October 22, 2024 • 40 mins
Join Àlex, CEO of MarsBased, as he tells the story behind starting both MarsBased and the Barcelona chapter of Startup Grind in 2014. Prepared for a rambling of 45 minutes?
This episode covers running both the chapter and MarsBased, reasons to keep it up, impact generated over ten years, metrics of Startup Grind Barcelona, highs and lows, and the reasons why we're quitting after 153 events and three international conferences.
We also give some hints as to what's next for Àlex and our involvement in the events & community space in the near future. Who knows, maybe you get the chance to listen to these ramblings live in a podcast studio near you!
🎬 You can watch the video of this episode on the Life on Mars podcast website: https://podcast.marsbased.com/
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Àlex Rodríguez Bacardit (00:00):
So what is my friends?
Here ends our journey withStartup Grand and I'm Alex, C of
Marspace, and welcome toanother episode of Life on Mars.
This one is a very special one.
We have no guests today.
In this episode, I will go aboutwhy I decided to quit Startup
(00:21):
Grand and, for the uninitiated,I will begin explaining what is
Startup G, which is afundamental part of what we do
at Mars Based, even though it isnot strictly related to what we
do with business or what we dowith web and mobile development,
(00:42):
which is what we are mostlywell known for, but it has
accompanied us from the verybeginning.
Let's start with the basics.
Startup Brand is the largestcommunity and organization for
entrepreneurs worldwide andbasically what Startup Brand
does is to organize events andhost meetups monthly, regular
meetups for entrepreneurs inevery city where they are
(01:06):
present, and they have chapters,and these chapters are
organized locally in over 500cities in more than 120
countries or something like that, and each of these cities has
got a local representative.
In this case, I have been thelocal representative of Startup
Grant in Barcelona, and that'ssomething I started at the same
(01:28):
time as Marspace because inearly 2014, when I was in San
Francisco, I thought well, if Iam to play in the lottery of
entrepreneurship, I might aswell buy two tickets.
And so it's not that I didn'ttrust in my or our ability to
(01:51):
build Mars space from the groundup or, to be honest, I didn't
and so that's why I decided tostart two things at the same
time.
So what started as two separateinitiatives in early 2014, one
of them as a co-founder of MarsSpace alongside my two best
friends, xavi and Jordi, andthen the other one was Startup
(02:15):
Brain, where I was appointed aslocal chapter director.
That was my official title in asort of a franchise contract.
So Startup Prime, much likeother similar organizations like
Fuck Up Nights, for instance,and other or I think TEDx works
like that as well.
(02:35):
They appoint local champions inevery city.
They are responsible for theorganization of the local
chapters.
They are responsible for theorganization of the local
chapters, and so it's up to themto create a company, to run it
as a nonprofit, to do it.
However the fuck, they want toorganize it and deploy it right,
and so it was appointed aschapter director.
(02:55):
So, technically, I've neverbeen employed by startup brand.
It's sort of a commercialagreement, but anyways.
So in 10 years, I have beenresponsible for developing the
brand of Startup Night inBarcelona.
That meant mostly organizingmonthly meetups around
(03:17):
technology, aroundentrepreneurship, investments,
startups, venture capital andwhatnot, and in these meetups,
what we did is host a verywelcoming event and setup for
entrepreneurs, because we allknow that entrepreneurship is a
very lonely journey and, as such, most entrepreneurs, they are
(03:40):
either solopreneurs or they arevery lost, or they don't know
where to go to for their to lookfor help, for instance, to look
for a co-founder to hire, toraise funds, to seek for advice
and counsel and maybe mentoringand whatnot, and or to learn
from more experienced people.
And so in this monthly meetupsthat basically revolved around a
(04:04):
fireside chat that was acentral part of the event what
we did is to educate, inspireand connect entrepreneurs
worldwide.
What that meant is, you know,we created the right environment
for entrepreneurs to join andmingle.
Every month and, in particularin the case of Barcelona, we
hosted 153 events in a littlebit over 10 years.
(04:25):
We started in March 2014, andour last event has been August
2024.
So 10 and a half years give ortake, and we created the event
with such a vibe that waswelcoming, that was inclusive.
The event was in English, so itwas mostly inclusive to
everyone who speaks English,because at the time, in 2014,
(04:49):
the community of entrepreneursin Barcelona for expats was
underserved and most events werein Spanish or Catalan.
But it was also a paid event.
That was quite the paradox,right?
By creating some sort of filter, we made it safer and more
inclusive, right, the filter wasvery low.
Like, you paid three five bucksto get in Actually, I always
(05:12):
joked it was the cheapest bar inBarcelona because for five
bucks you got unlimited beer,food and you had a lot of fun,
right.
So, yeah, it was a safe event.
And also, you could learn Ontop of that.
You could learn from thespeakers and from the rest of
the people in the audience andyou could get hell.
You could get you knowinvestment or a co-founder or
(05:33):
potential hires and whatnot.
So for 10 years, we've beendoing that.
I have been spearheading theproject.
I co-founded it with two otherpeople, carlos Cruz and Alex
González, two of my best friendsas well, and we've had a team
of volunteers, because thisstartup brand we ran it, or
initially we created as analtruist project that we didn't
(05:55):
want to make any money, but wealso didn't want to lose any
money, right?
And so, for the first time, itwas something that I did outside
of MarsBased.
That's something that I did,you know, working in the
graveyard shift after, becausethe first years of MarsBased
they were very intensive and Iwas pulling eight, 10 hours or
12 even every day, and then atthe end of it I had to do
(06:16):
startup, right, because I didn'twant any conflict between the
two parts.
But soon enough, my twoco-founders, xavi and Jordi,
were very generous and they toldme look, this looks like
something that could benefitMarsBased and why don't you do
it as a percentage of the hoursof MarsBased, right?
It's an integral part of yourjob, it's strategic for us.
(06:38):
We also don't want you to work12 hours a day.
Just try to do it inside of theregular working shift of
MarsBase, right?
So by year one, year two, wedecided to kind of like merge it
, and so MarsBase adoptedStartup Rank Barcelona.
We had been running an eventcalled Startup Circle, so it was
(07:02):
basically merging bothcommunities, and that's how it
came to be more professionalized, right.
We allocated a budget the first10,000 euros every year Urban
15, depending of every year,where, you know came right out
of our pockets, from the company, and we hosted these 153 events
(07:25):
mostly in English.
First year maybe we did someevents in Spanish, but we moved
to English very rapidly and wehad a lot of impact.
Right.
We have had an average of 120people per event.
That's for a paid event.
It is really good.
Of course, we've had eventswhere we had fewer people.
We had more.
(07:46):
We hosted three editions of aconference in 2017, 18, and 19.
We organized bigger conferences, international conferences.
The first one was San FranciscoBarcelona Summit.
Then it was Startup Brain Techfor a couple of years, but that
project had to be canceledbecause of COVID 2020 came.
We had to postpone theconference 2021,.
(08:08):
We tried to pick up from wherewe left off, but it was not
possible.
So instead of postponing again,we decided to cancel it
altogether and we never went torevive the project because at
the 2022, I don't know if therewere still some restrictions in
place probably not but businesstravel was still not picking up.
Sponsors were at a you know alltime low and so it was not a
(08:34):
great time to kind of like raisefunds to create events or get
sponsorships and stuff like that.
People were a little bitsaturated from all the events
post-pandemic, so we decided tocancel.
But they were pretty successfulconferences.
We got founders and C-levelsfrom companies like Google,
(08:57):
ventures, shazam, couchsurfing,codecademy, stripe, revolut,
atomico and other companies.
These are just a few off thetop of my head, right.
So we had a bunch of 20, 25people speakers coming from
Silicon Valley Actually, we hadso much in this coming from
Silicon Valley as well or fromCalifornia.
(09:18):
We had this guy in the firstconference came all the way from
LA and he said like, oh, I cameto the conference because, you
know, I love Startup Grind and Ithought Startup Grind in
Barcelona, what a nicecombination.
I wouldn't have done thatmyself, but you know, kudos to
him.
It's probably he spent also anice time in Barcelona.
But so, yeah, and that servesto give some context about what
(09:40):
we've done, because peopleoutside of Mars space they
probably know me because ofstartup brand.
