that dream. And also feeling a little bit of empathy for the entrepreneur who put their real heart into it.

‍

[00:00:27] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Do you still enjoy going to board meetings? Do you find them useful?

‍

[00:00:31] Adam Fisher:

No.

‍

It took me a long time to have confidence. I have a lot of self doubt of what I'm doing at any given moment in time. It took me many many exits to feel like okay, I think I've got this done now.

‍

[00:00:46] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Welcome back to Invested. I'm actually thrilled to have Adam Fisher with me. I'm telling Adam a story he doesn't even know yet, but Adam is a partner at Bessemer, and I'll have him introduce himself in a second. But when I set out to set up Aleph, I asked an LP, who became our anchor LP, who should I consider for a partner?

‍

And there were two names on the list. One is Eden Shochat, who is my current partner, and the other is Adam Fisher. And so, we didn't partner up on the fund, but we'll partner up on the podcast, and I'm really looking forward to it. So thanks for coming.

‍

[00:01:15] Adam Fisher:

‍

Thanks for having me.

‍

[00:01:16] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Adam, tell everyone about you.

‍

[00:01:18] Adam Fisher:

‍

About me?

‍

I typically start with the fact that I was born in South Africa, which surprises people because I don't have a South African accent. I left at the age of four with my parents, who took me to the United States. And so I grew up in the U.S. for formative years, and then moved to Israel immediately after completing university.

‍

I'm a venture capitalist, a partner at Bessemer Venture Partners, and I've been in venture capital for the last 26 years.

‍

[00:01:44] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Where'd you grow up in the United States?

‍

[00:01:45] Adam Fisher:

‍

Initially in Cleveland, Ohio, and then in San Antonio, Texas.

‍

[00:01:49] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

How did your family get to San Antonio, Texas?

‍

[00:01:52] Adam Fisher:

‍

Well that was family. We were following family at that point. And in Cleveland–my father's a physician, went to the Cleveland Clinic to finish his, or to do his residency, and then joined up with family who had moved to San Antonio. I think a lot of South Africans moved to Southern California and South Texas, Houston, San Antonio. It was a similar standard of living.

‍

[00:02:14] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Really? And why'd you move to Israel after college?

‍

[00:02:17] Adam Fisher:

‍

Good old fashioned Zionism.

‍

[00:02:19] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

I answer the same way, so I get it.

‍

[00:02:22] Adam Fisher:

‍

Right, I think as a South African Jew in particular, Zionism was very, very strong in the community throughout the generations. And so I grew up hearing a lot about Israel. My father had actually moved here as a child with his parents and his family in the early 1960s.

‍

It didn't work out for them. At the time the country was actually experiencing a deep, deep recession 1963, ‘64. So they moved back. But if I go every generation back, there's somebody else who actually moved here and didn't make it. My great-grandfather moved here from Poland. My grandmother was born here.

‍

I can go further back, even to 1898, a direct ancestor of mine left South Africa and moved to the Holy land. I have a document actually that was sent from his shul, from the synagogue, wishing him well. And I love that date, 1898, ‘cause actually a hundred years later I made Aliyah in 1998.

‍

Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Wow.

‍

Adam Fisher:

‍

And so I'm the first generation, I think, to succeed since that great ancestor, and I lost trace of him. I think he lived and died here, but I don't know what happened.

‍

Michael Eisenberg:

‍

How old was he when he came?

‍

Adam Fisher:

‍

He was an adult. He left his children in South Africa.

‍

[00:03:42] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Wow, he left his children behind in South Africa and moved to the Holy Land, to Jerusalem?

‍

[00:03:47] Adam Fisher:

‍

I don't know. Like you're asking me–it's too long ago to dig that far back. You're talking about five, six generations back.

‍

[00:03:54] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

You were an investor in MyHeritage, right? Which is–you couldn't find them on MyHeritage?

‍

[00:03:59] Adam Fisher:

‍

No, no, no, there's a lot there's still a lot that you can't find. MyHeritage is a place primarily for for documenting what is known, and then finding research to back it up. But it's actually quite difficult in particular with Jewish communities around that time. So I have a lot that's documented, but not that.

‍

[00:04:18] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

What is his name? Like if someone's listening to this podcast and they hear his name, maybe there's somebody out there who says, “Oh I know who that guy was!”

‍

[00:04:24] Adam Fisher:

‍

It was Moshe, or Morris, or Moses Magid.

‍

[00:04:28] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

I always start off by asking what are your core values. So what are your core values?

‍

[00:04:34] Adam Fisher:

‍

As an investor, or as a person?

‍

Michael Eisenberg:

‍

It's an open question.

‍

Adam Fisher:

‍

That's a core value question. I believe in being genuine. I think it's really important. Some people call that transparency.

‍

Some people call it ‘honesty,’ but it comes through for me in what I call ‘intellectual honesty.’ I think that's kind of a core value of mine. Intellectual honesty is different from honesty, because it's about truth with yourself. You know honesty is when I'm talking to you. Of course I also believe in honesty, but intellectual honesty is something different.

‍

It's a truth within yourself. It's actually accepting yourself, understanding yourself, and that helps me a lot in everything else–how I interact with people, how I make decisions.

‍

[00:05:23] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

I think I once heard from you in a conversation–and we can cut if you don't want me to talk about it–that you are an introvert. Can you define what that means?

‍

[00:05:32] Adam Fisher:

‍

Yeah, there's no reason to cut that. There's no shame. An introvert is somebody who actually gets more satisfaction in spending time with, let's just call it fewer people, or even on his own. It could be reading, it could be exercising, and gets a lot more out of that than being surrounded by many people. And an extrovert, in contrast, needs other people to feel alive, to feel active.

‍

[00:06:04] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

When I think about most of the venture capitalists I know, I find most of them to be extroverts. It's not that there aren't people who are introverts.

‍

[00:06:12] Adam Fisher:

‍

Well it's because you're going to conferences. You're going to meet other extrovert venture capitalists.

‍

[00:06:14] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

My partner Peter Fenton at Benchmark never went to a conference. I'd say he was closer to an introvert, but he felt like an extrovert. It certainly seemed that way around the table.

‍

[00:06:22] Adam Fisher:

‍

Look, it's ultimately, it's a spectrum right? It's not binary. And  I think most venture capitalists need to have the ability to turn themselves into extroverts. Sometimes it requires a beer or two,  but we're all capable of it. If not, were not going to succeed.

‍

You know, anybody who gets on stage needs to have some ability to take on an extrovert  persona. But I would also say the opposite. I think those who are extroverts also need to be able to spend time with themselves, to think carefully about what they need to do when they're making an investment, when they need to engage an entrepreneur or somebody else in a tough conversation–that's time with yourself. It's not teamwork. It's you. And then it's you in one person. That's much more of any kind of one-on-one type environment. That's where introverts are.

‍

[00:07:10] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Can I assume you don't go to conferences?

‍

[00:07:12] Adam Fisher:

‍

What's that?

‍

[00:07:15] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

So how do you–like, this is a networking business. Like how do you meet people if you don't get out and go to conferences and you want to be with yourself?

‍

Like how does that work? You know a lot of people. A lot of people know you.

‍

[00:07:26] Adam Fisher:

‍

Right. Well, I think at any point in your career you need to decide what you need to focus on. I personally don't feel like I'm at that point in my career where I want to continuously expand my network. There's value in that, don't get me wrong, but it always comes at the expense of something else. Perhaps just considering, thinking, writing thoughts down–again, engaging with entrepreneurs I back, or with my colleagues. There are other ways of reaching out to people, and it's usually in one-on-one or smaller settings, smaller gatherings.

‍

[00:07:56] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Did you ever go to conferences? Yes you did.

‍

[00:07:58] Adam Fisher:

‍

I just never understood those people that would collect the lanyards as a prize for themselves. And when I do go to conferences–and I do occasionally go to conferences–I'm usually last one to arrive, first one to leave.

‍

I come for speaking engagements of course, but less just to deal with chit chat. That's one other thing about introverts. They don't really like talking about the weather, and sports, and chit chat. It's like, they want to get to business.

‍

[00:08:23] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Eden says that in our partnership, I'm responsible for all the small talk.

