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So one thing that really helped us in the beginning at PhotoRoom was focusing.
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>> [music] >> And by that I'd explain that initially we started doing video and photo and we focused 10x on photo and we grew 10x.
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And then we focused on e-commerce photo and we grew 10x again.
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So don't don't confound don't don't misinterpret like depth with ambition.
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So being deep is actually a great way to achieve ambition.
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>> So maybe we can start with just each of you telling us who you are, what is PhotoRoom, what's the scale of PhotoRoom is, and then I'll ask you a bunch of questions on ambition. >> Yeah. Hi everyone.
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So in 30 seconds PhotoRoom gives e-commerce businesses AI visual to grow and sell.
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So this is like a one sentence description that you can add at YC of what we do.
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And to tell you the scale of PhotoRoom, I think the one I'm really proudest of is Gary Tan saying at the YC retreat that PhotoRoom is the biggest YC company with an HQ in Europe.
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That was a good one last year.
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In numbers, 300 million 300 million downloads, 20 million active users and the biggest e-commerce in the world.
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So Amazon, Uber, DoorDash, Decathlon all using PhotoRoom to edit their visuals to sell more on the internet. >> Congrats.
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>> [applause] >> Okay, so you're two French founders that built a company with the scale that you just described.
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Did you always think it could be that big?
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>> I think you're always a bit surprised by how how big it can become.
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I think that we when we came out out of YC we came out with much more ambition and and we we had in our mind that it could become what it's become today and probably can become 10x bigger, but it was still like some a big hypothesis.
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We we knew the path but was still surprised when when it happened.
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>> So, you mentioned that YC made you so much more ambitious.
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So, maybe can you tell us transparently with examples how ambitious were you before YC and after YC?
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>> Uh well, one thing I remember deeply is I was in a startup before and uh we wanted to do I think we wanted to do more like how do we do a 100 1 billion dollar company uh and we came to YC, but that was >> not concrete.
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Like there were no path, no playbook.
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It's like kind of a dream and not very concrete.
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Uh and so, YC came up with playbook and you actually make it a lot more concrete because the people you're talking to like and uh exchanging with they're they're at the scale you're you're looking at.
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So, that uh like just having this random conversation with someone who's like built a 10 billion dollar company is like, "Okay, so that's that's the scale we're talking."
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Like it's it's it looks closer.
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So, I would say before is like a dream that you're looking from afar and you're touching kind of just like ambition when you get there.
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>> I think it happened to other founders we we talked to before and after YC.
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It's like you you go to YC and you tell your friends, "Yeah, okay, 1 billion company. Haha.
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It's like it's not not like it's going to happen."
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And you come out of out of YC like it's not going to be 1 billion, it's going to be at least 10 billion.
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Like it it it yeah, it changes the scale at which you can dream and realistically dream, yeah.
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>> I remember so, I did YC in summer 14 and one of the questions that I knew they would ask was how big could it get?
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And we were waiting and we were preparing with my co-founder and I was listening to all these American teams and when being asked how big could it get, it was so natural for them to say, "Obviously a billion dollar company."
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And I had to train so many times to be able to say naturally, "Obviously a 1 billion dollar company." It was so hard.
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Um but I think I mean I'll I'll share for me an anecdote of how YC transformed our um, ambition.
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So, when I got into YC, we were accepted in the first dinner, we walked in and a partner uh, Kevin Hale, I don't know if you had him as a partner.
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Um, just asked me, oh, so what are you doing?
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And I said, I'm the CEO of Front.
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And he said, oh, Front, like that's one of the coolest company in the batch.
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And I was convinced he was talking about another company.
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Like, I was so unsure about everything we were doing.
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And then fast forward 3 months later, end of batch talk, I remember Sam Altman saying, you know, out of the 100 and I don't know, 10 companies in the batch, only five of them will still be alive in 5 years.
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In my head, I was like, I think I will be one of them.
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Um, but maybe you can share on this.
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So, I do agree that YC changes the ambition.
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Do you think it's like, how did it happen concretely?
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Is it There is there a moment that created the shift?
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Was it something slower that happened?
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>> I think it happens over time with multiple steps, but like when you talk about that, like one one clear moment was we did so Demo Day was the first batch to be remote.
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And I think you you kind of set always set expectation looking at the people around you.
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And I mean, for for us, like we're literally pitching from Paris because it was Demo Day, but we were like the most like, you know, and like doesn't matter, but the most like company because we did zero to 1 million in uh, like during the batch and like literally we're the fastest growing company of the batch.
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And you you kind of okay, so there is a 5% rate.
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Uh, you know, like X percent, I don't know, a few percent of the batch is going to be like a unicorn and right now we're like uh, on top of the of the batch.
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So, well, that something needs to happen, but the math seems to say like there's no reason we can't do it.