I have been the public face ofstartup brand in Barcelona.
I've been the ambassador ofBarcelona in startup brand and
and I'm always wearing startupbrand t-shirts because basically
we I have more than Mars spaceand and it's kind of like more
media friendly, more catchy, soto speak, and so newspapers like
(10:05):
the idea of interviewingsomebody who's even remotely
associated to Google, because upuntil 2020 or something like
that, startup Grind wassponsored by Google for Startups
and therefore it was StartupGrind powered by Google for
Entrepreneurs or Google forStartups, and so that gave us
some media coverage, but I hadto tell people that my real
(10:28):
business was Mars-based, so it'salways been a struggle to
combine both things.
I've spent 10 years in theorganization.
I've seen the community ebb andflow over time.
Startbrand grew a lotthroughout the years but also
was greatly affected by thepandemic, so the community ebbed
(10:49):
and flowed, but I made manygood friends.
Every year we'd meet in theStartup Brand Global Conference
in California around February,march, and it's a conference of
up to 10,000 people some of thegreatest speakers you can have
in Silicon Valley.
Over the course of 10 years, Ihave been very attached to
(11:10):
Startup Grind.
I attended Startup Grind in 15different cities and the chapter
directors and committee membersand people from the teams of
Startup Grind in other cities 60of them came to ours so the
relationship, the bonding, hasbeen very deep, right.
(11:30):
Another interesting thing is webuilt a community of 9,000
people, right.
It is estimated that Barcelonahas got 30,000 people working in
technology at least subscribedto the newsletters of technology
.
So we had 9,000.
That's pretty big actually, andalso you know the event was
paid.
So we had 9,000.
That's pretty big actually.
And also you know the event waspaid, so it was not for
everybody, and so that's anothermaybe difficulty, but I think
(11:54):
it contributed to having ahealthier newsletter, a
healthier subscriber base, ahealthier attendee base and
people who would come to theevent.
Right, and also another metricthat is very interesting.
We hosted about 500 speakers,give or take, most of whom we
(12:18):
consider friends.
Some of them are really goodfriends, some of them have
become my best friends and a fewof them I have invested, and a
few of them are really goodfriends.
Some of them have become mybest friends and a few of them I
have invested and a few of themhave helped the company.
We've gotten some clients andwe have become the clients of
somebody at some of thesecompanies, right, so we have
established very good commercialrelationships with some
(12:40):
companies.
We've partnered with TravelPerk, where we hosted the events
.
With Attico, I invested inMailTrack and and and and
BankTrack and HireFlix fromNacho González Barros and
Globatalian from Ferran Martínezand EasyPace from Sunil Pardash
and Inviertis from RebeccaPérez off the top of my head,
(13:02):
probably invested in morecompanies coming from startup
brand or from the startup brandcircles or vicinities.
Right, but there are threethings I want to single out as
to why I did this.
Right, of course, as Imentioned, I did within
MarsBased and with the supportof MarsBased, but that was
(13:23):
mostly and entirely mespearheading this.
At a certain point, we decidedto allocate some time of our
operations people.
You know the three differentpeople we've had in the team
Bego, leire and Eli over thecourse of the years.
But there are three things thatI want to single out as to why
(13:43):
I did this for 10 years, which Ithink it is pretty relevant,
because why do you do somethingfor 10 years and never skip a
single month?
That is important.
I think I didn't mention that.
So we have never skipped asingle month.
There's been at least one eventin every single one of these
(14:03):
months between March 2014 andAugust 2024, right, some months
we've done two events.
In some months we hosted threeof them.
We did a bunch of online eventsduring the pandemic, for
obvious reasons, but mostly itwas because of number one our
team of volunteers right For me,the friendships that I've first
(14:25):
off consolidated with some ofmy pre-existing best friends,
like Carlos or Alex or Paul orMark they were worth it but also
met really good friends that Ididn't know before, that I
hadn't known before creatingStartup Grind, right.
So people like Stella, victor,francesca, Nasia, anne Ferran
(14:48):
and others that havecollaborated throughout the
years, like Paula, dot and Davidother people who have
collaborated with Startup Brand.
So we've had a bunch of themright, but mostly they're the
people who stayed the most.
I have already mentioned all ofthem and they're great, they're
priceless, they're amazing.
They're priceless, they'reamazing, they're amazing.
Group of people.
I would hire them all.
I know I could work with themall and we're very good friends.
(15:14):
We will continue meeting andthey've been always there.
Somebody who has given theirall for seven years.
You know most of them Imentioned here.
They've been so on average,we've had people staying five,
six, seven years in the projectvolunteering.
So that's amazing.
That is super amazing.
That speaks at length abouttheir commitment, their passion
(15:36):
and their devotion for somethinglike this and for helping and
embodying the startup brandvalues, right?
The second is the motivation ofgoing on stage and seeing a full
audience pretty much in everyevent.
That is incredible.
The feeling, the kick I gotevery time I went on stage and I
(15:58):
saw 100 plus people in theaudience.
Or in the case of bigger eventslike the Corporate Innovation
Summit, the Scale Up Summit, theVC Night, or the conferences,
the conferences we had 1,000people in the audience.
Right, the feeling of going onstage and seeing these month
after month, it was incredible.
(16:19):
Occasionally you had that eventthat was like only 50 people.
It's like, oh my God, it washorrible, we only had 50 people.
It's like, oh my God, it washorrible, we only had 50 people.
That is literally every week orevery event for most people out
there.
So it's a first world problemto have only 50 people in the
audience.
Right, for me it was kind oflike a defeat, but it showed the
(16:42):
hunger that we had when weorganized this event.
Right, we wanted to have, notfor the sake of having a defeat,
but it showed the hunger thatwe had when we organized these
events, not for the sake ofhaving a lot of people, but
because we knew that below acertain size of an event, you
don't have that much impact.
There is this minimum thresholdfrom which the event grows in
value because potentially, youhave more interesting people,
(17:04):
you can create more connectionsand you can establish deeper
links with all the nodes in thenetwork, right, and so, if also
we have this mass mentoring ofthe Fireside Chat, the
networking was bigger andgreater, the video was more
interesting and whatnot.
So, having also people who haveattended 50 plus events, that's
(17:27):
some rare exceptions, but thereare people who've done that,
some crazy ones like Alex orOttman, for instance, but we
have people I would say over ahundred, maybe not a hundred,
yeah, close to a hundred peoplehave attended more than 30
events, which is insane.
I wouldn't have done thatmyself, you know.
So, having this, seeingfamiliar faces almost every
(17:49):
month, where 50% of the peoplewas always the same but they
were changing, but it was thesame base and 50% of the people
they were new in every event,because Barcelona is a very,
it's a transient city for a lotof people.
It was very interesting,created a very healthy mix of
new and consolidated andestablished people.
(18:10):
And then the third is theimpact right, that is very.
I have some examples here I wantto share.
I don't want to go very, verylong with this because I'm
saying that I've been ramblingfor 20 minutes already.
I wanted to keep it very short,but it's not going to be very
short.
But basically, you know, we'vehelped to create companies,
(18:31):
we've got an investment for acompany.
I have some numbers here.
The craziest example is youknow one of the people I met at
one event.
He said can I be introduced tothe speaker of the next event?
That was Juan San Rosso, thefirst investor of BlaBlaCar.
I said, yeah, sure, they metbecause of my introduction.
They created a company.
And the month after they sentme an email and said can we meet
(18:53):
Pedro Vallez?
Can we get an intro to him?
Because he's an angel investor,Maybe he wants to invest in our
company.
They meet him, they get moneyfrom him.
And so I said, fuck it, I'mgoing to invest as well.
That was my second investment,right?
Some examples here we have hiredfor our projects or helped
(19:14):
someone else to hire directlymore than 100 individuals that
we know.
We've been inspired and we'vespoken at business schools and
universities and middle schoolsand other initiatives over the
course of 10 years andpotentially inspiring new
generations of entrepreneurs.
I have personally invested in30 plus companies.
At this point.
I don't know off the top of myhead how many of these came
(19:35):
through Startpoint, but it's agreat example and, like me, I
have been able to drag otherinvestors to co-invest with me
in these companies.
And sometimes I've draggedinvestors to invest in companies
I haven't invested in, but Imet through Startup Brand and
that's also remarkable.
