– Hi Gary. – Hey Gary, it’s Dave. Cofounder of YNOME in Zurich. I’m here with the team. We’re interested about the
future of finance and FinTech. It’s been getting
a lot of VC money and interest from the media. You talk about investing in
money as an entrepreneur. Would really hear your view on what is the future of
banking and finance. Thanks a lot. – That’s a great
question, David. Thank you and team. I think FinTech has been hot for
a very long time and continues to be and through Web 1.0 and
Web 2.0 and social web and today FinTech is always
an opportunity. There’s so much
SaaS opportunity. There’s so much inefficiency in
the banking and financial worlds based on people at scale
and I think technology, look, I think of FinTech the same
way think of everything else. Uber, Airbnb, Amazon they are the absolute previews,
not anomalies. They happen to get to the book
industry, the black car service and hoteling, so
what do I think? I think Venmo or Mint or all
these things have been chipping away and creating billion-dollar
exit opportunities within FinTech and because finance
and money transferring and our personal
relationships with money, FinTech is incredible place. It’s been a place that
I’ve never been very passionate about. I never really gone after that.
I tend to like consumer behaviors that are more kind
of just not around money, I guess really. Escapism, entertainment,
communication, not around finances but I think it’s an
extremely fertile ground in one of the core pillars of who we
are as human beings and I think that like everything in the
world technology will eat it up. Change it, spit it out, create
billionaires, crush fortunes, create new ones and I think the financial sector
is no exception. Especially when you take it to
the most macro levels which is a crypto currency. They’re just like, that’s
arbitraging the money itself. Enormous opportunity in FinTech. Just ironically the reason you
don’t hear much for me is I’m not deeply educated in it
because I haven’t spent time paying attention to it just
not one of the areas that I’m passionate about but the thesis
of opportunity is enormous.

Kevin Widdop at
Kwiddopia on Twitter here. At the Masai Mara,
Kenya’s world famous Safari destination. Here a lion. My question this week is, in a market such as this, even here,
everybody has a smartphone. Huge smartphone penetration, twins with very
early stage social media development and promotion. What type of content
driven online business would you advise to set up? Thanks very much. – I don’t know the market
in Africa and Asia, as well as I do the
rest of the world but, I’m very aware of
the phone penetration, payment through phones, lack of… Did you see that? That was amazing… Something just dripped. – [DRock and Staphon]
Oh, the pipe. From my pipe… (laughter) That’s amazing. That was so cool. Did you see that? Did you know about that? Are they gonna fix it? Eventually. (laughter) I would say that, I would reverse
engineer the audience. So, what I would do, is would spend months
in the Africa market, figure out what
people wanna buy, and I would start
an online business that worked in
the U.S. or Europe, that’s around psychology. Not just because it
was the U.S. or Europe. Certain things are
tried and true human. Certain things are contextual to the neighborhood, the country, the cadence, the pulse, the slang of a marketplace. I would use my best of ability of understanding what’s human, what’s innately human. E-commerce, you know,
buying stuff, water needs, whatever it may be. Whatever the
market’s interested in, and try to build around that. To me, it’s understanding the users, with those phones, what they’re doing. I would look at what
they’re doing now. Whether it’s gaming
or music downloading, or things of that nature. And then try to project, what needs do they have that they’re doing in a traditional way, that the phone could solve. And I would look at the
progressive phone markets in Asia and the U.S., to see where they’re two
or three years ahead. I think a lot of
people have looked at the U.S. market
and have tried to replicate that
in their market. And some have
been very successful and some have not. And I think some things are inherently U.S. centric, and I think some
things are human-centric, and that’s what
you need to decode. And I think I’ve
done well with that, in social networks. Something are just
human based like, if you get big
enough group of people, they’ll drag other people into it. Snapchat, that’s why those are easy
for me to predict. Great, very serious show.