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>> Yeah, I I really believe it happens continuously.
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I I think it still happens today.
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So, not many people know that YC, on top of the program, the 3-month, you you still meet with the the YC partners and you still spend time getting their advice.
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And YC also runs events after that, so you can meet with other founders.
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So, just just here in the meeting room talking to other founders, you reset a bit your ambition because they they grow much faster than you and you're like, "Oh, how can I get there?"
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Um another example was uh YC organized a retreat in California.
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And so, you're having dinner and there's two founders uh talking about the satellites they are currently deploying in space.
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And they're two different startups launching satellites and comparing, "Oh, how many do you have in space?" "Oh, I have six." And "How about you?" "I have eight."
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And you're you're like, "Okay, well, those people, they're, you know, 20-30 people company, they're launching satellites in space.
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That that's the benchmark."
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So, even even today, just by meeting people like this, it it helps it helps you reset a little bit your your benchmark.
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And I think that's even more true for the newest companies.
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So, if you look at the demo day where companies are presenting at YC, their growth curve is just such so impressive.
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You're like, "Okay, well, how how do I get the same growth curve?"
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So, that's Yeah, that's that that's really like I think it's a continuous process. >> Yeah.
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And what you're not saying is the person building satellites, the founder, is 19 year old. Yeah.
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Um so, why do you think that European founders are scared of ambition or selling big ideas?
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>> We we talked about it a little bit with with some people that are that are in the room and and I think it's most likely cultural, like just one one thing that's how we grew up and the culture of European countries of when you talk about the big idea, someone will laugh at you or will try to find the the bad things that could happen.
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And I think if you do the same thing in the US, people would say, "Hey, that's an amazing idea."
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And by default, it's encouraging.
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And so, it pushes you much more towards the direction of, you know, just just trying.
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So, there's this like how people react to big ideas.
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There's probably also value the value of failure.
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Like, we really live in a country where, okay, you fail, that's not that great.
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Whereas, there are plenty of other countries where, well, you miss, you know, you learn a few things, and that's great, and we can give you a job offer because you you learn a lot of things, and so we're happy to extend that offer.
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I think there are a few criteria, like the those ones where really the culture of your country matters, and also so why it's important to surround yourself with people from different cultures.
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>> And I I want to dig deeper into how you actually make it happen.
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Like, how do you become more ambitious?
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Maybe just one last question on ambition in general.
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Like, why does it matter even to be ambitious in the first place? Or does it?
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>> I I think when it's very clear that like any problem is like how how is the same it's tough to if a problem is tough to solve, it's not necessarily harder to solve it.
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So it's really ambitious to like like find that.
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And then he found this problem that is actually hard because you also are going to attract more talented people.
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And one thing that like uh like one idea around which we founded Photo Mechanic Failure was the idea that like you really want to work with smart ambitious people, and that's you that pulls you higher.
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And you won't like if you don't have a hard tough ambitious problem, it's going to be very difficult uh to hire smart smarter than you uh people.
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So it is very important to to work with smart people to actually aim for something big.
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And that that's the key part of the success.
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>> Well, actually I have a bit of a contrarian opinion that it's it's it's it's not always important to be ambitious. Let me explain.
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So when when my friends are telling me, "Oh, I want to launch a company."
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I ask them the question, okay, let's say you have two options.
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Uh option A is your company is working decently well, you're struggling a little bit to get money, it's not growing as fast as you want, but you're working on a project that you're deeply passionate about.
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It's really the thing you you started it for.
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It's aligned with your belief.
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And number two, your company is growing super fast.
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And it's not exactly the thing you had in mind at the beginning, but it's growing.
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It's tough because you have growing pains.
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And I ask them, "Okay, what what what do you prefer?"
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So, I'm I'm really curious in the audience what's what's what is it for you.
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So, let's say you I'm guessing the answer already, but if you had to pick between option A, which is like, "Okay, company not growing that much, but it's really aligned and everything's going well."
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Versus option B, where it's you know, growing fast.
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So, who would prefer option A in this room? Okay.
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And who would prefer option B, where it's More people, interesting.
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But but I think it's important to answer that question first because in option A, where you're doing this as a passion project, you know, ambition if if it's you're living your passion, you're doing this for your passion, you maybe you don't need ambition.
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But the thing you have to realize that if you're signing for the the classic startup VC model, you're here for growth.
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Like your investors, everyone is going to ask growth for your employees, everyone is here.
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You're here for get your company as big as possible.
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And so, if you do not have the ambition to get it as big as possible, you're going to miss out on it's the necessary criteria of classic startup that that means growth.
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>> Yeah, and I don't know if all of you know this concept of one-way door versus two-way doors.
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Like two-way door is you make a decision and you can go back, and one-way door you can't go back.