So, as a result, companiesattending our event they got
funding right.
(19:55):
We and I know around 25 ofthese companies they've done
this with our help right.
We've never commissioned, nevertaken any money.
All of this we've donealtruistically.
We maybe not more importantly,but in another different level
(20:16):
of impact we've canceled andhelped a couple of companies to
open an office in Barcelona, andfor that I should have taken
money, to be honest, but I wasyoung and naive.
But we helped Haufe Romantis, abig German-Swiss multinational,
to open an office in Barcelona.
And also lots to know, alesser-known company, but it's a
product company from the States, to open a development office
(20:38):
in Barcelona.
Right now they've got 80developers or something like
that.
You know, it is somethingremarkable, creates employment
in the city and fuck yeah, Ishould have taken some money for
that.
But maybe the next one, thethird one is a charm.
We managed to channel investmentfrom Silicon Valley
entrepreneurs and investorsdirectly into Barcelona.
We have conducted open callsfor VCs.
(21:00):
Every time we hosted a VC or abusiness angel, we hosted an
open call and we screened orwhen I say we mostly Zai the
things he just to make it clear.
The operational part of theevent was taken care of by
somebody else in our team.
And these other initiatives Iwould do them myself, right, so
I screened about a thousandinvestment decks for other
(21:23):
people Later on, for myself aswell as an investor.
We raise funds for charity aswell, right?
Initiatives like Casa RonaldMcDonald, for instance, or the
war in Ukraine, for instance,and other initiatives we've done
over the years.
We help about a dozenentrepreneurs to go to Silicon
Valley.
Sometimes I went with them.
(21:43):
I invited them to the StartBrand Global Conference to open
doors for go to Silicon Valley.
Sometimes I went with them.
I invited them to the StartupBrain Global Conference to open
doors for them in Silicon Valley, just as I got 10 years prior
in 2014, when somebody elseopened the door for me.
That was my time to pay back tothe community.
Right?
We have inspired and mentoredother startup brain chapters in
(22:03):
cities well beyond our borders,like some of them were close
nearby.
They were like in Valencia,gibraltar, mataró, asturias,
andorra.
But I helped in a time I wasregional director of Startup
Brain, so I managed and mentoredsouthwestern region of of of
(22:24):
start brain and so chapters inin spain, portugal, malta, italy
, france and some of theproblems switzerland as well,
andorra and gibraltar.
They were my jurisdiction, sothat inspired in turn other
other things.
Right, they created impact intheir own local ecosystems.
Granted, I was not involved intheir, but if we helped to make
(22:47):
it happen, in turn that helpedtheir entrepreneurs.
We have given voice to hundreds, if not thousands, of
entrepreneurs selflessly overthe years.
That over open mics andnewsletters.
Right, in our event we had thispart 10 minutes, come on stage
30 seconds, say who you are,what you do and don't pitch,
(23:08):
just ask for help to ouraudience, because somebody in
the audience will be helping youright away.
In the networking partafterwards, right, people found
mentors, entrepreneurs, you know, co-founders, hires we hired a
couple of people from ouraudience over the years, right,
and then I spent over 800 hoursdoing office hours right,
helping entrepreneurs just forthe sake of helping and most of
(23:31):
the times, just welcoming themto Barcelona and opening the
first doors and giving somebasic indications and directions
.
So you know, this is part ofthe impact.
This part of why I did it mademe feel great.
It contributed to upping theGDP of the Barcelona startup
ecosystem.
That was my main KPI, that wasmy North Star.
(23:53):
I was driven by this.
But also there was the flip side.
You know, certain thingshaven't gone so well over the
years and that is something thatI also want to share, because
it's not everything that shines.
It was not a matter of rosesright, and so we lost a ton of
money in events where somethingbroke or our venue canceled last
(24:18):
minute and we had to movesomewhere else and, as a result,
we had to pay for the beers andthe food and transportation,
changing stuff here and there,people didn't sign up and
whatnot.
We lost a ton of money becauseof that.
In one occasion my screensaverwent off and a room full of 300
VIPs in the Barcelona startupecosystem.
(24:39):
My screensaver at the time saidfuck off.
That was pretty funny.
There's a link in the blog postI wrote as a farewell to
Starbrain.
Go check it out.
It's pretty fun.
I was collapsing internally.
I was.
You know, I was hoping theearth would swallow me because I
(25:00):
was so, so disturbing of anevent is so disturbing of an
event, but anyways, we had alsoa speaker that had to cancel
their attendance because he wasinvolved in a sexual harassment
scandal back in the day.
And I know you dirty minds.
You have somebody in mind.
It's not that person you'rethinking of, not that person.
Sadly, it's not that person.
(25:21):
I know who you're referring to.
I would say publicly forobvious reasons but no, it was
somebody else.
You can dig it up.
It's pretty basic Somebody whodisappeared off the website of
our conference in 2017, right,you know there are some tweets
about it and whatnot.
We had to cancel our conferences2020, 21.
(25:41):
We lost money because somethings we paid up front.
I personally fucked up so manytimes with sponsors sending the
wrong numbers, sending stuff toolate, lost money on that.
In one of our conferences welost about 30,000 euros.
Right, because I was not fullyfocused or because, you know,
(26:02):
startup was demanding, but MarsBase was more demanding and more
important than startup brands.
So, having to juggle all ofthese things, I accepted these
losses are as something that ispart of the game, and you know
other funny stories that we got.
We got there right.
There's a bunch of them.
It's a longer list on the blogpost.
But basically, the main pointof this podcast episode, the
(26:26):
main reason why I'm sharing this, is because we will not be
doing this anymore.
We have stopped.
Mars Base has been theorganizing partner, has been the
main sponsor and has been alsothe main reason why I've been
doing this.
Back in 2014, when I had nothingand I was in the application
process of Startup Grind, derektold me why do you want to do
(26:49):
this?
Like seems like you don't havea business, you don't have an
income, you don't have a plan.
Like you have nothing.
Everybody else who's appliedfor this has a more established
position and they either workfor somebody or they can afford
doing it right.
So he took a huge bet.
I think it paid off manifold individends.
(27:09):
Maybe we didn't give a lot ofmoney.
We also haven't taken much, butI think we have managed to
establish the brand of StartupBrain in Barcelona, to expand
the values, to sing the gospelof Startup Brain and expand our
impact beyond Silicon Valley andimporting to Barcelona certain
(27:30):
traits of the Silicon Valleyculture, like paying it forward,
giving back to the communityand these kind of things, that
they were not very establishedhere, if at all.
And but a few months back, I hadan epiphany when we made it to
the 10-year anniversary, whichwas a phenomenal event.
Phenomenal event, I freakinglove it.
(27:52):
We had 300 people in theaudience VIPs, clients of
MarsBase, early employees ofMarsBase and the other
co-founders of Startup Prime andpeople from all over the place
and throughout the years.
You know people who had come tothe first events and for 10
years they disappeared and theycame to this event specifically,
I realized that a lot ofcompanies that I have
(28:15):
interviewed at Startup Brandover the course of these 10
years, they don't exist anymore.
And I'm not talking about a 1%,it's not a 5%, it's not a 10%,
it's bigger than that.
I don't know, I don't think itis a 30%, but it is significant
but also a lot of companies thatstill exist.
They are either in zombie statethey have significantly shrunk.
(28:40):
Some of them they have beenaccused of fraud and other
scandals.
Right, we have had the case ofcompanies shutting down,
companies that have been in themidst very big PR turbulences.
You know companies like Rebi orBadi or what else that was Jeff
(29:03):
in Valencia, like stuff likethat, that supposedly they were
going to change the world.
That was Jeff in Valencia, likestuff like that, that
supposedly they were going tochange the world, and we don't
know the whole story.
But they turned out to not bethe things that they wanted to
be and some of them they engagedin not very ethical decisions,
right, and so I feel a littlebit dirty.
(29:27):
I even interviewed somebody thatshouldn't have been on stage
with me and back in the day andjust because the team asked for
it and the community asked forit, and so I don't want to do
these things anymore I can saythis now.
I can do this now because I'min a position of power after 10
years, after you know, havinggrown a company to 20 plus
(29:48):
people, having established somesort of a financial independence
and having grown a voice and afollowing, I can say that Maybe
I couldn't say 10 years ago,maybe I did say somehow 10 years
ago, but not as publicly, notas firmly.