‍

[00:08:27] Adam Fisher:

‍

There's a place for that. There's absolutely a place for that. I think it's a great icebreaker. It's also an important skill in our world. And ultimately I think you will probably also connect more closely, perhaps, with entrepreneurs who are like you in that sense, who are also extroverts. In my sense, I feel like I connect more with people who are slightly more introverted.

‍

[00:08:51] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

On your LinkedIn bio it says that you write more poetry than code. For me that's easy. The last line of code I wrote, I think, it was either in seventh or eighth grade. What was the last line of code that you wrote?

‍

[00:09:02] Adam Fisher:

‍

Yeah, that was just mostly just to emphasize the fact that I don't have a technology background.

‍

[00:09:07] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

I'm going to talk about that in a second.

‍

[00:09:08] Adam Fisher:

‍

I've never really written code, except for trying to figure out how to build a website back in the late nineties with some HTML.

‍

[00:09:15] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

But did you write poetry?

‍

[00:09:16] Adam Fisher:

‍

I do. I do write poetry. These days I mostly write poetry for my children. Essentially every birthday since I think the age of five, since my eldest turned five, I've written a poem for their birthday. And that's how the birthday celebration begins. And every year–

‍

[00:09:34] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Do the kids find this celebratory to read a poem? I just want to be–

‍

[00:09:37] Adam Fisher:

‍

Absolutely.

‍

[00:09:38] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

They don't want a present, they want a poem?

‍

[00:09:39] Adam Fisher:

‍

No, like, they get presents too. But the poem, like at this point, my problem is I've done it every year, that they expect nothing less. And let me tell you something–trying to find something new  to talk about, about your child and their last year, every year, with different language and different rhymes, is an incredible challenge, and somehow I'm able to pull it off.

‍

So I love it actually. When I'm finished.

‍

[00:10:06] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

This is a skill. So how long are each of these poems?

‍

[00:10:08] Adam Fisher:

‍

I mean each one is like a 10 font, one page. I try to get it onto one page so I can read it. No, it's a good 15 stanzas probably.

‍

[00:10:21] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Wow. And how long before the birthday do you start writing?

‍

[00:10:26] Adam Fisher:

‍

I try to cram it. This is, I don't always recommend cramming for other things, but something like a poem, where there's–perfection is a dangerous thing to obtain–you've got to rely on time. And so I generally start 24 to 36 hours before.

‍

[00:10:44] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

And do you collect anecdotes and tidbits throughout the year?

‍

[00:10:47] Adam Fisher:

‍

Not throughout the year. No, maybe in the few days prior.

‍

[00:10:52] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

But do you remember the whole year? How much of the year does the poem capture?

‍

[00:10:56] Adam Fisher:

‍

It tries to capture all the memorable moments and the changes in their lives.

‍

[00:11:02] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

And how many kids do you have?

‍

Adam Fisher:

‍

2.

‍

Michael Eisenberg:

‍

And you write both of them a poem?

‍

[00:11:04] Adam Fisher:

‍

On birthdays, yeah. On each one of their birthdays.

‍

[00:11:09] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Does your wife get a poem?

‍

[00:11:10] Adam Fisher: She occasionally gets a poem, but it's just too much.

‍

[00:11:15] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

All right. Now speaking of writing–since October 7th, you've turned up on Twitter. Is that fair to say?

‍

[00:11:22] Adam Fisher:

‍

Yes.

‍

[00:11:24] Michael Eisenberg:  

‍

Your presence is going, you've written what I consider to be epic threads, for example, on Ireland  and other places.

‍

What caused you to kind of come out onto Twitter–which is an extrovert kind of thing, I guess–and start to be so vocal? And by the way I think so incisive too.

‍

[00:11:41] Adam Fisher:

‍

Well I mean, I love that platform. It's actually perfect for introverts that aren't afraid of expressing their opinion. And introverts are not closed off from the world.

‍

They just–again they just don't get activated by those media interactions. It allows me to express my thoughts and opinions  with those that are interested in hearing it. I woke up like everybody else on the morning of October 7th, to, you know, to air raid sirens, and realized very quickly that this is highly unusual.

‍

If it's not a mistake, it's not the way I would expect an attack to start–meaning in the central region of Israel. And so I immediately actually got onto Twitter, X, to figure out what is really going on. And I did searches, the kind of searches you probably, in retrospect, kind of don't want to do to figure out what are they saying out there.

‍

And I immediately encountered some of the worst images, the very first images that were out there, that were being grabbed from Telegram channels and put onto text. And I realized this is actually massive. And so within, I think, by about 7:30, I made it clear to my followers that this is actually the beginning of a war.

‍

We might not know it yet, but it's the beginning of a war. And I realized that at that point in time I wanted to just express myself–of both how serious this is  for the moment, but also from a historical perspective. And from that point I also began to realize that what's happening, the response, meaning those who are anti-Israel, was also incredible.

‍

It was immediately what looked to me as support for the elimination of Israel, support for terrorist organizations. And I realized there was going to be two kinds of wars taking place here. The real war, and the information war, and that is modern warfare. It's an asymmetry that we think we're familiar with, but we're not.

And in some ways, like citizens are also soldiers, from the asymmetric war of trying to get information out there. My goal was not to convince anybody who hated Israel to suddenly love Israel. It's impossible to do. But rather to equip those who their instincts are with Israel to have the information they may not otherwise have, who aren't as well-read or well-informed, and to help give them the kind of ammunition, so to speak, to both explain to themselves why they support Israel and if necessary, also to tell others.

‍

[00:14:21] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

I asked Ariel Sterman, who is your partner at Bessemer, what should I ask you? One of the things he said was, “Has there been any pushback, number one, or number two, how does it feel to share your point of view out there?” You're in a partnership, it's a big partnership, you're in an international partnership, which I'm not in–has it had any impact internally, externally, from a fund basis? And did you have any hesitancy to get your views out there because of your position in the firm?

‍

[00:14:55] Adam Fisher:

‍

No. So the quick answer is no. Absolutely not. My partners are fully behind me and Israel, no hesitation whatsoever. You asked me before about what made me come out. I didn't mention it before, but my first coming out politically was actually in December of 22’, against the so-called judicial reform here. And it was at that time that I told myself, you know Adam, you've reached that point in life and in your career where if you can't exercise your freedom to speak your mind and to deal with some pushback, then what's it all for?

‍

And so the same thing here. I realized that there may be some price to pay and my partners may get some pressure. But I think that's a price I'm willing to pay, because again, if we as venture capitalists, independently successful, can't do it, well, then, who can? And so that's what I've done.

‍

I know it's also inspired others, which was not my intention, but that's also the reason I continue to do so.

‍

[00:16:01] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Give me some people that's inspired.

‍

[00:16:03] Adam Fisher:

‍

Well, people who have told me that they were inspired by it. They've told me that–a lot of people  are in a position, unfortunately, where they don't feel comfortable speaking out.

‍

They're in companies where even if they're the CEO or the main investor, they feel like it's just not worth it, because the blowback will be so hard, it will have been counterproductive. And so again, we have to then speak out also on their behalf, and compensate for that relative silence, which is unfortunate, but I also completely understand it.

‍

[00:16:37] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Does it bother you at all when–I've I looked at some of the comments on a bunch of your X posts, and some are pretty nasty. Actually, many are very nasty.

‍

[00:16:47] Adam Fisher:

‍

Well, you didn't see nearly as much as I have. I mean, it is unreal.

‍

[00:16:53] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

I'm certain that that's true. And how do you think about that? Like first of all, does it get to you at all?

‍

[00:16:55] Adam Fisher:

‍

No. Well no. The real crazies, like the total neo Nazis, it's–I laugh. I think when I did that one post on Spain, in particular, that was the most bizarre.

‍

[00:17:13] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Anyone who’s listening, you need to go scroll Adam's timeline to read the posts both on Spain and Ireland. They're excellent. Yeah.

‍

[00:17:17] Adam Fisher:

‍

Yeah so the Spanish one was interesting, because I was pressing Google Translate on all these, they're all posts in Spanish. It was just fascinating that like they would be so well-versed in antisemitism 500 years later. But they knew everything, and it just lives on.

‍

And so it yeah I mean does it affect me? Only in the sense that I knew this was always there  that latent antisemitism. And in some ways I'm glad it's out. That's the truth.

