Wissam Tabbara is a serial entrepreneur who has created multiple software startups in Seattle since 2009 when he left Microsoft where he was a software development manager. He led multiple startup technology teams and now is an experienced CEO and business builder. In 2021 he founded Truebase, a B2B prospecting platform for revenue teams using the power of generative AI to accelerate the prospecting journey.
Wissam steps back to assess his startup adventures more objectively and shares his biggest learnings around leveraging the latest technologies, funding and acquisitions, and staying ahead of giant tech companies in the same space. He shares his biggest learning as a technical founder: how the revenue and growth side of the business is where “all the action is at” when creating a valuable software company.
Best quote from Wissam:
“I witnessed so many amazing products created by companies that failed because they were never able to efficiently take it to market. That’s actually the untold reality of startups. Taking your product to efficiently to market is where everything is at.
“For you to efficiently take it to market, you have to have the right culture with the ability to fail and retry and be more analytically driven than emotional. It’s a more scientific approach to really be able to vet ideas and quickly pivot.
“It’s good enough to build a B+ technology. You don’t need A+ technology. Every day I show up to work and I say, What is it that I need to do to unlock the business? Not to unlock the product. Product is part of the business.”
In this episode, Wissam explains:
- How immigrated from Lebanon and worked at Microsoft in Seattle as a software engineer and manager
- The benefits and challenges of his entrepreneur career path versus being a successful corporate executive
- What happened with his multiple startups that worked and didn’t work, including funding, being acquired, and key growth challenges
- Being a technical founder and leveraging new technologies including cloud storage, mobile data, blockchain, modern SaaS APIs, and now generative AI
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