Right Now we can do it.
So that's why I think I haveoutgrown the role at Startup
Brain and somebody else willbenefit more than I can do.
(30:13):
Somebody deserves it more.
I'm going to be looking forsomebody to replace myself.
The team does not want tocontinue.
The team wants to do somethingwith me which is very funny and
super humbled by.
So of course, they don't wantto continue this if I am not
involved, and so that's why I'mclosing the chapter on my career
(30:37):
.
Also, marsbase, and if you'relistening to this podcast, it's
because you listen to theMarsBase podcast and we haven't
talked much about MarsBase inthis episode.
But I think that a lot ofpeople don't know StartupBrand
is an integral part of what wedo, right, part of why MarsBase
is the way it is.
It is explained by StartupBrand.
Right, because of the values,because my trip to Silicon
(30:59):
Valley maybe my trips to SiliconValley every year, every year
more or less I got a client fromthere.
We have gotten some clientsfrom StartupBrand.
I've given visibility toMarsBase through StartupBrand
and the other way around.
So they have cross-pollinatedvery well over the years, but
they have been very separate.
As a matter of fact, in theevents you could barely see the
(31:23):
existence of MarsBase, becauseI've always had this imposter
syndrome.
I don't like it when somebodyorganizes an event and they're
like by the way, come to myevent, my event is this and
because it's my company andthey're trying to sell you
something Like we couldn't sellsomething because entrepreneurs
are fucking poor and theycouldn't afford Mars Base rates.
(31:44):
Jokes aside, it's like I didn'twant to do that.
Couldn't afford Mars-basedrates Jokes aside, it's like I
didn't want to do that.
I wanted to prove you can be100% honest and transparent and
upfront at organizing an eventwithout having to soft sell
something or engage in shadytactics or something like that.
Right, I wanted to keep it 100%separate.
That's possible.
I've done it for 10 years, but Ithink it is time for me to move
(32:07):
on.
And now what?
Right?
So how does this continue?
Well, the last 10, 12 months,mars Days has required me more.
The company is now past 20employees.
We live in a cycle, in a momentin which I have to spend most of
(32:27):
my weekly dedication doingsales and marketing and growing
the company, and I cannot devotethat time to something that is
not my project.
In other words, I found thatsometimes I was dedicating some
time and effort and mentalbandwidth to StartBrain over
(32:50):
MarsBased and MarsBased is mycompany, startbrain is not Right
and so I didn't find thatacceptable.
Also, for a couple of years,for some years we haven't seen
eye to eye with StartBrain fordifferent reasons, and so that
didn't help either, but it's notthe main case of me leaving.
But so for me I felt like, look, I'm not doing the right thing.
(33:13):
I have to invest everything Ihave in Marseilles because
there's a recession.
We have been growing in thelast years, but I feared that we
would stall or we would shrinkdown if I continued spreading
too thin and too many thingsRight, and my heart wasn't in a
(33:37):
start point.
For the last year, year and ahalf, maybe two years,
post-pandemic, it's never beenthe same, and so I said, look,
let's move on.
It doesn't make sense anymore.
That doesn't mean we will stopdoing events.
That means we will do it on ourterms, because that's something
that I was always atloggerheads with the
(33:58):
organization of Startup Crank.
We'll do it on our terms.
We'll do it more technicalevents.
We will do events that are notso much focused on VC and
investment, high growth andstuff like that.
I want to build events more forthe community.
I found that it's closer to myvalues and my heart, which is
(34:22):
more bootstrap companies,healthy companies, no bullshit
companies, and therefore that'swhy I want to focus on that.
I'll let somebody else enjoythe ride the ups and downs of
entrepreneurship with VC andhigh growth and move fast, break
things, go big or go home andthese other nonsensical bullshit
just not going to be me.
(34:42):
I'm not saying I didn't like itfor this year I liked it, I
enjoy it.
I learned a ton, but I alsolearned it's not going to be me.
I'm not saying I didn't like itfor this year.
I liked it, I enjoyed it, Ilearned a ton.
But I also learned it's not forme, right.
And so for me.
I wasn't interested in learninghow this 21 year old raised 40
millions of venture capital andthen, three years after, the
company had to be shut downright, or they had to sell
everything at a discount becausethe company was not viable.
Of course, it was not fuckingviable.
(35:04):
And also I found a lot ofhypocrisy in people demanding
less taxes but at the same time,government isn't helping me
much because they're not givingme the freaking ANISA or other
funding coming from governmentand whatnot, or I want to hire
cheaper from unis and stuff likethat.
(35:25):
I don't know, man, that's nothow taxes work.
Maybe I'm being too opinionated, but that's why you're here in
the Mars Days podcast.
I can be more opinionated herethan I was in startup, right.
So I want to contribute.
I always said, like, if you'renot part of the solution, you're
part of the problem, and I wasbeing part of the problem.
That's why I want to stoppromoting that kind of things.
(35:45):
I will occasionally talk aboutVC and some companies I respect
and admire, because some of themare very good, like in the case
of Factorio in Barcelona, verygood friends of mine.
I like them and if they can VCmoney and they're doing a great
job and who knows how it's goingto pan out.
But to me they are more of anexample than other companies in
Barcelona, right.
And so you know, if you want tostay tuned to what we do,
(36:07):
basically what you can expect ismore content.
The podcast you know we had tostop it for six months and while
we stopped the Mars Dayspodcast, we didn't stop Startup
Friend events and that was oneof the things that you know.
It kind of like didn't feelright with me and that's why I
said like it's not acceptablethat I stopped a Mars space
(36:28):
initiative to continue withsomebody else's project, and so
that's why the podcast goesuninterrupted.
From now on, we will revive thenewsletter.
One year without a newsletteris not acceptable.
I have launched the personalwebsite.
I have relaunched my personalwebsite and I'm blogging there
every week and talking about thethings I can talk, maybe at a
company level, and sharing otherstuff, but I don't know.
(36:52):
I will continue to contributeto StartBrand, embodying the
values.
That's something that stayswith me forever, eternally
grateful.
I want to also to share myeternal gratitude for the
opportunity, share my eternalgratitude for the opportunity
(37:14):
People like Derek Francisco,carly, bruce G Finn, daniel Yele
Madeline, all of thesecountless people, but most of
them in the community team orheadquarters team that they
place their trust in me andthey've given me power.
They've given me the voice.
They've put up with my infiniteruns, sometimes sending 90
minute long videos, saying likethis is shit, this is not
working, and but look, if youdon't move, you don't hear your
(37:37):
chains, right.
So I think that somebody isgoing to be that the devil on
the shoulders saying like, hey,something's not working, this is
bad.
Here I think outside the boxand basically be vocal about
things that aren't working.
And so I think I havecontributed to StartBrain,
immensely grateful for thefriendship, the leadership and
(38:00):
the companionship that I'vereceived over the course of
these 10 years.
The awards and recognition someof them that you see over here
and most of them are hidden theyevery year we back two, three,
four of them at the Star PrimeConference and the friends we've
made all over the world andother chapter directors and the
people at the organization.
(38:21):
Having the opportunity to meetPatrick Collison, jason Freed,
dustin Muscovitz and otherfamous people.
I don't remember right now, butbackstage in the Startup Prime
conference or introducing themon stage or even interviewing
them myself, like Balaji.
I interviewed Balaji in 2017 or18, before he got so famous,
(38:42):
and I didn't have a clue aboutfucking blockchain, and I didn't
have a clue about fuckingblockchain, but yeah, these
opportunities are to just go onstage in front of 5,000 people
and speak.
That has been phenomenal.
The friendships I've made andthe things I've gotten out of
this are countless and that'swhy I'm so grateful.
I will continue singing praiseof StarCrane and I will continue
(39:03):
supporting from the distanceClose distance, long distance, I
don't know, but I need sometime to oxygenate.
I think MarsBase will benefitfrom this.
Everybody's better off partingways amicably and basically, my
responsibility right now is tofocus 100% on Mars space,
(39:25):
because there are 20 peopleeating from the contracts I land
and some other freelancersinvolved, and it's my direct
responsibility to put my eggs inthis one basket.