Got a quick question for you
regarding real estate, what part of the home buying process do
you believe is broken and how could technology
best solve it? – To me very quickly and
this is going off topic I think paperwork.
I am fascinated by time. There’s a lot of startups that
I’ve invested in, I invest in a lot of early-stage startups,
two of them that I’ve recently invested in one helps
people submit for adoption in 17 minutes–
– I love that. – instead of 7 years.
– Yeah. – Another one is for wills and
helps you produce a will in an hour that is very legit
versus all the time and money. I think the paperwork process–
– The mortgage process. – The creative, the vision, you
showing somebody that’s human, that’s not technology. But stuff like I bought a place
out east, signing for an hour that’s not interesting to me. There has to a better way.
That technology can solve. Getting an expert’s opinion,
where is the market going, why is this a new neighborhood
that’s the creative, that’s the magic,
that doesn’t get replaced. The commodity does. We don’t write letters
put them in an envelope, buy a stamp, lick it, put it. Technology fixes the
inefficiencies and I think the inefficiency that is
commoditized is the paperwork process of mortgages. You agree?
– I love that. I do the (inaudible) packages
and there is 600 pages. To your point, they
take months to complete. There is a way to like (beep). When I started,–
– Yes. – this was 13 years ago
and that’s how old I am the the listings– – 35?
– 39. The listings were
coming in via fax. No, this is true.
– I get it. I used to have a fax service
before my email service for Wine Library just the
fax people offers. – I used to watch the freakin’
fax every morning I came to the office and it got like
jammed with papers because the listings were coming in and
I was sitting circling my first year these listings in the
New York Times to take buyers. I would the first person
I think to have a Blackberry or blueberry, whatever we
called it, with a wheel. Do you remember them?
– Yes. – That came from London,
the Wall Street or the hedge fund guys there.
– New York was ahead of them. – And people thought I was crazy
’cause I can answer real-time. It’s funny in 13 years
how much it’s changed. In the real estate what happened
is everybody was saying the real estate agent is
going to be eliminated. There’s no need for it because
now you have these systems and Zillow but what happened is big
real estate agents are getting bigger than ever– – Because that skill matters.
– Yes. – That skill matters. What has happened is and is
actually a very good point, a lot of you your tech
and entrepreneur driven. Everybody always said
this is going to be dead. Nothing dies. What happens to being the B and
C and D players lose and the A players take up more because
what technology does is it takes out commodity and commodity is
usually the only value prop that the C and D player
brings to the table. – Yeah.
– That was interesting. – That’s good, I like this.
– We’re getting somewhere.

“tech is bringing to the
restaurant industry?” – Connectivity to the, the
biggest change with tech to the restaurant is connectivity
with the consumer. So the editor used to the
guard maybe with a couple of newspapers, a
couple of magazines. Listen, that consumer out there
that’s connected to that is now the most important person. – This happened in
the wine business. It was Wine Spectator, it
was Robert Parker, period. New York Times for you and
maybe a couple of other things. – Gary V wasn’t up there?
– Not yet. I started a process
and then it was technology. I rode the wave, it wasn’t me. It was me understanding
what YouTube and Twitter was going to be. Instagram, do you
know Andre Mack? – Yeah.
– Andre’s my boy. I remember those
conversations early on. – He’s right here in Harlem.
– That’s right. I was like Andre this was
happening he’s doing a nice job. I’m watching him on
the ‘Gram right now. I just knew that
that was coming. And I don’t know what’s going
on in the restaurant world. I feel it’s probably similar
to what’s going on in the wine world. A big Wine Spectator and a big
Wine Advocate score are still really matters. I’m sure the same way a New
York Times review matters. But now, there
are taste makers– – But the world is not
either/or it’s both. Right?
– That’s right. Where there used
to be one option. Absolutely. – [India] I mean all my friends
and I look at Foursquare and look at Pinterest of food
when we get restaurants. – Yeah.
– Yeah. Sure. – Tristin is a
good friend of mine. One of the guys from Foursquare. – [India] There you go. – Tristan Walker?
– Yep. – He’s the best.
– He is. – I love that dude.
– He’s a good guy. And talk about
breaking the mold. – I was an investor in Gowalla
which was a competitor to Foursquare and I remember being
on call with a bunch of the investors and people on the
team, I’m like, “This guy, “Tristan Walker’s a problem.” – He would respect that
as the highest compliment. – It’s meant as a
highest compliment. I’ve been an enormous fan
of his for a long time. – And you know his get up, you
should have him on the show. His get up is amazing.
– Bevel? – From Queens.
– He’s the best. – Ivy League schools. The hustle.
– Best. Best. – [India] From Daniel.
– Daniel.