‍

[00:17:51] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Does this have anything to do with like when you think–I know it's hard to kind of do a retrospective–you said earlier that it was Zionism that caused you to move to Israel. Did you think that antisemitism was latent, either through your college experience or any other experiences growing up that caused you to think, “Hey, I'm going to go to Israel, won't be antsemitic.”

‍

[00:18:09] Adam Fisher:  

Yes. I mean the answer is yes.

‍

[00:18:11] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Where'd you go to college?

‍

[00:18:12] Adam Fisher:

‍

Georgetown.

‍

[00:18:14] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Georgetown. And you felt it there?

‍

[00:18:15] Adam Fisher:

‍

I did. I mean I encountered it for the first time truly at university. It's a Jesuit university, which is  Catholic. Now they themselves are actually very welcoming, and also connected to Israel. But Georgetown, there's a very large Arab studies program which, for years, was funded by problematic sources. They once even took money from Libya when it was still under Gaddafi.

‍

They actually were forced to give it back. But that just gives you a sense of who was running the show there, again, at this program. And so I encountered a lot of, you can call it anti-zionism, but it was very clear. It came from a much deeper place, and from a, I wouldn't say religious angle, but it wasn't simply about the modern state of Israel

‍

[00:19:12] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

When I interviewed Sam Lessin who tried to get on the Harvard Board of Overseers recently and has been trying to figure out how to take Harvard back from the forces that have taken over Harvard, and the antisemitism there and other things. I asked him if he thought it was redeemable, and whether college campuses were. He said he wasn't sure, basically, but that it was an important fight to fight.

‍

Do you think these college campuses that have taken money over all these years from somewhat nefarious sources are redeemable at this point? I didn't have it. I went to Yeshiva University.

‍

[00:19:47] Adam Fisher:

‍

Right. I think so. By the way, I don't think the source of the funding is the problem, because you could easily–it could very well be that many of these universities have most of their money actually from much more liberal-minded or even Jewish sources.

‍

So I don't think it's a source of the money that's a problem. I think it's something rotten in academia, something rotten about the tenure system which was not supposed to work that way. It was supposed to allow people to have their own opinions, and to do their own work and research without interference from administration or from donors.

‍

But in this case, it led to a certain level of groupthink, where tenured professors would be in the selection communities that would essentially grant tenure or not, just positions, to like-minded people. Over the last 20 years, there are many more opportunities for intelligent, well-spoken  people who want to do things, right, in the private sector, even in private research organizations,  in government.

‍

Those who stuck to academia, they're of a certain typecast and made from a certain cloth, and I think what you're what you're seeing is that come out, and–typically, not just the United States, but across the world, it's the extreme left.

‍

[00:21:05] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

There's no tenure at Bessemer, right?

‍

[00:21:07] Adam Fisher:

‍

No

‍

[00:21:07] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

There's no tenure at Aleph either. And it makes me wonder–candidly, I keep wondering about systems where the meritocracy goes out the window at some point ,whether then the goal becomes, “Hey I got to get to this point. And then like I don't need to earn our merit anymore. I can just be there.”

‍

I once thought that about founding partners at venture firms who had an unlimited tenure. Do you think that there's room for a more market based system in universities, or this tenure thing is important? I mean the thinking of tenure where a person should be able to express their own view–you said before, “My success enables me to express my own view.” What's the best way to kind of get to some real pursuit of the truth, or ability for people to speak out and be free?

‍

[00:21:55] Adam Fisher:

‍

Well I think people in universities feel they feel free to speak out. Again, I just think the faculty has now just been–it doesn't represent the broad spectrum of views in the country.

‍

[00:22:09] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

It's been captured.

‍

[00:22:10] Adam Fisher:

‍

Yeah. It's been captured. And of course they also teach students in a certain way. I just remember myself being in university, and now, I was well-read, and I understood how to make sense of what the professors were saying, if I felt that they had clearly had an anti-Israel agenda.

‍

And I took it in stride. I found it fascinating. I just didn't think about it as a form of propaganda.  Look, you can make the same argument about somebody who's very right wing and teaching at a university. I think there's room for a diversity of views. The problem is that lack of diversity. I don't know if there's a market way to go about it, but I do think that there should be some balance in the types of people who are educating the next generation.

‍

[00:22:55] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

I want to make a sharp turn. So I'm speaking to somebody who, on some level, has a similar background to me, right? Which is, we both grew up in the States, both went to college in the States, we both moved to Israel right after college, and we're both in venture capital for more than two and a half decades. That's a pretty parallel path. You've done very well. You've been very impactful. We've even invested in a couple of companies together.

‍

Do you think there's something about that path, like growing up in a bigger economy, in a bigger country, and then applying the skill in a smaller country, that gives you a different perspective, maybe a unique angle on investing, that’s made you a better investor?

‍

[00:23:36] Adam Fisher:

‍

Well we're both immigrants–

‍

Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Yes.

‍

[00:23:36] Adam Fisher:

‍

And I think immigrants and entrepreneurs have something in common. You know, it's not a coincidence that a lot of entrepreneurs in the U.S. are immigrants. I think there's something about being an outsider that makes you a better observer of the world and a better innovator, better positioned to innovate. And I think both of us coming here, there's some aspect of being entrepreneurial in that sense, taking some risk I think obviously we're going back to the U.S. Our companies are focused on the U.S. market. That's a huge advantage, not just language and culture but also being able to travel back and forth.

‍

It's an advantage to our Israeli peers.

‍

[00:24:13] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

You mean culturally to be able to travel back and forth, basically. It's not just a passport issue.

‍

[00:24:17] Adam Fisher:

‍

No, it's not a passport issue. It feels like our home. We’re advising our companies, and they see us as locals there, even though we're locals here. I would say that we both did it also without much of a career before.

‍

Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Right.

‍

Adam Fisher:

‍

And that was unusual at the time. And so we had to kind of forge our way at a time when the industry was very very young. It didn't really know what it didn't know. Those who were experienced had two to three more years experience than we did.

‍

[00:24:51] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

And a decade and a half plus of age.

‍

[00:24:53] Adam Fisher: At least. And you know, I always believe that your past certainly informs your present. In good ways and bad ways. A lot of the people who were the first kind of crop of VCs, they were former execs, not so much at startups but rather at larger companies.

‍

And that doesn't necessarily lend itself to working with entrepreneurs. So we started with a clean slate, and that allowed us both to decide who to emulate. We met a lot of American venture capitalists. We learned their kind of, the secrets of the trade, so to speak. These days it's all public and on blog posts and Twitter.

‍

But back in the day it took effort to figure out exactly how it was supposed to work.

‍

[00:25:32] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

And what do you think is the core trait that turns you into a very successful venture capitalist?

‍

[00:25:37] Adam Fisher: In my case, it's accepting the uncertainty of business, but also of life and figuring out the right mental framework that's going to allow you to move forward.

‍

That's going to allow you to embrace that uncertainty. There's a lot of risk in starting a business. There's a lot of risk in funding a business. And I think the ability to find the way forward, find some the justification to move forward, is what propels us. And I say it that way because our business also requires –we have to be dreamers, but we also have to be skeptics, right?

‍

Otherwise we'll invest in everything, and we'll lose the fund very very quickly. So the default is skepticism. It's like, this is not going to work. This guy doesn't know what he's doing. At the same time, we have to have a framework for moving forward, for seeing an opportunity and seizing it.

‍

[00:26:29] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

It’s interesting that you say that, by the way, because I agree that the framework is both what you call dreamer, I would call optimism–I often refer to it as if this goes right and this goes right and this goes right and that goes right then we have a big outcome.  and skepticism. I have the same framework but I tilt the other way which is my default is optimism  and dreaming. And then I poke holes from the skepticism and  

‍

[00:26:51] Adam Fisher:

‍

I think that works. Clearly it’s worked for you.

‍

[00:26:53] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

It’s fine. It’s interesting. Well yeah, you know, Eden often kind of, and now Tomer kind of look at things and say, “But like, where's the data?” And I’m like, “I think it can work!”

‍

[00:27:05] Adam Fisher:

‍

So I'm a bit more like you in that sense of also not relying so much on data. I think those who come with an engineering background, they look for data as a source of truth.

‍

And I think data is a bit of an illusion. It can be an illusion. It's a fact, but it's not truth. It's something about the past. It doesn't tell you about the future. And I've seen this over and over, even at the early stages. It can be a company with evidence, but if you dig, you can, in a certain way, present those facts–good numbers–to tell whatever story you wanted to tell.