That is very and it's a verynice basket and but anyways, I
cannot, of course, disregardeverything that I've done, built
(39:45):
and helped to build or gottenfrom StartupBrain and you know,
forever eternally grateful and Iwill always recommend that
people go to StartupBrainconferences and events and, you
know, hoping that our pathscross again in the future
Without being said I'm off fortoday, so thanks for listening,
(40:07):
peace.
So what is my friends?
Here ends our journey withStartup Grand and I'm Alex, C of
Marspace, and welcome toanother episode of Life on Mars.
This one is a very special one.
We have no guests today.
In this episode, I will go aboutwhy I decided to quit Startup
(00:21):
Grand and, for the uninitiated,I will begin explaining what is
Startup G, which is afundamental part of what we do
at Mars Based, even though it isnot strictly related to what we
do with business or what we dowith web and mobile development,
(00:42):
which is what we are mostlywell known for, but it has
accompanied us from the verybeginning.
Let's start with the basics.
Startup Brand is the largestcommunity and organization for
entrepreneurs worldwide andbasically what Startup Brand
does is to organize events andhost meetups monthly, regular
meetups for entrepreneurs inevery city where they are
(01:06):
present, and they have chapters,and these chapters are
organized locally in over 500cities in more than 120
countries or something like that, and each of these cities has
got a local representative.
In this case, I have been thelocal representative of Startup
Grant in Barcelona, and that'ssomething I started at the same
(01:28):
time as Marspace because inearly 2014, when I was in San
Francisco, I thought well, if Iam to play in the lottery of
entrepreneurship, I might aswell buy two tickets.
And so it's not that I didn'ttrust in my or our ability to
(01:51):
build Mars space from the groundup or, to be honest, I didn't
and so that's why I decided tostart two things at the same
time.
So what started as two separateinitiatives in early 2014, one
of them as a co-founder of MarsSpace alongside my two best
friends, xavi and Jordi, andthen the other one was Startup
(02:15):
Brain, where I was appointed aslocal chapter director.
That was my official title in asort of a franchise contract.
So Startup Prime, much likeother similar organizations like
Fuck Up Nights, for instance,and other or I think TEDx works
like that as well.
(02:35):
They appoint local champions inevery city.
They are responsible for theorganization of the local
chapters.
They are responsible for theorganization of the local
chapters, and so it's up to themto create a company, to run it
as a nonprofit, to do it.
However the fuck, they want toorganize it and deploy it right,
and so it was appointed aschapter director.
(02:55):
So, technically, I've neverbeen employed by startup brand.
It's sort of a commercialagreement, but anyways.
So in 10 years, I have beenresponsible for developing the
brand of Startup Night inBarcelona.
That meant mostly organizingmonthly meetups around
(03:17):
technology, aroundentrepreneurship, investments,
startups, venture capital andwhatnot, and in these meetups,
what we did is host a verywelcoming event and setup for
entrepreneurs, because we allknow that entrepreneurship is a
very lonely journey and, as such, most entrepreneurs, they are
(03:40):
either solopreneurs or they arevery lost, or they don't know
where to go to for their to lookfor help, for instance, to look
for a co-founder to hire, toraise funds, to seek for advice
and counsel and maybe mentoringand whatnot, and or to learn
from more experienced people.
And so in this monthly meetupsthat basically revolved around a
(04:04):
fireside chat that was acentral part of the event what
we did is to educate, inspireand connect entrepreneurs
worldwide.
What that meant is, you know,we created the right environment
for entrepreneurs to join andmingle.
Every month and, in particularin the case of Barcelona, we
hosted 153 events in a littlebit over 10 years.
(04:25):
We started in March 2014, andour last event has been August
2024.
So 10 and a half years give ortake, and we created the event
with such a vibe that waswelcoming, that was inclusive.
The event was in English, so itwas mostly inclusive to
everyone who speaks English,because at the time, in 2014,
(04:49):
the community of entrepreneursin Barcelona for expats was
underserved and most events werein Spanish or Catalan.
But it was also a paid event.
That was quite the paradox,right?
By creating some sort of filter, we made it safer and more
inclusive, right, the filter wasvery low.
Like, you paid three five bucksto get in Actually, I always
(05:12):
joked it was the cheapest bar inBarcelona because for five
bucks you got unlimited beer,food and you had a lot of fun,
right.
So, yeah, it was a safe event.
And also, you could learn Ontop of that.
You could learn from thespeakers and from the rest of
the people in the audience andyou could get hell.
You could get you knowinvestment or a co-founder or
(05:33):
potential hires and whatnot.
So for 10 years, we've beendoing that.
I have been spearheading theproject.
I co-founded it with two otherpeople, carlos Cruz and Alex
González, two of my best friendsas well, and we've had a team
of volunteers, because thisstartup brand we ran it, or
initially we created as analtruist project that we didn't
(05:55):
want to make any money, but wealso didn't want to lose any
money, right?
And so, for the first time, itwas something that I did outside
of MarsBased.
That's something that I did,you know, working in the
graveyard shift after, becausethe first years of MarsBased
they were very intensive and Iwas pulling eight, 10 hours or
12 even every day, and then atthe end of it I had to do
(06:16):
startup, right, because I didn'twant any conflict between the
two parts.
But soon enough, my twoco-founders, xavi and Jordi,
were very generous and they toldme look, this looks like
something that could benefitMarsBased and why don't you do
it as a percentage of the hoursof MarsBased, right?
It's an integral part of yourjob, it's strategic for us.
(06:38):
We also don't want you to work12 hours a day.
Just try to do it inside of theregular working shift of
MarsBase, right?
So by year one, year two, wedecided to kind of like merge it
, and so MarsBase adoptedStartup Rank Barcelona.
We had been running an eventcalled Startup Circle, so it was
(07:02):
basically merging bothcommunities, and that's how it
came to be more professionalized, right.
We allocated a budget the first10,000 euros every year Urban
15, depending of every year,where, you know came right out
of our pockets, from the company, and we hosted these 153 events
(07:25):
mostly in English.
First year maybe we did someevents in Spanish, but we moved
to English very rapidly and wehad a lot of impact.
Right.
We have had an average of 120people per event.
That's for a paid event.
It is really good.
Of course, we've had eventswhere we had fewer people.
We had more.
(07:46):
We hosted three editions of aconference in 2017, 18, and 19.
We organized bigger conferences, international conferences.
The first one was San FranciscoBarcelona Summit.
Then it was Startup Brain Techfor a couple of years, but that
project had to be canceledbecause of COVID 2020 came.
We had to postpone theconference 2021,.
(08:08):
We tried to pick up from wherewe left off, but it was not
possible.
So instead of postponing again,we decided to cancel it
altogether and we never went torevive the project because at
the 2022, I don't know if therewere still some restrictions in
place probably not but businesstravel was still not picking up.
Sponsors were at a you know alltime low and so it was not a
(08:34):
great time to kind of like raisefunds to create events or get
sponsorships and stuff like that.
People were a little bitsaturated from all the events
post-pandemic, so we decided tocancel.
But they were pretty successfulconferences.
We got founders and C-levelsfrom companies like Google,
(08:57):
ventures, shazam, couchsurfing,codecademy, stripe, revolut,
atomico and other companies.
These are just a few off thetop of my head, right.
So we had a bunch of 20, 25people speakers coming from
Silicon Valley Actually, we hadso much in this coming from
Silicon Valley as well or fromCalifornia.
(09:18):
We had this guy in the firstconference came all the way from
LA and he said like, oh, I cameto the conference because, you
know, I love Startup Grind and Ithought Startup Grind in
Barcelona, what a nicecombination.
I wouldn't have done thatmyself, but you know, kudos to
him.
It's probably he spent also anice time in Barcelona.
But so, yeah, and that servesto give some context about what
(09:40):
we've done, because peopleoutside of Mars space they
probably know me because ofstartup brand.
I have been the public face ofstartup brand in Barcelona.
I've been the ambassador ofBarcelona in startup brand and
and I'm always wearing startupbrand t-shirts because basically
we I have more than Mars spaceand and it's kind of like more
media friendly, more catchy, soto speak, and so newspapers like
(10:05):
the idea of interviewingsomebody who's even remotely
associated to Google, because upuntil 2020 or something like
that, startup Grind wassponsored by Google for Startups
and therefore it was StartupGrind powered by Google for
Entrepreneurs or Google forStartups, and so that gave us
some media coverage, but I hadto tell people that my real
(10:28):
business was Mars-based, so it'salways been a struggle to
combine both things.