revitalize the company?
From Robert. – I think what I would do is
truthfully a lot of M&A, mergers and acquisition. I would go and look at the
Anchors and the Musically’s and the after schools and the
things that are emerging in the marketplace and realize what I
have is a business model that is cold or not working as well
and not rolling so that’s what I have an issue in and when I have
an advantage in is that I have dollars and assets and money
from Alibaba and other places that I can deploy and so I think
when your core business is not driving upward mobility
in growth in your company. The thing you do is you
leverage that asset to try and build up your future. And so my answer would be M&A. I think to Marissa’s credit, the
current CEO, and I have a lot of respect for her and I think
it was a tough gig that she jumped into. She went out and did that and
bought Tumblr for a big nut. And to me in hindsight if she
would have been able to buy Instagram instead of Facebook
buying it though I’m sure Kevin wouldn’t have sold to Yahoo
that he would have to Facebook. There was definitely other, I do
believe that when Marissa became the CEO there was probably a
moment where she could have bought Snapchat for 1 billion
or two but then the question becomes when you buy these hot
things on the way up do they stop becoming those hot things
once they go and get cashed out and there’s not the same energy. The other thing I would have
thought about is hardware. I’m very obsessed right now
with the notion of hardware. I think Facebook should
absolutely, don’t worry about the cost I think that Facebook
should absolutely make a television for example. I think Yahoo could
have made a television, could have made
a Netflix competitor. I didn’t like your
reaction there Andy. Worry about the cost.
(laughter) And so the biggest thing
I would say to all of you to make this a little more
relevant to so many that watch why don’t you focus
on the following. If you’re in a business that
has a situation where it’s not growing as well, you need to
kind of disrupt yourself and try to make new revenue angles and try to do different things.
If you stay the course and try to do incremental things
that grow your business that becomes a vulnerability. So if you’re in a 3 to 4 your
year funk where your business is flat, you have to really change
the business not just do what you’re doing a
little bit better. For example, Wine Library one
thing I’ve always debated that if we capped out our growth on
the wine stuff is to really build out Gourmet Library and become
like a supermarket and sell cheese and gourmet meats
and things of that nature. That’s a big change than
just doing wine selling a little bit better. Doing a little bit better on
email service to adding a couple more selections or changing
the pricing strategy on the core business so if I was Yahoo CEO a
year ago and just trying to grow the business, not taking any of
the Wall Street dynamics into play which Marissa had to,
I would’ve done very drastic things in hardware would
have been on the forefront. I think phones are too hard. I think televisions are easier
and so I would have done is made a Yahoo television
that was unbelievable. Would have bought a TV producing
company that makes TVs and put Yahoo at the forefront of
the brand and then build an over-the-top Netflix like
business and produce original content that would have driven
into there because Amazon and Netflix are now making
some of the best television in the world. That means anybody can. Facebook, Snapchat, anybody
can and that’s what I’d done. I probably would’ve reached out
to this guy named GaryVee and give him a late night show. That would’ve worked. Andy?
– [Andy] Yo.

– So, what’s the next big thing? My argument is this is the next big thing. That, if you are waiting
for something beyond a billion people connected
online with mobile being the driving force, with a fight for attention, and with constant froth around the edges. If you’re waiting for something else, you’re gonna miss out on a
big chunk of opportunity. This is our revolution. There was the industrial revolution. There was the mass media revolution. There’s this. And it will keep changing it’s flavor. The names of the public
companies that run things are gonna have to change. But please don’t wait for the next thing. This has been the next thing since 1991. And the people who ask me at
the newspaper conference in ’93 when I told them what was coming said, “Oh, well. We’ll just wait for that.” No, this is it. This is what we got. – I totally agree with that. And the one thing that’s on the horizon that I think a lot of people
are paying attention to is VR. And I say to a lot of people, “Look. That’s a ten years away.” In 1998 I thought by the year 2000 everybody would come into my wine shop and know the price of everything. And, so, I think the thing I’ve learned, my version of that same exact answer is there’s a long way away. If VR is truly contact
lenses, sitting at our home, If VR is truly contact
lenses, sitting at our home, being in places, we’re talking
about 15 to 25 years away from the scale. We’re just hitting the maturity. Let’s not forget. 15%-17% of
all eCommerce done in America is done online. It’s nothing. If you told me in 1998 that
only 15% of all things bought would be online by the year 2016, I would have sat there and said, “Shit. Do I even want to do this? That’s forever from now.” This stuff doesn’t go as fast
as we all think it’s going to. – 30 years ago today,
1986, sitting in my office at 215 1st Street in
Cambridge, Massachusetts. – As like, literally, literally today? – I’m making that part
up, but it’s 30 years ago, sitting in my office in
Cambridge, Massachusetts. Do you know who walks in? I’m 26 years old. Guy named Guy Kawasaki. – Telling you Apple’s the greatest? – Well, I was already a beta tester. We did a deal with him, right? The point is, if Guy had
waited for the next big thing, he wouldn’t have become Guy Kawasaki. If I’d waited for the next big thing, I wouldn’t have become me, and you wouldn’t have become you. This idea that there’s always
the froth around the edges, there are people who
are working in VR today who are gonna go off and
do something interesting, but it’s not gonna be because
they’re right about VR. It’s gonna be because
they’re right about being a trusted person worthy of our attention. That’s the arc of the people you trust and the brands you trust. Not that they got the
product right the first day or the iteration right the first day. It’s that they made a
commitment to show up in a certain way, in a certain universe in front of certain people. – What’s crazy about that is when I think about the thought leaders in marketing, and names
that people throw out there, and authors in this space. 30 years ago he walks into your office. It’s unbelievable that
when you have the chops: A. How long you can keep the
attention of the end consumer. B. How long this all plays out. Like, I just got fired up. The level of domination
that I’m gonna have in 2037 just dawned on me. And I’m really excited about 2037. – You should be except football will be against the law by then. – Don’t even start with me. Let’s go.