‍

And you have to be very aware of that. So I prefer to be skeptical first, and then try and figure out how to justify it, and sometimes it's with the numbers, and other times it's despite the numbers.

‍

[00:27:54] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Do you think venture capital is a skill?

‍

[00:27:56] Adam Fisher:

‍

It's not a one skill. It's a skill set. There are a lot of skills involved in venture capital, especially our type of active, early stage investing where you truly partner with entrepreneurs. You're on the board, you're often, if not the first investor, you're also in our case the largest investor. It's a lot of skills and working with entrepreneurs, working with co-investors, understanding markets,  being able to make quick decisions but also having patience. So it's an incredible set of skills and a lot of balancing work.

‍

[00:28:29] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Does it hurt you to lose money when you lose?

‍

[00:28:32] Adam Fisher:

‍

It's less about losing money, I'll be honest, and much more about extinguishing that dream of  you know–you really wanted to see that product be successful or have an impact. That’s much more painful to me than having lost money, and also feeling a little bit of empathy for the entrepreneur who obviously lost much more, who put their real heart into it.

‍

[00:28:57] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

I told myself–I don't know if it's true–that if it doesn't work out, it's best that the entrepreneur figure this out quickly, even though they had a dream, because their time and kind of cycles are far more important than both the capital and the idea itself. If they're going to be–a good entrepreneur can kind of reinvent himself and find something else to do.

‍

I'm not sure that's always true what I just said now, right? Which is, there's some people that are just married to an idea, and it's like their life passion and life project. I just met someone like that earlier today. I don't think that the idea has a lot of merit, but I think the person does.

‍

[00:29:26] Adam Fisher:

‍

Look, there's something to be said about perseverance. It's also an incredible trait. And sometimes it's absolutely necessary for success. There are stories of startups and entrepreneurs that, had they not continued at it despite what everybody said– there's no way it would have been a success. And there are others where I agree with you. Like my message to the entrepreneur is, look, this is not going anywhere, but you're full of ideas and you're going to create another company, and it's going to be massively successful. You're not going to remember this company.

‍

[00:29:55] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

I've often thought of you as a contrarian. Like, you were running around semiconductors when nobody else was for a long time. I want to talk about another view that you've held for a very long time, in fact you had a recent X post about it–on Bitcoin, right?

‍

So Bitcoin took a big drop, and you posted, I think alongside a chart of gold which is going up and to the right and said, “You see?” It’s about gold. Bitcoin's made a U turn, and by the time the podcast comes out it can make another U turn again. It's highly volatile, but it's obviously come back. Where is your anti-Bitcoin sentiment from?

‍

[00:30:28] Adam Fisher:

‍

Well, it started with anti-crypto. I didn't like the grift. I didn't like the speculation. I didn't like the claims that it was decentralized, that it was a store of value, that it was like a currency. Because in each case, you could–or that it was anonymous, because in each case, you can ask a different person in crypto, and they would tell you, “Well actually, it's not anonymous, because we can track it,” and they'd say, “Well it's not, it's decentralized,” but actually to get on in the first place, it's centralized. Or there are whales, you know, somebody owns incredible amounts and can swing [00:31:00] markets.

‍

My comment on the gold thing was against the store of value. It's not supposed to act like that if it's like gold. Obviously it can go back up. I actually think Bitcoin will continue to go up. I think it's the one asset that has the most potential. It was much more against the other types of crypto at the time the speculation really got to me.

‍

And those advocating for it were almost always self-interested. Actually they're always self interested. And that bothered me in particular, because it was tied up with what I felt is not just personal interest, but a certain kind of ideology, of supplanting the current system. And I know as venture capitalists, our role is to figure out what couldn't go right

‍

Always ask that question. And it's somebody else's problem to think of what can go wrong. But I think at some point, we also have to ask ourselves what can go wrong. And in this case I saw both. I could see what can go right. But what could go right is also what could go wrong. Meaning if it indeed would supplant the current system where there's no longer an interest rate set by the government because everybody's trading in these virtual currencies, or the stock market was irrelevant, that is not a world I wanted to live in. And so that's how I reached that conclusion that it's not for me.

‍

[00:32:15] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Why not? Why don't you want to live in that world?

‍

[00:32:17] Adam Fisher:

‍

It's a world that was essentially seeded and capitalized by those that already had capital or took not fair risk early on buying up an asset, using advertisements to run it up.

‍

And now they own a certain percentage of some type of a coin. And that being an asset, I just don't think that's a fair system. It's just, it's another feudal type of system where the early ones all of a sudden have power over others. And again it's a currency, it's a finite currency. It's not a stock.

‍

[00:32:56] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

But isn’t that true in everything? Like, so there were the early oil barons, and the early railroad barons, and then there was De Beers, and diamonds, and there's, you know, Rio Tinto and mining, and you’ve got all these people who discovered something, found something–by the way, the Emiratis and the Saudis, you know, by luck of geography, you know they ended up on top of a large part of the world's oil reserves. And the Qataris, the tiny Qataris who are causing a lot of mess in the world right now, landed on a giant gas reserve that they share with the Iranians.

‍

And so inevitably there are people either by luck of geography or dint of geography, by dint of  innovation, by dint of just good luck or whatever, it is–turn up at the beginning of an asset or an innovation cycle, and own a lot of it.

‍

[00:33:43] Adam Fisher:

‍

Yeah. I mean I don't agree with those analogies. I mean, oil was not in one place.

‍

Nobody thought they had cornered the oil market earlier. They didn't create the oil market. Oil also had another purpose beyond just an appreciating asset. It was only worth something because it actually was needed.

‍

[00:34:01] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

I mean, we found more use for oil over time, which increased its demand and made it much more valuable.

‍

And it takes time to dig oil wells. There ends up always being a lag, at least in the early parts of the market between demand.

‍

[00:34:15] Adam Fisher:

‍

No I'm all for free markets, but–

‍

[00:34:16] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Even Bitcoin, right. If you're in Venezuela today or Argentina, and you want to get your money out, which is, you know these are oppressive regimes in Venezuela, and they were inflationary regimes in Argentina until Milei turned up. It was a way to get your money out. That's a valuable use case.

‍

[00:34:34] Adam Fisher:

‍

It is. I just don't think that Bitcoin was bid up because people wanted to help Venezuelan refugees.

‍

[00:34:40] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

That's fair. In the same way probably oil wasn't created, it wasn't found initially so it could run automobiles.

‍

[00:34:47] Adam Fisher:

‍

No, it wasn't automobiles, but you know, yeah. They found a purpose for it.

‍

[00:34:55] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

And diamonds, like think about diamonds. What's the value of a diamond? It's like, we created a system called carats, and we created a perfect color, and whatever it is. It's a narrative. We're out of diamonds. Like you can make them in labs today and they're the same.

‍

[00:35:09] Adam Fisher:

‍

They are, but they're not valued the same as real diamonds.

‍

[00:35:12] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Right. But why? Because it's a story. Because I want a natural diamond. It's just a story. You know, I hate to quote Yuval Noah Harari on this, because I'm not a big fan, but you know, there was a story around a lot of these things. Why is a Nike sneaker worth more than the same identical sneaker that's sold at Costco? Because of the story around their brand.

‍

[00:35:27] Adam Fisher:

‍

Yeah, that's fine. I just don't think it is. If diamonds were the way in which we interacted going forward, we transacted, that would be a problem.  

‍

[00:35:37] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

It was for a long time. Like people would sew their diamonds into their underwear and use them to trade.

‍

[00:35:43] Adam Fisher:

‍

Yeah I think crypto will continue to exist. I fear a world in which crypto dominates our society. It's not so much that it exists at all. I'm not one that advocates for banning it. But it was reaching a crescendo, where to me it just seemed dangerous. People were plowing all of their savings into these virtual coins and NFTs and there's a lot of very unhappy people around the world who bought into this.

‍

[00:36:10] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Because it's in the news now just so you know. And it's not in the same category as crypto is controversial. But I feel like I want to ask you–have you followed this Pablo Durov story?

‍

[00:36:20] Adam Fisher:

‍

A little. Yeah.