I've spent 10 years in theorganization.
I've seen the community ebb andflow over time.
Startbrand grew a lotthroughout the years but also
was greatly affected by thepandemic, so the community ebbed
(10:49):
and flowed, but I made manygood friends.
Every year we'd meet in theStartup Brand Global Conference
in California around February,march, and it's a conference of
up to 10,000 people some of thegreatest speakers you can have
in Silicon Valley.
Over the course of 10 years, Ihave been very attached to
(11:10):
Startup Grind.
I attended Startup Grind in 15different cities and the chapter
directors and committee membersand people from the teams of
Startup Grind in other cities 60of them came to ours so the
relationship, the bonding, hasbeen very deep, right.
(11:30):
Another interesting thing is webuilt a community of 9,000
people, right.
It is estimated that Barcelonahas got 30,000 people working in
technology at least subscribedto the newsletters of technology
.
So we had 9,000.
That's pretty big actually, andalso you know the event was
paid.
So we had 9,000.
That's pretty big actually.
And also you know the event waspaid, so it was not for
everybody, and so that's anothermaybe difficulty, but I think
(11:54):
it contributed to having ahealthier newsletter, a
healthier subscriber base, ahealthier attendee base and
people who would come to theevent.
Right, and also another metricthat is very interesting.
We hosted about 500 speakers,give or take, most of whom we
(12:18):
consider friends.
Some of them are really goodfriends, some of them have
become my best friends and a fewof them I have invested, and a
few of them are really goodfriends.
Some of them have become mybest friends and a few of them I
have invested and a few of themhave helped the company.
We've gotten some clients andwe have become the clients of
somebody at some of thesecompanies, right, so we have
established very good commercialrelationships with some
(12:40):
companies.
We've partnered with TravelPerk, where we hosted the events
.
With Attico, I invested inMailTrack and and and and
BankTrack and HireFlix fromNacho González Barros and
Globatalian from Ferran Martínezand EasyPace from Sunil Pardash
and Inviertis from RebeccaPérez off the top of my head,
(13:02):
probably invested in morecompanies coming from startup
brand or from the startup brandcircles or vicinities.
Right, but there are threethings I want to single out as
to why I did this.
Right, of course, as Imentioned, I did within
MarsBased and with the supportof MarsBased, but that was
(13:23):
mostly and entirely mespearheading this.
At a certain point, we decidedto allocate some time of our
operations people.
You know the three differentpeople we've had in the team
Bego, leire and Eli over thecourse of the years.
But there are three things thatI want to single out as to why
(13:43):
I did this for 10 years, which Ithink it is pretty relevant,
because why do you do somethingfor 10 years and never skip a
single month?
That is important.
I think I didn't mention that.
So we have never skipped asingle month.
There's been at least one eventin every single one of these
(14:03):
months between March 2014 andAugust 2024, right, some months
we've done two events.
In some months we hosted threeof them.
We did a bunch of online eventsduring the pandemic, for
obvious reasons, but mostly itwas because of number one our
team of volunteers right For me,the friendships that I've first
(14:25):
off consolidated with some ofmy pre-existing best friends,
like Carlos or Alex or Paul orMark they were worth it but also
met really good friends that Ididn't know before, that I
hadn't known before creatingStartup Grind, right.
So people like Stella, victor,francesca, Nasia, anne Ferran
(14:48):
and others that havecollaborated throughout the
years, like Paula, dot and Davidother people who have
collaborated with Startup Brand.
So we've had a bunch of themright, but mostly they're the
people who stayed the most.
I have already mentioned all ofthem and they're great, they're
priceless, they're amazing.
They're priceless, they'reamazing, they're amazing.
Group of people.
I would hire them all.
I know I could work with themall and we're very good friends.
(15:14):
We will continue meeting andthey've been always there.
Somebody who has given theirall for seven years.
You know most of them Imentioned here.
They've been so on average,we've had people staying five,
six, seven years in the projectvolunteering.
So that's amazing.
That is super amazing.
That speaks at length abouttheir commitment, their passion
(15:36):
and their devotion for somethinglike this and for helping and
embodying the startup brandvalues, right?
The second is the motivation ofgoing on stage and seeing a full
audience pretty much in everyevent.
That is incredible.
The feeling, the kick I gotevery time I went on stage and I
(15:58):
saw 100 plus people in theaudience.
Or in the case of bigger eventslike the Corporate Innovation
Summit, the Scale Up Summit, theVC Night, or the conferences,
the conferences we had 1,000people in the audience.
Right, the feeling of going onstage and seeing these month
after month, it was incredible.
(16:19):
Occasionally you had that eventthat was like only 50 people.
It's like, oh my God, it washorrible, we only had 50 people.
It's like, oh my God, it washorrible, we only had 50 people.
That is literally every week orevery event for most people out
there.
So it's a first world problemto have only 50 people in the
audience.
Right, for me it was kind oflike a defeat, but it showed the
(16:42):
hunger that we had when weorganized this event.
Right, we wanted to have, notfor the sake of having a defeat,
but it showed the hunger thatwe had when we organized these
events, not for the sake ofhaving a lot of people, but
because we knew that below acertain size of an event, you
don't have that much impact.
There is this minimum thresholdfrom which the event grows in
value because potentially, youhave more interesting people,
(17:04):
you can create more connectionsand you can establish deeper
links with all the nodes in thenetwork, right, and so, if also
we have this mass mentoring ofthe Fireside Chat, the
networking was bigger andgreater, the video was more
interesting and whatnot.
So, having also people who haveattended 50 plus events, that's
(17:27):
some rare exceptions, but thereare people who've done that,
some crazy ones like Alex orOttman, for instance, but we
have people I would say over ahundred, maybe not a hundred,
yeah, close to a hundred peoplehave attended more than 30
events, which is insane.
I wouldn't have done thatmyself, you know.
So, having this, seeingfamiliar faces almost every
(17:49):
month, where 50% of the peoplewas always the same but they
were changing, but it was thesame base and 50% of the people
they were new in every event,because Barcelona is a very,
it's a transient city for a lotof people.
It was very interesting,created a very healthy mix of
new and consolidated andestablished people.
(18:10):
And then the third is theimpact right, that is very.
I have some examples here I wantto share.
I don't want to go very, verylong with this because I'm
saying that I've been ramblingfor 20 minutes already.
I wanted to keep it very short,but it's not going to be very
short.
But basically, you know, we'vehelped to create companies,
(18:31):
we've got an investment for acompany.
I have some numbers here.
The craziest example is youknow one of the people I met at
one event.
He said can I be introduced tothe speaker of the next event?
That was Juan San Rosso, thefirst investor of BlaBlaCar.
I said, yeah, sure, they metbecause of my introduction.
They created a company.
And the month after they sentme an email and said can we meet
(18:53):
Pedro Vallez?
Can we get an intro to him?
Because he's an angel investor,Maybe he wants to invest in our
company.
They meet him, they get moneyfrom him.
And so I said, fuck it, I'mgoing to invest as well.
That was my second investment,right?
Some examples here we have hiredfor our projects or helped
(19:14):
someone else to hire directlymore than 100 individuals that
we know.
We've been inspired and we'vespoken at business schools and
universities and middle schoolsand other initiatives over the
course of 10 years andpotentially inspiring new
generations of entrepreneurs.
I have personally invested in30 plus companies.
At this point.
I don't know off the top of myhead how many of these came
(19:35):
through Startpoint, but it's agreat example and, like me, I
have been able to drag otherinvestors to co-invest with me
in these companies.
And sometimes I've draggedinvestors to invest in companies
I haven't invested in, but Imet through Startup Brand and
that's also remarkable.
So, as a result, companiesattending our event they got
funding right.
(19:55):
We and I know around 25 ofthese companies they've done
this with our help right.
We've never commissioned, nevertaken any money.
All of this we've donealtruistically.
We maybe not more importantly,but in another different level
(20:16):
of impact we've canceled andhelped a couple of companies to
open an office in Barcelona, andfor that I should have taken
money, to be honest, but I wasyoung and naive.