computer I’m not sure her yes I mean you
know I can’t just give those kind of answers on the show because there are so
few answers ever in history who knows about what to do now scared you book to
the desktop I mean I think you know the team either the TV the radio what’s the
desktop like the biggest magazines and print articles in The Wall Street
Journal your time Sports Illustrated and time magazine in 1992 with a media thing
but the phone is just a proxy to the internet it’s the delivery mechanism so
really you know what you know what actually I got a much better on see this
is why I took it the desktop computer or the laptop was the black and white
television the mobile devices the color television possible delivering the
internet at the internet that is what i’m talking about the phone just happens
to be telling you we don’t do that question so what is the
next like that no no that’s what i think is a commercial real estate like well at
home is just like we will try to get the

“of tech companies using
billboards to advertise? “Slack, Snapchat, Yahoo!,” et cetera. – Um. God, I’m a bad mood. (laughter) Evan, you’re seeing that
because, first of all, you should never put 100, and by the way, I speak
in absolutes on this show, so please let me use this moment, especially for the people
that catch this episode, or watch every show, contextualize this. I love to talk definitively,
’cause I don’t think people take action, and I think
it takes definitive stances to kind of move the needle. But there’s no situation
where 100% of actions is the right thing. There’s always a proper
hedge to everything. I really, really do believe
that, in your execution, and so in marketing,
when you’re in a Yahoo!, or a Slack, or a Snapchat, and
you’ve gotten to that scale, and you have that much
money, in marketing budget, there’s only so much you can allocate to 100% Facebook, 100%
Instagram, 100% digital. And when there’s these
big consumer brands, there’s a demo from, call it
the 45 to 75-year-old demo that people, like Snapchat
wants 45-year-olds to use Snapchat. Like that’s just straight up. And definitely Yahoo!,
it’s a mature brand, and Slack, is a SAS enterprise software that, you know, 52, 49, 63. I mean James Orsini, who’s in his 50s, is an executive at VaynerMedia, he’s helping make a decision
if we’re gonna use Slack, along with AJ and things of that nature. And they want that demo to be educated, and their belief is that
billboards is a place to play that. Look, I’m not high on billboards,
I think they’re overpriced because I think people are
looking at their mobile devices, but they’re not worth zero. And if you know that you’re going in and you’re gonna spend $7000
on this billboard a month, and you think it’s only worth 2300, but, that 2300, value is worth it to you, paying 7000, follow me here. Then that’s the right thing. Like, you know, that’s it. I mean, you know if it’s worth
spending $1000 on a dinner with the prettiest girl you
ever went on a date for, for the ROI of a kiss, if
you decided that the kiss was worth 1000, well then it’s worth it. And that’s what I think
on billboards, which is, you know, if they decide it’s worth 7000 even though they know
that they’re overpaying, well then that’s what you do. And so I think you’re gonna
see more television commercials for that reason from internet companies. You’re seeing it with Airbnb and Uber. When you saturate one medium, you have to go to another place
where you get more upside. Once you crush digital
like those companies have, overpaying for traditional
has more value to you. So it’s the timing in
which those companies deploy the media. They didn’t start at that place. They first got a better ROI. You’re getting all these
people digitally for, call it eight bucks a
head, 18 bucks a head. Well, now it’s startin’
to cost us $38 a head ’cause we’ve gotten everybody
and we can’t get no mores. So we’ll go over here and we’ll pay 52, because at least we can get new people, and it’s now worth 52 for us. That’s why. That was really good, considering,

