S03 E07
17 Mar 2023/00:59:24

On Silicon Valley Bank with Eric Vishria


Eric Vishria of Benchmark and Oxide CEO, Steve Tuck, join Bryan and Adam to talk about Silicon Valley Bank, its role in the startup ecosystem, and the short- and long-term effects of its collapse.


We've been hosting a live show weekly on Mondays at 5p for about an hour, and recording them all; here is the recording from March 17th, 2023.

In addition to Bryan Cantrill and Adam Leventhal, we were joined special guests Eric Vishria and Steve Tuck.

(Did we miss your name and/or get it wrong? Drop a PR!)

Curated chat log from the show:

  • davidf: Sharing this here because I loved every bit of it: My Startup Banking Story by Mitchell Hashimoto
  • ewen: 'The teller looks at the paper, then looks at me, then looks back at the paper, then asks ""Are you the HashiCorp guy?"" ' 😮 (Definitely agree that post looks relevant, and is worth reading; thanks for sharing. There's quite the impedance mismatch between ""traditional banking"" and ""startup"" approaches to things. Which I suspect in part explains how SVB was so widely used by startups.)"
  • antranigv: Question: Are there any reasons why the US is behind in these banking things? all countries in the EU and developing countries have solved these problems decade(s) ago.
  • statuscalamitous: my personal, barely informed take: we built this infra earlier, so we have more legacy
  • a172: It sounds like what SVB was providing that was so rare was a kind of business as a service.
  • statuscalamitous: my favorite "scare a developer" story: the way ACH payments work. that's right, SFTP!
  • antranigv: I think you mean FTPS? did they move to SFTP? 😄
  • drkamoz: I think the opposite is also true, without the infra, Africa’s been very early to adopt mobile banking https://www.bbc.com/worklife/article/20131217-east-africa-a-mobile-banking-hub
  • drkamoz: Can you explain sweep funds?
  • Eric Likness - carpetbomberz.com: 6 months of runway some place else. Not what Peter Thiel was telling people.
  • antranigv: What was his response?
  • arjenroodselaar: Eject! Eject!
  • ahl: this was a fun summary: https://svbhallofshame.wordpress.com/
  • ahl: https://www.fdic.gov/news/press-releases/2023/pr23016.html
  • antranigv: This Venture Debt is intriguing, specially for startups who have a good background but are having a hard time... kinda? I guess?
  • ahl: Acquired: Benchmark Part I
  • ahl: Acquired: Benchmark Part II: The Dinner
If we got something wrong or missed something, please file a PR! Our next show will likely be on Monday at 5p Pacific Time on our Discord server; stay tuned to our Mastodon feeds for details, or subscribe to this calendar. We'd love to have you join us, as we always love to hear from new speakers!