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And there are not many decisions in the life of a company that are one-way door.
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When you make these decisions, you should be super careful about making them.
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And one of them is taking VC money and signing up for a venture-backed company.
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Because the moment you do this, you sign up for more growth every year, and that dictates so many things about how you're going to operate your company.
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Um so, let's assume that you actually want to aim a higher and want to be more ambitious.
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And to be honest, like if the audience is European, I would argue that no matter what, you should aim higher because my experience with Front end offices in the US and in Paris also in the last batch I was doing we had 2/3 that were from 1/3 that was from Europe.
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And one thing I've noticed is for equal skills American people obviously are so much more ambitious.
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The best example of this is literally us France making an offer to an engineer in Paris and us making an offer to another engineer in the US. They're equally good.
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The French engineer tells us true story.
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Like I'm not going to join the company I've met your team they're just too strong.
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I think I'm going to fail.
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And then the American engineer who is clearly um overconfident will say yeah, I'm going to join and also I want to be two levels above what you just offered as compensation.
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And so then I end up in a situation where the French engineer didn't join the company yet had the skill to do this and the American engineer joined the company two levels up and is now set up for failure and will eventually leave. Everyone loses.
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So the balance is probably what's best. So how do you get there?
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How do you take this like very skilled European founders and help them be more ambitious very tactically?
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>> So we we talked about surrounding yourself with ambitious people.
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So I mean if you hear a friend telling you yeah, probably not going to work then 1 million is too high block them. I don't know.
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But surrounding yourself is probably a good idea.
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I think there are a few tricks you can use.
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You can probably try to list all your options.
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Say okay, like I'm going to look for a new job.
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How much what level can I like decently aim for?
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So I don't know software engineer level two whatever.
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And then just do the thought exercise of okay, I have a magic wand no constraint at all.
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What's the level like just above that?
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And what's the level 10x above that?
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And what's the level like like full control I'm I'm like king of the universe.
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I can aim as as high as I as I go.
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So forcing yourself to just aim higher because as you've said like it's it's ingrained in our system that it's much much much it's very natural to aim lower or have doubts.
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So, yeah, I guess that's one trick.
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>> Yeah, on that I clearly remember, so we were like a small I mean we grew very fast to 1 million and then to 20 million of ARR and I literally remember like doing an offsite 10 people and saying like now we're going to aim at 20 million and we're like at a few millions of ARR and everyone in the room say like it's not possible and then 1 year later we're there.
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So, there is a power of like setting the bar high and I probably we I would have said like we'll be at 8 million we would have been at 8 million.
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So, really there's a just like auto realization of how much you think you can accomplish on one vertical and just it realize themselves you need to always constantly say can we can we beat at that point and then talking to YC partner was actually like said the right talking to other people ambitious people set the bar in the right way.
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>> It's really funny like the goals you set yourself they end up happening.
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Like if you look at the curve of the times at marathons like there's a spike at 2:30 and and 3 hours because people say I'm going to 2:30 in 3 3 hours cuz they fool themselves and so it's the same with with targets.
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You can just say okay, here's the goal and then you walk back from there and you know, worst case you end up lower than the goal but at least you would be would have been higher than not setting an ambitious goal.
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>> Yeah, Nico who is another partner at YC always says shoot for the stars worst case you land on the moon and that's good enough.
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Sam Altman gave a talk a month ago at YC and said just add a zero to whatever success metric you have in mind and then that will force you to do the thought exercise of how you get there and that exercise enough is extremely useful.
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So, you said one of the things that you should do is hire ambitious people and one of the tactical things you can do is to block people that ambitious but just very practically how do you find these people?
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How do you assess for ambition?
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>> Um, so there is for instance one thing of a like रूम is very global.
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We have like 180 countries and for us it's very clear that like a you if you don't like want to be global like you're not going to be ambitious enough.
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And so we speak like we speak deliberately English in the in the Paris office and I'll tell you you can look at my WhatsApp with Elliot.
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We only speak English and that was actually a tremendous filter of people who want to build a global company.
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Like if you enter Phot रूम and you say actually I don't really then you're two French people you you speak French with each other that doesn't make sense.
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And that's that's kind of a filter for us like you have to be ambitious like English is the global language and we won't like we won't dominate and be the leader of the world if we just speak French in the Paris office.
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>> And and I think the the what what you said just before which is what is your success metric and how how big do you want to aim is an interesting discussion to have with the people you're going to work with.
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I'm hearing discussions of people who started working together and they didn't realize there was a disconnect.
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They If I ask the two people the question I just asked you, someone would say hey no I'm I'm interested in the mission of the company, it's fine if it doesn't go big and the other is like it's the world of of nothing.
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And just this disconnect is enough to slow down the company and just like create a lot of frustration.