“What are your thoughts on the future “of mobile credit services?” – Yeah, I think that um, (laughs) this is, I mean, there’s a
vine out there by the way of me like on the toilet, I
don’t know if people know this. But this is starting to
feel like a really bad idea. I think that, I think the
wallet will be eliminated and that we will all pay
with our mobile devices, maybe with our fingerprints,
but the wallet is antiquated, it’s like a magazine, it’s
like carving in the caves. And I think over the next 10 years technology will be really in a place where we can go full throttle
on electronic payments. Obviously there’s the Blockchain and all that world with bitcoin. There’s also the fact
of my historic behavior. Four years ago, maybe five, I invested in Venmo, maybe six. So I’ve been on this kick for a while, I’m big believer, and
I think with Apple Pay you’re seeing more behavior around this and I’m extremely bullish,
so if you’re playing in a space that is like, you
make portraits for wallets or you make wallets, that’s something to be concerned about
over the next decade, and even on the flip
side, if you can support an ecosystem where people
don’t carry wallets, so like, what’s the chatchka
that needs to be made, in a world where your phone
is really your payment thing, so like, what’s the official Beats by Dre license carrier with the
phone 36 months from now that like is the hot shit that
everybody’s got on the ‘Gram or whatever anybody’s paying
attention to in 36 months, that’s where I’d be using this wave as an entrepreneurial venture opportunity. – Oh yeah, we gotta respect
Mike in this scenario.

“Gary, what does the future look
like for the auto industry? “Will local car dealers be cut
out of the business model?” – It’s a great question. Look, I think direct-to-consumer over a 50 year period is very real, and so, anybody who’s, including
what I do for a living, like, selling wine and liquor, like, I do believe that the
internet is the middle man, period, and I think a lot of industries just haven’t been affected by it yet. So, the hotel industry’s
been affected by it, airBnB, the car, you know, the black car industry’s
been affected by it, the bookstore industry’s
been affected by it. Systematically, over next half century, most of the things that sell to customers will be affected by it, and
I think auto is in play. I mean, look, Tesla’s selling direct, so, I think that, yes, I do think, now, I think way too many
people think about things, and they think they’re
gonna happen tomorrow. I’ve learned that,
that’s what I’ve learned. Now that I’m 40 and wise, where I was 20, I would’ve, if my 20-year-old
self was sitting here, since Brian looks 20, according to Brian, I’ll say Brian, I’ll say
Gary, 20-year-old Gary, not everything’s gonna
happen as fast as you think. And that’s the thing I’ve
learned, that it takes time, but do I think over a 50-year period? Absolutely. If you’re asking as a 48-year-old who owns a car dealership,
I don’t think you need to sell it tomorrow, but if you’re asking as a 12-year-old who wants to take over
grandpappy’s dealership, you may wanna consider going
in a different direction then you’re trying to
triple-down on the model. Bri? – I love car dealerships. Said no one ever. – That hurts. – Look, I just actually
came off some research with Google about this, and we sent in the moments of truth about the highly digital
customer shops for cars, and I think there’s an
opportunity for dealerships to be relevant to today’s society, it’s not based on yesterday’s model. – Sorry, just showing
my new kicks, go ahead. – But, if you study it is, look
up autoshopping micromoments and you will start to see exactly where you add relevance and
value to the value chain, but if you do not, Tesla-like
models are gonna take over, and it’s just inevitable, people
need to get what they want when they want it, and how they want it. – And things have been flow, like, we used to have the downtown market, like, the Main Street, American,
then we went to the suburbs, and we had, you know,
supermarkets and Costco’s, and now, more than ever, people are moving back into the cities, the
Detroits of the world, and now you have Main
Street merging again, so ebbs and flows, ebbs and flows, and so technology overlaying
that is gonna cause a lot of disruption
over the next 50 years, and I do think the direct consumer model is very real. It’s just economically
sound for the people that the take the biggest risk, who are the people that
actually make this crap. – I think that just
reminded me of Clueless,