Niccolò Perra, Co-Founder & CTO Pleo

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The theme for our session is: “how to build an effective Minimum Viable Product (MVP) and finding product-market fit.” and our guest is Niccolo Perra is the co-founder and CTO of Pleo, an expense management system that processes expenses, pays invoices and issues smart company cards to employees. He co-founded Pleo in 2015 along with Jeppe Rindom, and the company has since raised over $400+ million in funding, expanded to multiple European countries and has 25,000 enterprise customers to date. Niccolo oversees the engineering team, driving tech innovation with a focus on the end-user experience. Prior to co-founding Pleo, Niccolo worked as a software engineer at Tradeshift and Corena. He holds a degree in Computer Science from the University of Cagliari and a Master of Science in Software Development and Technology at the University of Copenhagen (ITU).

the v the VC to actually get everyone on board. I think that you can raise Murray with a PowerPoint, but you need to make sure that on the other side you have someone that when you present what is your plan, what you want to do, they understand the technology, they understand why you're going to be different from from everyone else. So it is possible, it is hard, but I also feel, you know, again, that's for, for them in the end, the fortune of that, uh, VC because, you know, they were able to, to get us, you know, with a very low valuation early on.

Niccolò Perra (00:49:08) - And it was the fortune for us because for uh, two, three years we were running actually we're really the only one in the market. So I think for a VC especially nowadays, really money in the market is a commodity, especially when you have good ideas and good people. And actually that's, that's also being an important one that I need to say. But yeah, it's, you also want to find VC that have the expertise in order to understand what good and great ideas are. The other thing is also like look at the people. I am so thankful to have partner with someone as strong as yk. That was bringing a lot of expertise from the market. I've done, as done, done this before, not been a, as a co-founder, but but has been c e o before, very strong as the charisma. They bought so much into the charisma for myself.

Niccolò Perra (00:50:02) - I am a thinker. I built things from the ground up in the beginning. I've built things across continents. So I had, I could show the expertise into doing this. So even they couldn't see the numbers, they could see that the people and also the first people that we hired along the way that the people were right. And when you have the right people, you can actually do great things and you know, probably most likely a lot of other ideas will come along the way that's probably going to be better than what you actually presented to the vc. And they know it, but they are buying into the team, they're buying into the people. And

Inès Makula (00:50:39) - Especially you, you both as a team, you know, you were not college students who are 21 years old. You had, when you started, you had your experience and obviously having built and having worked for other companies or in other startups or like, it does help with the credibility of the money that they're going to give you. Maybe it's a little bit less risky to give it to you than than a guy who, or somebody who hasn't has, who hasn't had that experience. Uh, but just kind of an idea in, in their head and how, what, how big was the first check Before we move to the last question, how big was that first check for you?

Niccolò Perra (00:51:08) - I think 150. We didn't even see it because it went into the ising part, so that was quite a big chunk. One thing also that, you know, yeah, where you come from is very important, you know, right now we have how many, uh, I think now probably seven, seven companies that were built out of pleo, uh, employees. And for them it was the fact they were coming for Pleo. So yes, you were not in the driving seat, but you know, you were on the passenger seat and you're seen a lot. And uh, if you were part of Cleo, that means that you know, you know, you know your things, you're dedicated. And I think that's also, you know, for me, what makes me proud, you know, of Christian, it's frustrating to see, you know, such great talent, you know, living, uh, but also I think it's, uh, it's beautiful to see what, uh, what our company, what what we stand for actually is seen also by the markets. So also, you know, try if you have seen this, if you have an, an experience in another company so they can feel that some of the mistakes you've seen in the previous company you're not going to do or you know, some of the ways that made the company you've been working for successful, that you're going to replicate those. I think that's also, that also big plus.

Inès Makula (00:52:32) - Yeah, and you see it's, it's a great compliment for, for your company if, if employees then are launching, you know, new companies from the ex and, and they get the credibility from the market, from the experience they got at play. So should we, should we get like one last question before we close? Um, Mattia Monte is asking ideal customer profile. How, um, how that changed between seed and growth phases?

Niccolò Perra (00:52:54) - That's a good one. Um, in the beginning it's interesting, like we built for ourself and then over the years we tried to continue building for, uh, for, for ourself. So we started building for small startups and then more the market was maturing and more actually even, you know, non-tech companies were approaching a product like ours. Then also we started to, uh, to add functionality or, you know, even change in our branding, in our approach or you know, in the type of onboarding we would give to our customers. We try to, we try to change or you know, we started to grow as a company in Pleo so that actually our company, uh, our product was becoming quite painful to be used. Now we are 850 people and you know, our product is actually not as easy and we have actually, we're working on functionality to support bigger companies, bigger complex organization and also making sure that by doing that we can also target, uh, bigger customers. So yeah, we, uh, we grew with our products so we uh, and I think, you know, for many other companies that, uh, that's kind of the same. Um, I, one thing that's actually quite important when you build a product with yourself as a co-founders, but also with the employees, it is always great if your employees, if who is going to build that product, who's going to code, it's going to support it, it can actually understand the product well and actually they feel that it's something that can solve their problem as well.

Inès Makula (00:54:29) - Okay. Thank you so much Niccolò, that was the last question. Thank you for sharing your experience. I think it's, it's been super useful for everybody listening. Thanks to everybody for asking the questions for joining us live and then this masterclass will be published on, made it in a few weeks time so you can re-listen to it if you want to.

Niccolò Perra (00:54:49) - Thank you everyone.