But we helped Haufe Romantis, abig German-Swiss multinational,
to open an office in Barcelona.
And also lots to know, alesser-known company, but it's a
product company from the States, to open a development office
(20:38):
in Barcelona.
Right now they've got 80developers or something like
that.
You know, it is somethingremarkable, creates employment
in the city and fuck yeah, Ishould have taken some money for
that.
But maybe the next one, thethird one is a charm.
We managed to channel investmentfrom Silicon Valley
entrepreneurs and investorsdirectly into Barcelona.
We have conducted open callsfor VCs.
(21:00):
Every time we hosted a VC or abusiness angel, we hosted an
open call and we screened orwhen I say we mostly Zai the
things he just to make it clear.
The operational part of theevent was taken care of by
somebody else in our team.
And these other initiatives Iwould do them myself, right, so
I screened about a thousandinvestment decks for other
(21:23):
people Later on, for myself aswell as an investor.
We raise funds for charity aswell, right?
Initiatives like Casa RonaldMcDonald, for instance, or the
war in Ukraine, for instance,and other initiatives we've done
over the years.
We help about a dozenentrepreneurs to go to Silicon
Valley.
Sometimes I went with them.
(21:43):
I invited them to the StartBrand Global Conference to open
doors for go to Silicon Valley.
Sometimes I went with them.
I invited them to the StartupBrain Global Conference to open
doors for them in Silicon Valley, just as I got 10 years prior
in 2014, when somebody elseopened the door for me.
That was my time to pay back tothe community.
Right?
We have inspired and mentoredother startup brain chapters in
(22:03):
cities well beyond our borders,like some of them were close
nearby.
They were like in Valencia,gibraltar, mataró, asturias,
andorra.
But I helped in a time I wasregional director of Startup
Brain, so I managed and mentoredsouthwestern region of of of
(22:24):
start brain and so chapters inin spain, portugal, malta, italy
, france and some of theproblems switzerland as well,
andorra and gibraltar.
They were my jurisdiction, sothat inspired in turn other
other things.
Right, they created impact intheir own local ecosystems.
Granted, I was not involved intheir, but if we helped to make
(22:47):
it happen, in turn that helpedtheir entrepreneurs.
We have given voice to hundreds, if not thousands, of
entrepreneurs selflessly overthe years.
That over open mics andnewsletters.
Right, in our event we had thispart 10 minutes, come on stage
30 seconds, say who you are,what you do and don't pitch,
(23:08):
just ask for help to ouraudience, because somebody in
the audience will be helping youright away.
In the networking partafterwards, right, people found
mentors, entrepreneurs, you know, co-founders, hires we hired a
couple of people from ouraudience over the years, right,
and then I spent over 800 hoursdoing office hours right,
helping entrepreneurs just forthe sake of helping and most of
(23:31):
the times, just welcoming themto Barcelona and opening the
first doors and giving somebasic indications and directions
.
So you know, this is part ofthe impact.
This part of why I did it mademe feel great.
It contributed to upping theGDP of the Barcelona startup
ecosystem.
That was my main KPI, that wasmy North Star.
(23:53):
I was driven by this.
But also there was the flip side.
You know, certain thingshaven't gone so well over the
years and that is something thatI also want to share, because
it's not everything that shines.
It was not a matter of rosesright, and so we lost a ton of
money in events where somethingbroke or our venue canceled last
(24:18):
minute and we had to movesomewhere else and, as a result,
we had to pay for the beers andthe food and transportation,
changing stuff here and there,people didn't sign up and
whatnot.
We lost a ton of money becauseof that.
In one occasion my screensaverwent off and a room full of 300
VIPs in the Barcelona startupecosystem.
(24:39):
My screensaver at the time saidfuck off.
That was pretty funny.
There's a link in the blog postI wrote as a farewell to
Starbrain.
Go check it out.
It's pretty fun.
I was collapsing internally.
I was.
You know, I was hoping theearth would swallow me because I
(25:00):
was so, so disturbing of anevent is so disturbing of an
event, but anyways, we had alsoa speaker that had to cancel
their attendance because he wasinvolved in a sexual harassment
scandal back in the day.
And I know you dirty minds.
You have somebody in mind.
It's not that person you'rethinking of, not that person.
Sadly, it's not that person.
(25:21):
I know who you're referring to.
I would say publicly forobvious reasons but no, it was
somebody else.
You can dig it up.
It's pretty basic Somebody whodisappeared off the website of
our conference in 2017, right,you know there are some tweets
about it and whatnot.
We had to cancel our conferences2020, 21.
(25:41):
We lost money because somethings we paid up front.
I personally fucked up so manytimes with sponsors sending the
wrong numbers, sending stuff toolate, lost money on that.
In one of our conferences welost about 30,000 euros.
Right, because I was not fullyfocused or because, you know,
(26:02):
startup was demanding, but MarsBase was more demanding and more
important than startup brands.
So, having to juggle all ofthese things, I accepted these
losses are as something that ispart of the game, and you know
other funny stories that we got.
We got there right.
There's a bunch of them.
It's a longer list on the blogpost.
But basically, the main pointof this podcast episode, the
(26:26):
main reason why I'm sharing this, is because we will not be
doing this anymore.
We have stopped.
Mars Base has been theorganizing partner, has been the
main sponsor and has been alsothe main reason why I've been
doing this.
Back in 2014, when I had nothingand I was in the application
process of Startup Grind, derektold me why do you want to do
(26:49):
this?
Like seems like you don't havea business, you don't have an
income, you don't have a plan.
Like you have nothing.
Everybody else who's appliedfor this has a more established
position and they either workfor somebody or they can afford
doing it right.
So he took a huge bet.
I think it paid off manifold individends.
(27:09):
Maybe we didn't give a lot ofmoney.
We also haven't taken much, butI think we have managed to
establish the brand of StartupBrain in Barcelona, to expand
the values, to sing the gospelof Startup Brain and expand our
impact beyond Silicon Valley andimporting to Barcelona certain
(27:30):
traits of the Silicon Valleyculture, like paying it forward,
giving back to the communityand these kind of things, that
they were not very establishedhere, if at all.
And but a few months back, I hadan epiphany when we made it to
the 10-year anniversary, whichwas a phenomenal event.
Phenomenal event, I freakinglove it.
(27:52):
We had 300 people in theaudience VIPs, clients of
MarsBase, early employees ofMarsBase and the other
co-founders of Startup Prime andpeople from all over the place
and throughout the years.
You know people who had come tothe first events and for 10
years they disappeared and theycame to this event specifically,
I realized that a lot ofcompanies that I have
(28:15):
interviewed at Startup Brandover the course of these 10
years, they don't exist anymore.
And I'm not talking about a 1%,it's not a 5%, it's not a 10%,
it's bigger than that.
I don't know, I don't think itis a 30%, but it is significant
but also a lot of companies thatstill exist.
They are either in zombie statethey have significantly shrunk.
(28:40):
Some of them they have beenaccused of fraud and other
scandals.
Right, we have had the case ofcompanies shutting down,
companies that have been in themidst very big PR turbulences.
You know companies like Rebi orBadi or what else that was Jeff
(29:03):
in Valencia, like stuff likethat, that supposedly they were
going to change the world.
That was Jeff in Valencia, likestuff like that, that
supposedly they were going tochange the world, and we don't
know the whole story.
But they turned out to not bethe things that they wanted to
be and some of them they engagedin not very ethical decisions,
right, and so I feel a littlebit dirty.
(29:27):
I even interviewed somebody thatshouldn't have been on stage
with me and back in the day andjust because the team asked for
it and the community asked forit, and so I don't want to do
these things anymore I can saythis now.
I can do this now because I'min a position of power after 10
years, after you know, havinggrown a company to 20 plus
(29:48):
people, having established somesort of a financial independence
and having grown a voice and afollowing, I can say that Maybe
I couldn't say 10 years ago,maybe I did say somehow 10 years
ago, but not as publicly, notas firmly.
Right Now we can do it.
So that's why I think I haveoutgrown the role at Startup
Brain and somebody else willbenefit more than I can do.
(30:13):
Somebody deserves it more.
I'm going to be looking forsomebody to replace myself.
The team does not want tocontinue.