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So I think it's important to align with the whoever you're working with what you're here to do because maybe the person is just here for a stable job, not worrying too much and enjoying their weekend.
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And that's entirely It's just like some other people might be really excited at creating a product that really has a big impact.
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In US they like to say they make a dent in the universe.
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And so just you know this mindset is perfectly fine as well.
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You just need to understand that it will require some trade-off, some compromises and and going that direction is costly but reaps great benefits.
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>> Are there other exercises that you've done?
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I think we talked about ranking projects by impact.
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What are some practical things that you've implemented at Photo Room to keep that ambition? >> Definitely.
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So, once you get bigger, it's easy to forget the end goal.
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And so, just, you know, ranking all the projects and say, "Okay, if this works out perfectly, how much revenue it is going to bring us?"
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So, I think that's an interesting exercise to do.
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I think most of the time, as well, looking back at the things that you worked on is important.
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So, if your company is not growing as you expected, looking back and saying, "Okay, I worked on that project for 3 months, and turns out the result is not at all what I expected in terms of impact. What went wrong?
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What piece in the decision chain didn't go well so that next time I'm not going to make that that mistake?"
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So, just looking back at at at past mistakes to make sure that next time you're picking the project that is, you know, the most the most ambitious.
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>> One extra thing that works, especially in small teams, is all size of team, actually, is what's the asking what's the V0 of that.
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So, you always have like people starting working on something, and most of the time, like 50% of the project they'll fail.
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Like, they don't have the impact you expect them to have.
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And one of the the key to like actually trying more project, which is how you get impact, is reducing the time for each project.
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So, what what what can you get from that to understand and learn if this project is going to be successful?
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And always catching like what matters?
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Like, what's the V0 of that?
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So, you can learn if it's going to be successful or that.
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Otherwise, people might spend like 3 months on a project, and really with AI now, you can do it in like 3 days.
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So, cutting down to what's the V0 is very important to optimize for impact.
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>> And even Olivier Pomel was in this room before, so he owns a 50 billion company.
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He says, "One learning the one learning is also always learn how to go faster in even in the age of AI."
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So, really that thing of like going as fast as you can, it applies to small startups, but it applies also like to much larger companies. So that's really key. >> Yeah.
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I I I think that you can do So uh when you get into YC, you have group office hours every uh other week.
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So you have like maybe eight other companies that are with you.
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And one of the uh exercises that we ask everyone to do after a few weeks is explain to me how your business is going to uh lead to a hundred million of AR.
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Like just doing this exercise when you're super early forces you to think about how big your market can be and what's the most ambitious version of what you're building.
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And so I would encourage you to do this.
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There are so many times where just the thought exercise of doing something leads to a great outcome.
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Another example is um you know, you have a project uh that you want to pursue and you ask the team, "If you had half of the resources, what would you do to still achieve this goal?"
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And then that create creative thinking that leads to better outcome.
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Um Okay, we're almost at time.
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Uh I'll ask maybe one last question cuz we're at time.
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Um So is there one last piece of advice that you want to leave the room with each of you?
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Um They're you know, young people, ambitious, willing to make a dent in the world maybe.
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Uh what what can you tell them?
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>> Um So one thing that really helped us in the beginning at Fohr Room was focusing.
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And by that, I'll explain that initially we started doing video and photo and we focused 10x on photo and we grew 10x.
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And then we focused on e-commerce photo and we grew 10x again.
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So don't don't confound don't don't misinterpret like depth uh with ambition.
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Um so being deep is actually a great way to achieve ambition.
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>> Well, we we came to the conclusion just by by talking that you're going to have some doubts.
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Like the fact that you grew up in an environment that was not naturally pushing us to be ambitious, you're going to have to force yourself to be more ambitious.
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And hopefully, by using the tricks we talked about, it's going to happen.
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You're going to aim higher.
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But the thing to keep in mind is that you're going to have some doubts.
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So, if you take back the example of the the guy that applied at your company and said, "Hey, I'm not going to work because your team is too talented."
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It's very useful to erase those doubts.
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You will have them for sure, but just set them aside.
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Say, "Okay, I know they're here, but let's not talk about something.
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Let's talk about something else."
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And just this will allow you to just be more ambitious.
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Because otherwise, if you listen to them too much, you may end up in a situation of just yeah, forgetting.
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And that applies to everything.
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And one thing I would like to add is that it's it's anyone can really create a big company.
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I didn't say it, but Matt was sitting in your spot 12 12 years ago at Startup School.
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>> Yeah, I did Startup School at Stanford like 12 years ago. So, yeah.
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We are in the seats and be ambitious and you can do it. >> Yeah. >> Amazing. Thank you everyone. Thanks to both of you. It was great. >> [applause]