‍

[00:36:20] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Yeah. Guy who's invested going into France. I don't know any of the specifics of the case. I want to ask you a more meta question, which is–you've got people today, like Pavel, and Mark Zuckerberg, and Elon Musk, and I'm not comparing them or anything. I just find there's individuals in the world today with a lot of power to influence.

‍

Because they have platforms that are used by billions of people. How do you think about the interaction between states on the one hand–and it's just come out, for example, this morning –Mark Zuckerberg penned a letter to Congress basically saying “Hey, I was influenced by the Biden administration to take down posts about COVID,” undermining government's policy and to cover up the Hunter Biden laptop thing.

‍

How do you think about this balance right now, or this complex issue right now, between these kind of mega CEOs and founders and platforms versus states?

‍

[00:37:16] Adam Fisher:

‍

I worry about state interference. I do. I worry about anything labeled as misinformation. That is a slippery slope, to government or bureaucratic control. That's something we should be very wary of. At the same time, you know, in the case of Telegram for instance, they are much more lax in what they allow on their platform or how they proactively stop things. And as you know, that's the preferred channel for terrorist groups, for drug traffickers, for pedophile rings and for good reason.

‍

It's fully encrypted. It's not domiciled in any country. And you can reach anybody. That is problematic. I don't know what the answer is. I don't know whether I support or I'm against his arrest. I haven't seen the arrest warrant. I don't think any of us know exactly what's going on.

‍

But the idea that they have zero responsibility is also problematic to a certain extent. I don't know where I would put it down. It's a dilemma that I think is going to characterize our society for decades to come. I'm just not an absolutist in either way.

‍

I'm probably more scared about government control than complete decentralization, and so called anarchy. At the same time, I can understand governments who are aware of something or have access to information where there's a missing link and they know it's there using all means to get it.

‍

We know that conversations are tracked by the NSA. We know that. And we're probably safer as a society. Now at the same time, that also kind of scares me right? It freaks me out. As Snowden pointed out, it's a balancing act. I guess I would trust that in an open system, a non-concentrated governmental system that it works, there'll be situations which the government overreaches, but there'll be pushback. And I think that's inevitable and probably healthy.

‍

[00:39:27] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

As someone who had to, on some level, watch the Hamas videos after October 7th–something I'll never probably fully recover from–they came in over Telegram. And initially I said to myself and then some of them were reposted on Twitter in the early days, until they got you know, kind of banned.

‍

I vacillated myself between this notion of, “Oh my God, people need to see what happened. It's good.” The Telegram existed for them to get this out–because it's not what Hamas had in mind, but the world needed to see this too. But oh my God, that's terrible, that there was a way to broadcast this horror and the suffering of people.

And I wonder how you think about that. Like this notion of open, because we got to see it and open gives people a chance to terrorize people and oppress them.

‍

[00:40:18] Adam Fisher:

‍

Yeah, well they put on Telegram what they wanted to put on Telegram. So a lot of the footage that we've seen was not put on their telegram. It was captured by CCTV, and GoPros that never made it back to Gaza for obvious reasons. And so at that point, yes, I'm in favor of sharing it, because I think it shows the sheer horror of these atrocities, which are just unfathomable. So I'm in favor of that. Am I in favor of Hamas having a right to distribute content?

‍

I think that serves their interest. That is how they recruit. That's how they fundraise. That's how they show their success. I think if they hadn't shown it, it would have been seen as a failed operation. I mean they planned to take over, you know, for weeks they planned to go deeper into Israel.

‍

That would have been seen as a failure. So Telegram essentially helped them with propaganda, showing it as a success.

‍

[00:41:20] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

So again, making a hard right turn–you were an early investor in Wix, which I was fortunate to join you in, very early investor in Fiverr, became household names, these two, around the world.

‍

What are your core lessons? And particularly from these two, because they become really branded household names. What about these two spoke to you? Like I mentioned before, I've always admired the fact that you have this interest in semiconductors, even though you don't have a technological background. I wish I could understand enough to go invest there. But these two names are like, you know, they're brands right now. And so what attracted you to them? What do you think you did to propel them? And why are they important?

‍

[00:42:06] Adam Fisher:

‍

So they're quite different, even though they were both very early stage.

‍

I was the first venture investor. In the case of Wix, I saw two things that I really had not seen before in Israeli companies. The first was this marketing angle that they had. They were doing things that I'd never seen before, well in advance release of the product of how to create–everything from buying their URL, a three letter URL back in 2007–but also various sites that were kind of building their SEO, and just already thinking about paid acquisition, which is something that again, it was not very familiar with. That was fresh. And that to me felt like somebody who was really thinking far ahead.

‍

The second thing I saw, and this actually helped, that I'm not technological, is the whole proposition that it shouldn't be that to create content on the web, you need to be a developer, or that you had to learn a specific kind of software. That didn't make sense to me. And I've always been one to say that if it can be made for non developers, or non technical people, then that is what will succeed. Because most people will always be non-developers.

‍

So that's where I signed it. It was admittedly a small investment. It was a two million dollar initial investment, with an option for another million.

‍

[00:43:28] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Back then you could still do those kinds of deals.

‍

[00:43:29] Adam Fisher:

‍

I had to overcome a lot of doubt. My partners really didn't like it. Because again, there was no traction. I don't mind saying this. The company did not present well at the time.

‍

[00:43:44] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

So I have a similar story, by the way, when they came to see me–it was right at this point, and older listeners will appreciate this, when Flash was about to become obsolete, and Wix was originally built on Flash, and they walked in and started telling me “Don't worry about it. Our current platform is going away, but there's a thing called HTML5 that we'll just reconstruct everything.” And you're going, “They didn't really just say that in the presentation right? That the whole thing is going obviously, but don't worry, it's going to be okay.” And I actually admired the honesty on it but it was a tough kind of–

‍

[00:44:17] Adam Fisher:

‍

Oh they were always very transparent, right? I mean, there are a lot of things I learned from Wix over the years. I mean they were a magnet for talent. Whenever they saw somebody who was talented, they would find a way to find a position for them. It just didn't matter what the titles were. It was a company that didn't care about titles. They just wanted talent.

‍

And so they became a magnet for all types–former founders, new ideas. I mean, Monday was spun out of Wix and all the different products. The second thing was being afraid to throw away what you've done. I mean that that moved from Flash to HTML5. They literally said to 1 million users, “Fuck you, because we're not going to support you anymore.”

‍

Now, they didn't use that language of course, but they said, “Listen, we care about the next 10 million users, not the first million. They have nowhere else to go anyway. They'll figure out a way. We'll make it easy for them to transition.” And I realized that it was actually, it was a bold move, but it actually makes sense.

‍

Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Fiverr?

‍

Adam Fisher:

‍

Fiverr had traction. When I met them at the time, we were measuring websites on Alexa. You remember what Alexa was?

‍

Michael Eisenberg:

‍

I do.

‍

Adam Fisher:

‍

Alexa was a was a way of measuring website traffic.

‍

[00:45:29] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Before you talked to it, you actually installed the little Alexa toolbar.  

‍

[00:45:32] Adam Fisher:

‍

Right. It was a toolbar that measured website traffic, that actually, Amazon bought and then reused the name. But there was a website that just went through the roof overnight. And I met the founder Micha, and saw what they were doing. And I was just astounded that there could be a market for what was at the time five dollar services, which you immediately think about–what is somebody willing to do for five dollars?

‍

And it was silly at first, it really was. A lot of it was silly, but there were some real things. And I was compelled by just the continuous traction, the momentum that I could see the volume of transactions and the diversity of transactions, and sellers, and buyers told me this is probably going to go for a while.

‍

[00:46:22] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

I had to get over the fact that it was like five bucks only, and it was in the name Fiverr can only be five bucks. I thought it was one of the risks. Not everything is going to be five bucks, for God's sake. There's some things that are worth more and worth less.

‍

[00:46:33] Adam Fisher:

‍

So you value it appropriately, and–look in our business, you know, there's lots of risks.

‍

The question is, can you get comfortable with the risks? Can you eliminate them over time?  That was potential cap on the company's potential, but we knew that there was probably a way to move up over time. And sure enough, pretty much, you know every quarter, if not every year, the average transaction value kept going up.

‍

I don't remember what it is today. I think it's like close to 300 or so, and of course, that's the average. So it just shows you even in the name, even if their original mission was five dollars, like that that doesn't need not pin you down.

