Wen Sang discusses how surrounding himself with the right people led to success, emphasizing that having the right team makes all the difference in founding.
Wen Sang discusses how surrounding himself with the right people led to success, emphasizing that having the right team makes all the difference in founding a startup.
The center of the world is always human beings. But the path we picked was a rather hard path. It was good that we accomplished certain things, but I would say the same amount of time, same amount of energy spent on it, there could be even bigger results. How quickly, you know, can we enable technologies to get adopted and then make the world a better place? There are better pathways and just got to be open to it. Got to be mindful of it. Got to be aware that hey, human factors is always the most important. And pay attention to what people want, not just what you want. All righty. Hello everyone and welcome to the Deal Maker Show. So today we have a really exciting founder. You know, we're going to be learning a lot. You know, he's a tremendous founder. You know, he's he's he's done it before. Build it, scaled it, raised for it, exited. I mean, you name it, you know, we're going to be
talking about going from zero to 150 million ARR in 10 months, you know, let that let that sink in. And obviously, you know, things that h that have happened along the way, how he went about, you know, his previous company too. You know, he also went through the full cycle. So again, brace yourself for a very inspiring conversation. And without further ado, let's welcome our guest today, Wen Sang. Welcome to the show. >> Hello everyone. I'm Wen, co-founder and CEO at jpspark.ai. Super excited to be here and thank you so much Alejandra for the opportunity. >> Amazing. Wen, so born and raised in China. So give us a walk through memory lane. How was life growing up for you? >> Just like billions of other Chinese kids, I guess. So yeah, I mean I was born and raised in China. Um it's a place called Shanhi. If you drive down south from Beijing for six hours, you get to my
hometown, you open the door, 360, it's all mountains and people love noodles in my hometown. >> Yeah, >> that's amazing. So, so tell us how did you get into the whole, you know, engineering problem solving and numbers and things like that? >> For sure. So, since college, I've been trained as a automotive engineer because at that time, uh, you know, automotive was the industry to get into. And then by 2010 I got this opportunity to come to states to do my PhD at MIT MIT automotive lab. Uh I was burning gasoline like how other folks would burn diesel to make the engine a lot more efficient. Uh and did that for three years graduated from MIT and during that time uh I would say MIT has this really amazing environment. They really bring in the uh you know successful entrepreneurs. at the time I remember Drew House came back to give a talk and a lot of the others as well but
it was just so inspiring that I discovered another path uh to make impact um and that was when you know entrepreneurship just got into my mind and um eventually I started my first company after MIT uh it was an enterprise SAS company uh we sold software to municipalities commercial real estate owners and so on so forth um and it was started in Boston uh but by 2015 Uh we moved to uh Silhou Valley to go through uh Y Combinator. >> Well, well before before you even get there when when Before we even get there, I mean we we can't we we we can't walk over the fact of who was your first investor in smarking. Who who was your first investor? >> So, so fun story. I mean obviously I was a first time founder. Uh I had no track record. I was an engineer by training. I tried raising money in Boston. You know, Boston has a lot of, you know, big investors and many of them were like, okay,
give me your five-year financial projection. I was like, I'm just getting started here. I'm not sure if I give it. I I don't even know if I would believe in it. But that was kind of the the the vibes there. So, couldn't raise money in Boston. And now my wife at the time, my girlfriend, she was like, "Oh, you poor guy. You So, so she she wrote the first check. Uh um Tumi, my wife was my uh first angel investor. >> That's amazing. So So you were talking about location. So you were in Boston. So I guess you were having this trouble raising money and then you decide to really move out and and to go to Y Cominator. What what got you through that thought process? Because I mean moving it's a big deal too. Obviously you're coming from China now you're in Boston you know pursuing the American dream. You're all in your wife you know also investing now. Now now you're you're now wife. So,
thank God, you know, that thing, you know, you know, had a good outcome. I mean, otherwise, the wife would have not been happy because you you guys were acquired. So, that's good. But I guess you're in Boston. Things are not unfolding the way that you had hoped for on the financing. Walk us through why moving to the Bay Area. Why combinator? Walk us through that thought process. >> 100%. So, I guess on the one hand, I was young and I was ignorant enough to take all the risks, you know, in the world. uh because a lot of the immigrant founders here in the US would understand this that for you to start a company in the US or for you to even you know work in the US you have to have permit or you know certain type of visa or green card and that is a whole process right so most of people would go through the jobs and so on um but at the time I I was you know when I got started I was on a
student internship visa uh and and I was like you know what uh either we make it or we go big or go home that was kind of the mentality But then uh yeah it was almost impossible to raise money in Boston and we got really lucky that um that year white cominator sent one of the partners to scout projects or companies um in Cambridge. Uh so I was eating free ramen noodle at the MIT entrepreneurship center just trying to get bikes. Uh initially I I I landed my first job as a mechanical engineer uh you know near Boston. But then I decided you know this is I can see my next 10 years of lifetime. I'm not I'm done with this. So just quit the job. That year I made about $10,000. So that was some life. All my other schoolmates they were either in oil, gas or Wall Street. I just making big dollars. So, so that was kind of the the beginning of uh my my journey. But then u you know I I I I heard
about this uh uh white com partners visit and basically we got connected through some u you know MIT alum mutual connections. Uh some of the uh you know good folks went through white program and then made the introduction and we eventually met at this uh coffee shop uh in Cambridge and Harbor Square. I I think that was where it happened and um you know we just hit it off really well because uh at the time I remember building this sales proposal for Boston Logan Airport and basically revealed the whole kind of a whole new world for you know uh this amazing am you should apply for YC. I was like okay I guess I I mean I've heard about it for sure. So basically went through the application and um you know at the time Samman was the president still and and then went through the whole thing. It was exciting. They flew us over to uh Mountain View to do the interview. Uh it was it was intense.
It was a lot of prep. Uh but we were also very uh uh fortunate that uh we got a lot of help along the way. um you know from the uh you know YC alum and mighty alum and so on. So so eventually we got in and then uh my original plan was to move over to Mountain View for three months go through the pro program because that was the requirement at the time and then moved back to Boston because I really loved Boston. I mean Boston is amazing amazing place. Um but then you know three months later the weather in Man of was just so good that you're obviously in shorts and short sleeves during the winter. I was like ah it's going to be hard for me to move back. Five months of winter in Boston. So that's how we just you know stayed. And more importantly um the fundraising environment in Boston uh was very different from Sil Valley. I mean Sil Valley is Sil Valley for a reason. There's Sil Valley in
the whole world. So >> what do you think you learned? because I mean obviously there's a lot of immigrant founders. I mean I'm an immigrant too so I I can really relate to your story but I'm sure that there's a lot that are listening tuning in and and really wondering how did you go about being intentional too with building your networks because I'm sure that once you joined Y Cominator it sounds like the snowball started to gain effect and to move uh a little bit quicker when it came to having the right people in your corner. So, how did you go about really being intentional about building your network though? >> That's a a great great question, Alejandra. I don't know. I mean, I don't know that honestly I had the uh consciousness to kind of build network uh early on when I was you know grad student. uh I think you know for all the folks trained as an engineer the mindset is
just to…