The team wants to do somethingwith me which is very funny and
super humbled by.
So of course, they don't wantto continue this if I am not
involved, and so that's why I'mclosing the chapter on my career
(30:37):
.
Also, marsbase, and if you'relistening to this podcast, it's
because you listen to theMarsBase podcast and we haven't
talked much about MarsBase inthis episode.
But I think that a lot ofpeople don't know StartupBrand
is an integral part of what wedo, right, part of why MarsBase
is the way it is.
It is explained by StartupBrand.
Right, because of the values,because my trip to Silicon
(30:59):
Valley maybe my trips to SiliconValley every year, every year
more or less I got a client fromthere.
We have gotten some clientsfrom StartupBrand.
I've given visibility toMarsBase through StartupBrand
and the other way around.
So they have cross-pollinatedvery well over the years, but
they have been very separate.
As a matter of fact, in theevents you could barely see the
(31:23):
existence of MarsBase, becauseI've always had this imposter
syndrome.
I don't like it when somebodyorganizes an event and they're
like by the way, come to myevent, my event is this and
because it's my company andthey're trying to sell you
something Like we couldn't sellsomething because entrepreneurs
are fucking poor and theycouldn't afford Mars Base rates.
(31:44):
Jokes aside, it's like I didn'twant to do that.
Couldn't afford Mars-basedrates Jokes aside, it's like I
didn't want to do that.
I wanted to prove you can be100% honest and transparent and
upfront at organizing an eventwithout having to soft sell
something or engage in shadytactics or something like that.
Right, I wanted to keep it 100%separate.
That's possible.
I've done it for 10 years, but Ithink it is time for me to move
(32:07):
on.
And now what?
Right?
So how does this continue?
Well, the last 10, 12 months,mars Days has required me more.
The company is now past 20employees.
We live in a cycle, in a momentin which I have to spend most of
(32:27):
my weekly dedication doingsales and marketing and growing
the company, and I cannot devotethat time to something that is
not my project.
In other words, I found thatsometimes I was dedicating some
time and effort and mentalbandwidth to StartBrain over
(32:50):
MarsBased and MarsBased is mycompany, startbrain is not Right
and so I didn't find thatacceptable.
Also, for a couple of years,for some years we haven't seen
eye to eye with StartBrain fordifferent reasons, and so that
didn't help either, but it's notthe main case of me leaving.
But so for me I felt like, look, I'm not doing the right thing.
(33:13):
I have to invest everything Ihave in Marseilles because
there's a recession.
We have been growing in thelast years, but I feared that we
would stall or we would shrinkdown if I continued spreading
too thin and too many thingsRight, and my heart wasn't in a
(33:37):
start point.
For the last year, year and ahalf, maybe two years,
post-pandemic, it's never beenthe same, and so I said, look,
let's move on.
It doesn't make sense anymore.
That doesn't mean we will stopdoing events.
That means we will do it on ourterms, because that's something
that I was always atloggerheads with the
(33:58):
organization of Startup Crank.
We'll do it on our terms.
We'll do it more technicalevents.
We will do events that are notso much focused on VC and
investment, high growth andstuff like that.
I want to build events more forthe community.
I found that it's closer to myvalues and my heart, which is
(34:22):
more bootstrap companies,healthy companies, no bullshit
companies, and therefore that'swhy I want to focus on that.
I'll let somebody else enjoythe ride the ups and downs of
entrepreneurship with VC andhigh growth and move fast, break
things, go big or go home andthese other nonsensical bullshit
just not going to be me.
(34:42):
I'm not saying I didn't like itfor this year I liked it, I
enjoy it.
I learned a ton, but I alsolearned it's not going to be me.
I'm not saying I didn't like itfor this year.
I liked it, I enjoyed it, Ilearned a ton.
But I also learned it's not forme, right.
And so for me.
I wasn't interested in learninghow this 21 year old raised 40
millions of venture capital andthen, three years after, the
company had to be shut downright, or they had to sell
everything at a discount becausethe company was not viable.
Of course, it was not fuckingviable.
(35:04):
And also I found a lot ofhypocrisy in people demanding
less taxes but at the same time,government isn't helping me
much because they're not givingme the freaking ANISA or other
funding coming from governmentand whatnot, or I want to hire
cheaper from unis and stuff likethat.
(35:25):
I don't know, man, that's nothow taxes work.
Maybe I'm being too opinionated, but that's why you're here in
the Mars Days podcast.
I can be more opinionated herethan I was in startup, right.
So I want to contribute.
I always said, like, if you'renot part of the solution, you're
part of the problem, and I wasbeing part of the problem.
That's why I want to stoppromoting that kind of things.
(35:45):
I will occasionally talk aboutVC and some companies I respect
and admire, because some of themare very good, like in the case
of Factorio in Barcelona, verygood friends of mine.
I like them and if they can VCmoney and they're doing a great
job and who knows how it's goingto pan out.
But to me they are more of anexample than other companies in
Barcelona, right.
And so you know, if you want tostay tuned to what we do,
(36:07):
basically what you can expect ismore content.
The podcast you know we had tostop it for six months and while
we stopped the Mars Dayspodcast, we didn't stop Startup
Friend events and that was oneof the things that you know.
It kind of like didn't feelright with me and that's why I
said like it's not acceptablethat I stopped a Mars space
(36:28):
initiative to continue withsomebody else's project, and so
that's why the podcast goesuninterrupted.
From now on, we will revive thenewsletter.
One year without a newsletteris not acceptable.
I have launched the personalwebsite.
I have relaunched my personalwebsite and I'm blogging there
every week and talking about thethings I can talk, maybe at a
company level, and sharing otherstuff, but I don't know.
(36:52):
I will continue to contributeto StartBrand, embodying the
values.
That's something that stayswith me forever, eternally
grateful.
I want to also to share myeternal gratitude for the
opportunity, share my eternalgratitude for the opportunity
(37:14):
People like Derek Francisco,carly, bruce G Finn, daniel Yele
Madeline, all of thesecountless people, but most of
them in the community team orheadquarters team that they
place their trust in me andthey've given me power.
They've given me the voice.
They've put up with my infiniteruns, sometimes sending 90
minute long videos, saying likethis is shit, this is not
working, and but look, if youdon't move, you don't hear your
(37:37):
chains, right.
So I think that somebody isgoing to be that the devil on
the shoulders saying like, hey,something's not working, this is
bad.
Here I think outside the boxand basically be vocal about
things that aren't working.
And so I think I havecontributed to StartBrain,
immensely grateful for thefriendship, the leadership and
(38:00):
the companionship that I'vereceived over the course of
these 10 years.
The awards and recognition someof them that you see over here
and most of them are hidden theyevery year we back two, three,
four of them at the Star PrimeConference and the friends we've
made all over the world andother chapter directors and the
people at the organization.
(38:21):
Having the opportunity to meetPatrick Collison, jason Freed,
dustin Muscovitz and otherfamous people.
I don't remember right now, butbackstage in the Startup Prime
conference or introducing themon stage or even interviewing
them myself, like Balaji.
I interviewed Balaji in 2017 or18, before he got so famous,
(38:42):
and I didn't have a clue aboutfucking blockchain, and I didn't
have a clue about fuckingblockchain, but yeah, these
opportunities are to just go onstage in front of 5,000 people
and speak.
That has been phenomenal.
The friendships I've made andthe things I've gotten out of
this are countless and that'swhy I'm so grateful.
I will continue singing praiseof StarCrane and I will continue
(39:03):
supporting from the distanceClose distance, long distance, I
don't know, but I need sometime to oxygenate.
I think MarsBase will benefitfrom this.
Everybody's better off partingways amicably and basically, my
responsibility right now is tofocus 100% on Mars space,
(39:25):
because there are 20 peopleeating from the contracts I land
and some other freelancersinvolved, and it's my direct
responsibility to put my eggs inthis one basket.
That is very and it's a verynice basket and but anyways, I
cannot, of course, disregardeverything that I've done, built
(39:45):
and helped to build or gottenfrom StartupBrain and you know,
forever eternally grateful and Iwill always recommend that
people go to StartupBrainconferences and events and, you
know, hoping that our pathscross again in the future
Without being said I'm off fortoday, so thanks for listening,
(40:07):
peace.
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