‍

[00:47:14] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Hand on your heart–how many times did you look at the name Fiverr, F I V E R R, and say, “Oh my God, what are we gonna do with those two ‘r’s?”

‍

[00:47:20] Adam Fisher:

‍

No, I wasn't bothered by it at all. No, no. No, there are far worse names. I'm sorry.

‍

[00:47:27] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

All right. Give them to me. Which are the far worst names?

‍

[00:47:30] Adam Fisher:

‍

I have a whole blog on bad names. Look, there are a lot of bad names that are typically, they're words that sound like something to an Israeli ear.

‍

Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Give me some of them.

‍

Adam Fisher:

‍

No I'm not going to go into–I don't want to accuse anybody. Look, the first name of Monday was Dapulse.

‍

Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Dapulse, right.  

‍

Okay, and with a D, “Da Pulse,” as if that's what it sounds like to non-Israelis. And every time I would meet the founder I'd say, “Have you changed the name yet?” And then he did.

‍

[00:48:04] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

All right. I'm not going to get you to give me the other ones, huh?

‍

[00:48:06] Adam Fisher:

‍

No, not now.

‍

Michael Eisenberg:

‍

You're too well media-trained.

‍

I need to pick the best ones. I don't have them on the top of my head.

‍

[00:48:13] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

So like Amit Karp, your partner, said I should ask you–you bet on teams and ideas very early. He says, “Where do you get the confidence from to kind of just bet like that?”

‍

To bet on a team? Yeah. Just a team and an idea. Yeah. Yeah.

‍

[00:48:25] Adam Fisher:

‍

Yeah, when you've been doing this for so long, you know it fails. It's like it's the inversion technique when you figure out all the ways in which a startup or an entrepreneur is going to fail. And if you don't see any of those signs, there's a good chance that this person or this team can be successful.

‍

I look for certain positive traits also in entrepreneurs. Well I focus primarily on the CEO, I look for communication skills. I look for transparency with me. We're going to become partners essentially, we're not just investors of course, at that stage. They need to be able to have to communicate what they're doing in such a way that they can recruit top people, fundraise, sell the product.

‍

That's a lot harder than it seems. I look for somebody at the same time who's sophisticated, who I think can as much as they're transparent and a good communicator, can play a game of poker if they need to. And then, of course, I look for a very compelling product, or sometimes it's just a market direction where I feel like it's not contrarian.

‍

We're actually here kind of I can see I think the trend is in their favor over time. where it will actually be easier to fundraise with time as opposed to kind of going with a headwind. So I also look for entrepreneurs that I think can handle adversity, that realize that the journey they're on is going to be filled with a lot of bumps and surprises.

‍

Sometimes there's something in their past that suggests they'll be able to handle it.

‍

[00:49:58] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Can you give examples?

‍

[00:49:59] Adam Fisher:

‍

Look, sometimes it's really tough things in a personal life. Including, you know, deaths in the family disease. Sometimes it's massive setbacks in their previous venture–it was shut down, didn't work.

‍

That tells me something about their character. You know, it's important. Entrepreneur startups are not easy. If they're easy in the beginning, they're not going to be easy in the end, and vice versa. And you need that. I looked to get past that initial risk phase from a funding perspective as well, which is not trivial, you know that series A–can they get far enough? Is the domain, is the entrepreneur compelling enough that additional funding will be straightforward and de risk it? Do I see the future? Do I really know where it's going? I don't.

‍

[00:50:49] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

You've been doing this a long time, like I have. And I forgot the right words to ask this question. So like, you've been to thousands of board meetings at this point. Do you still enjoy going to board meetings? Do you find them useful? Do you want to be there?

‍

[00:51:05] Adam Fisher:

‍

No. You know, as an early stage investor, I'm typically quite tight with the team, the CEO. We have regular conversations. And typically I know what's going on ahead of the board. In fact I don't like to have any surprises at the board, not negative or positive. The board is an opportunity to have a discussion, to hear other perspectives that you perhaps hadn't thought of or hadn't come up in the conversation you have had with the CEO. But oftentimes it's just going through numbers. It's just updates, and it's not a very productive use of our time.

‍

[00:51:42] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Do you prefer in person board meetings or Zoom board meetings?

‍

[00:51:46] Adam Fisher:

‍

In person.

‍

[00:51:46] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Which means you can't do something else at the same time, because you're in person.

‍

Adam Fisher:

‍

Correct.

‍

Michael Eisenberg:

‍

But you like it better because you think you can get value from other people in the room?

‍

[00:51:53] Adam Fisher:

‍

I think I'm able to concentrate a lot more in person. There's something about looking at a screen and having things pop up at you,and having ideas. You know, whenever I'm sitting doing something, I have ideas popping into my head, and the urge to look something up on my phone. It's not good. I'm not proud of it. But luckily my–enough interaction in between the boards means that I actually know exactly what's going on.

‍

[00:52:25] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Yeah. I noticed something interesting. I found the same thing. And so I now take Zoom board meetings without the video because I actually find it's–maybe this is like, habit, because I'm old. I have telephonic board meetings. You remember the Polycom board meetings before this, Polycom video, and I find it easier to concentrate when I'm just on audio than when I'm on video too.

‍

[00:52:44] Adam Fisher:

‍

I completely agree. I don't use a Polycom, but I put my AirPods on and I just walk in circles. All conversations are much more effective that way.

‍

[00:52:55] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

I do too. I often leave my house. If it's an evening then I'll go walk, because I find it much better.

‍

[00:53:01] Adam Fisher:

‍

I find also that it actually helps with my memory. The discussion as well.

‍

[00:53:05] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Same. I find the same thing. But people want to do Zoom board meetings! So what do you do about that? Because no one wants to travel!

‍

[00:53:11] Adam Fisher:

‍

Board meetings used to be all in person. So I don’t think it’s horrible. But my problem with  Zoom meetings is that people want to do Zoom meetings, instead of a phone call. Phone calls, it doesn't exist anymore.

‍

[00:53:26] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

You and I can talk by phone, because the two of us seem to be the only two guys who wanna talk by phone.

‍

[00:53:28] Adam Fisher:

‍

No, you can do phone calls only if you're in the car. That's the only legitimate excuse these days for doing a phone call rather than a Zoom.

‍

[00:53:36] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

I have this new shtick where you know, where they want a Zoom call. So I get on the Zoom and I go “Now that we've said hello, I'm turning off the camera so that I can concentrate.”

‍

And there’s this puzzled look on the other side of the Zoom, like what does he mean? And I say “It's okay. I'm old.”

‍

[00:53:54] Adam Fisher:

‍

You're ahead of me on that. Maybe I'll take that.

‍

Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Why do people want to keep doing Zoom board meetings? Do you invest over zoom?

‍

Adam Fisher:

‍

No.

‍

Michael Eisenberg:

‍

[00:54:00] Right. Did you invest over zoom during COVID?

‍

Adam Fisher:

‍

Once.

‍

[00:54:03] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

And?

‍

Adam Fisher:

‍

I regret it.

‍

Okay. How fast did you regret it?

‍

[00:54:10] Adam Fisher:

‍

It takes time to realize you've made a mistake. I'm not sure that's the reason, but I felt very uncomfortable investing in teams over Zoom. I also missed many opportunities. So I don't want to blame Zoom. I found it very hard to establish a rapport with the team at that period of time. And by the way, it wasn't just that it was on Zoom. It was the pace of activity, if you remember.

‍

[00:54:31] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Oh yeah.

‍

[00:54:32] Adam Fisher:

‍

That was when there was an accelerant applied to all venture deals, to the point where you have to decide within days of meeting a company over Zoom whether you're going to invest. And for those of us who like to truly partner with entrepreneurs in the beginning, that was an impossible thing. To me, it was truly speed dating for marriage.

‍

Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Did you think of retiring at that point?

‍

Adam Fisher:

‍

Retiring? No, because you know it was like a gold rush. It felt like, cause we had portfolios, and all of a sudden everything was doing really well, and there were exits. It was fantastic in that sense. And no, not ever retiring. No

‍

[00:55:07] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

I thought I was finished, to be honest. I thought, I can't keep up with this. It's all these people speed dating over Zoom, and you know, I can't figure this out. And I figured that this was going to be what the future might look like. And I was done.

‍

[00:55:21] Adam Fisher:

‍

The other problem I had is that I met all these companies, and you know, six months, 12 months later, I had no recollection that I'd met them.

‍

Michael Eisenberg:

‍

100%.

‍

Adam Fisher:

‍

There's something about meeting somebody on Zoom with that same San Francisco background, or whatever background they're using. And I mean, it was impossible. And the odd thing is that, I meet them in my office, I remember exactly what chair they sat in, which side, who else came to the meeting–not so much what they were wearing, but–

exactly that the dynamic. You just lose that all in Zoom.

‍

[00:55:53] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

I interviewed a board member on Zoom yesterday, which I also don't like, for what it's worth, for one of my companies. And I was completely distracted, had to stay on Zoom for this one. I was completely distracted by the fact that the logo of the company that the person works for was in the background. And it was like one of these virtual backgrounds. Every time the person moved their head and a big head of hair it was like, you know, eating into the logo. Right.

‍

I don’t think I have A.D.D. but it was like, I couldn't concentrate. There's that background.

‍

[00:56:24] Adam Fisher:

‍

And before–not everybody was using those backgrounds, but I once had a situation where I had a reporter once say, from a publication that was interviewing me–there was no background. She was in her home. And in the middle of the interview walks in this young man with a towel wrapped around his waist. And of course she can't see him, but I can see him. And I'm in an interview, in an answer.

‍

And at a certain point she realized that her son had walked in and you know. So. Yeah. I prefer face to face. Or phone calls.

‍

[00:56:59] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

My daughter was joking that a podcast interview I did last night over video would've gone much better had I let my grandson in the room ,and he could have jumped on my lap. She thought that would've added a lot of, some interest to the conversation. Otherwise it was boring, things that happen on zoom.

‍

Michael Eisenberg:

‍

So–I have a partner. His name is Tomer. He used to work for you.

‍

Adam Fisher:

‍

Great guy.

‍

Great guy. But you must have a favorite Tomer story.

‍

[00:57:27] Adam Fisher:

‍

You've caught me here. I don't have a great Tomer story. Tomer was always just so composed and together, and mature, and wise beyond his years. You know, I don't have any good, like, silly or embarrassing stories.

‍

[00:57:47] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

He didn't walk in a towel on a Zoom or anything like that.

‍

[00:57:50] Adam Fisher:

‍

No never, I don't have a story like that. No he was just–

‍

[00:57:54] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

So I want to try something here. So like, there's an entrepreneur walks in and says, “I've only got room for one of the two of you.” So after you explain to them–really we should do the deal together, you and I. How would you compete against me and say don't take the Aleph money, come take the Bessemer money?

‍

What's the Adam Fisher pitch? Why do you want Adam Fisher's money? You get a chance to do this live, like, tons of entrepreneurs are going to hear you.

‍

[00:58:14] Adam Fisher:

‍

Why take our money? Oh, look, honestly–I want what's best for the entrepreneur. I think we offer, we have very different personalities you and I, different approaches.

‍

[00:58:27] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

I think Matan Bar would agree with that. Matan Bar the CEO of Melio.

‍

[00:58:32] Adam Fisher:

‍

He took us both. I feel like it's self-selecting. So my view is that if you're more comfortable with Michael, go with Michael. We can invest in the next round. I think you know if you want to go with Michael, go with Michael. if you feel more comfortable with me, you know, go with me.

‍

I don't like to put down others. I try to, you know, bring us up. And if that doesn't connect with them well, then it's probably not the best match anyway.

‍

[00:59:02] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Why should someone take one of our money instead of, say, a foreign investor that comes into Israel?

‍

[00:59:08] Adam Fisher:

‍

Oh, that's easier.

‍

[00:59:09] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

All right, good.

‍

[00:59:09] Adam Fisher:  

‍

In the early years, you need somebody local. You need somebody who can meet you face-to-face, who can really spend time with you. Aside from the help we provide, whether it's recruiting or understanding the market, or the idiosyncrasies of compensation in Israel, or you know, working with lawyers, there's something about being present physically, and in your time zone in those first 18, 24 months, that is priceless.

‍

And as we know, as much as foreign VCs foreigners come to Israel quite often, much more often than they did in the past–they're not here more than once a quarter. And if they are, they have a very busy schedule and they're not going to spend half a day with you.

‍

[00:59:56] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Amit told me also to ask you, what do you think is the biggest misconception foreign investors have about this market?

‍

[01:00:01] Adam Fisher:

‍

The biggest misconception probably is that all the great entrepreneurs come from a certain technology unit.

‍

[01:00:07] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

I agree with that.

‍

That's a great point. Yeah.

‍

[01:00:10] Adam Fisher:

‍

And the second one would be that everybody speaks English.

‍

[01:00:16] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Well my second one is different. I think from the outside this looks like an endlessly deep market. And it's still a country of like less than 10 million people. And it's not endlessly deep.

‍

[01:00:27] Adam Fisher:

‍

And they see a very high percentage. They don't realize how efficient the market is in terms of surfacing opportunities. That's frustrating to a certain extent, because it means they can come here for a week and actually meet a lot of the interesting companies that are fundraising at a particular point in time. They figured that out. It's great for the market. I'm not against it. I agree. But yeah, they do tend to focus on a certain typecast of entrepreneur.

‍

We've seen it with Shmona Mataim [8200] and in the cyber sectors. And I think when you veer beyond what has already been proven in Israel, they're much more skeptical, even cynical. You asked me about Wix–like Wix was really an impossible thing to get approved when it would have been in other funds, because there were really no consumer success stories out of Israel, except for ICQ which was never a business.

‍

And there's one thing I've seen over the last two and a half decades–you have as well–it's that there is no domain that entrepreneurs can't eventually conquer. And we've seen it, you know there were doubts about consumer. There were then doubts about mobile, and cloud infrastructure, but truly building a cloud–you know Wix is one of the first companies to build a scalable service payments. Fintech, you know, insuretech in your case with Lemonade. And so that's what attracts me about the Israeli market, the breadth of domains, and the ones that have still not yet proven themselves.

‍

But for me I view that as an opportunity, not as a reason to be skeptical or cynical.

‍

[01:02:07] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

What was your first success? First investment success?

‍

[01:02:11] Adam Fisher:  

‍

Like as an exit, or…?

‍

[01:02:13] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Yeah, which company was the first–put you on the map?

‍

[01:02:19] Adam Fisher:

‍

It wasn't a map.

‍

Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Fair enough.

‍

Adam Fisher:

‍

But it was a company called Dune Networks.

‍

[01:02:25] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Is that what gave you confidence that you can do this?

‍

[01:02:28] Adam Fisher:

‍

No, it took me a long time to have confidence. You know there are people who have confidence and that makes them successful, and there are others that need to be successful before they have confidence. So I'm the latter. I have a lot of self doubt of what I'm doing at any given moment in time.

‍

It took me many, many exits just to feel like, okay. And so I don't know if it was my 10th exit or what exit it was that made me feel like I figured it out. But you know Dune was a success story because I had sourced it, negotiated it. I mean, I was 25 at the time, and road it to an exit, and it became actually one of Broadcom's most successful acquisitions ever.

‍

[01:03:11] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

What was the multiple on capital you returned from that?

‍

[01:03:12] Adam Fisher:

‍

It wasn't big.

‍

[01:03:13] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

It wasn't big. That's the interesting thing. But you remember it really well.

‍

[01:03:16] Adam Fisher:

‍

I remember because we persevered. It took nine years, but we felt the success along the way.

‍

[01:03:24] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

I think it's a critical point that people often miss, right? Which, it's not always the multiple on capital early in your career. It's a sense that I can get through these tough times. You know, the ups and the downs of these businesses, ‘cause there are roller coasters.

‍

[01:03:38] Adam Fisher:

‍

That's right. I mean I think early on, I realized that in our business, it's much easier to lose money and it's very hard to, at least at this stage, to see those home runs. You can't see that. We're not nearly imaginative. You probably also don't have the patience to think that far ahead. We're talking about a decade ahead. But what you can do is eliminate the risks and avoid losing money. And I decided to go on, I wouldn't call it low multiple opportunities, but things where I felt like I know how to get to a three X.

‍

And that doesn't sound like great justification for an investment, but my view is that once you're there you can figure out if there's another three X in it, and then all of a sudden you're at a nine or 10X right? And so that's been my approach. So when I invested in Wix, I didn't anticipate whatever five or 10 billion company. My best outcome was 500 million. Actually I was hoping even for a hundred million, because when you invest at such a low price–it was seven and a half pre I think–

‍

Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Oh, the good old days. That's all you needed.

‍

Adam Fisher:

Yeah. You know I always say, if you get points on the board then you can also lose some at another place but you have to figure out how to manage that risk.

‍

And I don't know. You tell me. My feeling is that you're willing to take more risk. You see opportunity where I see perhaps too much risk. And that's why I feel like we haven't cooperated as much as we might have.

‍

[01:05:04] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Just the way I think about it is, I'm really good at losing money.

‍

And I'm okay with all those zeros, and I think one or two or whatever it is will turn out great. And so I don't mind writing them off. I feel bad for the entrepreneurs, but I also think they should get their time back. And that's kind of what I was referencing earlier. So yeah I don't know if it's more risk tolerance as much as it's, I don't mind the crazy part of this, so I don't mind the really really way out there entrepreneurs. I'm looking for very small propensity to have an outcome. But if the outcome is there, it's very large.

‍

[01:05:40] Adam Fisher:

‍

I respect that. And I love that. It's necessary. I mean I've done it on occasion. I do think that Wix and Fiverr were those crazy opportunities that you could not explain logically. I need to do more of them.

‍

[01:05:53] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

So Ronni Zehavi said I should ask you this question. I think it's a really great one. He's founder of HiBob, by the way, he insisted on saying, “Send regards.” He said, “What is your recommendation to private companies when it comes to the geopolitical tensions that exist now?”

‍

And to say it in a different way, he said, “What comes first, company or country?” And I don't think, by the way they're dichotomous, I want us to say that up front.

‍

[01:06:18] Adam Fisher: Yeah I don't, I mean, I'm trying to think of a situation in which I'm favoring my company over the country. Maybe it's from a perception standpoint.

‍

You know, I think the country will be fine. The country's not gonna go bankrupt because of a bad rap. I think a company can, if maybe that's what he was getting at. I’ve been of the opinion that we perhaps took the Israel “Startup Nation” story a little bit too far, and it's unnecessary.

‍

[01:06:50] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

I agree with that.

‍

[01:06:51] Adam Fisher:

‍

I don't think we need to market Israel's high tech. It's doing fine without it. I can't think of another country that markets its business community the same way. We don’t think of most products we buy as Swiss or Swedish or Dutch. It's just not that important. And I think we need to get used to not always referring to our companies as Israeli companies.

‍

I don't think the venture ecosystem needs to pound its chest the way it has. We've reached the stage of success where, just look at the results. You want to make money? You know, you're welcome to invest. I just don't think we need to market ourselves the same way we have over the last decade.

‍

[01:07:30] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Yeah. So I think the startup nation moniker is problematic. I do think there's a certain amount of national pride in you know America and Israel. I don't like the startup nation thing. I think it was great for a period. I don't think it's great for now. But as kind of this leader in innovation, I think is super valuable.

‍

[01:07:45] Adam Fisher: It is. But again I think great companies are funded. I don't think there's any problem with good companies continuing to get funded, or being dismissed by customers as not being serious. There was a time, and you remember this, when businesses in the U.S. especially in Europe, they wouldn't buy from a company outside of their home territory, let alone Israel.

‍

That sounded, to them, very sketchy. It's just not an issue anymore. The world is far more interconnected. There's much more acceptance of not even asking where the salesperson is calling from, where that website is actually domiciled. It's just not interesting anymore. And so I just don't think it's important.

‍

So maybe to Ronni's question, like I'm fine with our companies kind of not raising the Israeli flag and just considering themselves international companies.

‍

[01:08:40] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Last two questions, since we deal a lot with values on this podcast. It’s been, I open with that question. So you're on the board of Beit Issi Shapiro, and I'm interested in what drew you to that cause?

‍

What motivates you to be there? And you should tell us about it also, because it does important work.

‍

[01:08:59] Adam Fisher: I’m actually no long on the board. I was on the board I think for seven years. I'm still active there in other ways. Beit Issi Shapiro is, they do a lot of things, but they essentially focus on children with disabilities–from the most severe disabilities to light ones, very young children, kind of the preschool kind of years.

‍

And they’re the first of its kind in Israel and had a huge impact on the disabled community in Israel in particular children, how the government treats them, the rights they deserve. And they've actually exported a lot of their ideas, and thoughts, and training to other countries around the world, both in the Middle East but also in Europe and in Asia.

‍

And so they've had an enormous impact. I got involved because my youngest son went there at age six months, which for us was a godsend. He was born with a very severe, very rare neurological disease  that made him essentially unable to do pretty much anything. No cognitive function, I can't even say very limited.  And they took him with open arms. And you know this is where I thank myself for choosing to live in Israel. I know some places like that exist in the U.S., but the kind of personal warmth we received was just incredible. The rights he received as an Israeli citizen despite the fact that he couldn't communicate in any form.

‍

And so you know, my family said we're gonna we're gonna be involved and truly give back. And so that's what we do.

‍

[01:10:50] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Amazing. You know I first ran into them–you mentioned the consumer industry before–so Nahum Sharfman of blessed memory who was an early father was really high tech. He was a national semiconductor.

‍

And then he started this company that became shopping.com that I was invested in, in the late nineties and in the early two thousands, was very involved there. But then it dropped off my radar, until kind of doing the research for this episode. So you know, thank you for the work. It's an incredible place.

‍

[01:11:25] Adam Fisher:

‍

It's an amazing institution. You know, it's just it's also a sign of–it itself was an entrepreneurial venture in the name of of Issie Shapiro,  but it also shows like, what Israel is capable of even beyond high tech.

‍

[01:11:44] Michael Eisenberg: People don't realize by the way, but they're in the non profit sector in Israel, you have this in the four-year study center in Jerusalem you have Beit Issie Shapiro, you have it in Yad Sarah, which distributes free medical equipment across the country.

‍

It saves the country by the way billions and billions of dollars in medical costs. And Zichron Menachem in Jerusalem for cancer patients. The nonprofit sector particularly around health services populations is actually an area of IP export that is underappreciated in this country. And to your point, you know it's all over the world, whether it's Middle East or Southeast Asia or Europe–people are not even aware of what incredible work is done here and now.

‍

[01:12:25] Adam Fisher:

‍

There's incredible innovation. I think the only thing that has been lacking, that I think has changed, is just Israeli citizens approach to supporting and helping nonprofits financially, not just with their time.

‍

[01:12:38] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Yeah I agree with that. Last question for you from Tomer Tagrin of Yotpo, and I'm going to quote it. He says, “How do you manage to deal with your level of success and stay so grounded and humble?” He thinks that one of the most unique things about you is that nothing goes to your head. How do you pull that off?

‍

[01:12:59] Adam Fisher:

‍

It helps to have self doubt to begin with. Yeah I mean, failure is just around the corner all the time, or other types of challenges. As successful as you've been, you've also had a lot of privilege, and privilege may come from the family you were born into or the country you were born in or whatever the opportunities you were given. It also comes from not having had to deal with horrible things. After October 7th, I think you realize what people deal with, so I've just always been very conscious of how lucky I am–whether it's in business or in life–and not let it get in my head.

‍

A lot of what we do feels like it was scripted, or we knew exactly how it was going to end up. We didn't, right? I mean it's a lot out of our control, not only just the macro but even the micro. We're dealing with individuals who things happen to them as well that are unforeseen, and you have no control over that.

‍

And so you have to accept that. When you accept that, I think you realize how much luck is involved in success. Because in my opinio,n luck is just the absence of bad luck. When you understand that, you realize look, don't let it get to your head. Be grateful. Move on to the next one.

‍

[01:14:31] Michael Eisenberg:

‍

Thank you for doing this Adam. I appreciate it. For those of you who want to learn more about Adam, check him out on X, and I highly recommend you check him out on X @AdamRFisher. That's @ A D A M R F I S H E R. And if you like the podcast, rate us five stars on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Youtube–subscribe wherever you can find us. I really appreciate you doing this Adam. This was a lot of fun.

‍

[01:14:54] Adam Fisher:

‍

Awesome. Thank you Michael.

‍