Best Joakim Achren Podcasts (2024)

1
20Europe: UK: Julien Bek (Sequoia Capital), Georgia Stevenson (Index Ventures) & Finn Murphy (Nebular VC) on the UK Punching Above its Weight, Why a $100bn Business Can't be Built in Europe, and Lighting ... 38:53

11d ago38:53

38:53

20Europe is a new series profiling European ecosystems. Each episode is a roundtable format featuring investors based in countries including Germany, France, UK, Sweden and more. Half of the show will focus on how these local ecosystems operate, with the other half focused the tech and venture landscape. For Episode 3, we profile the UK. I was join…

1
20Europe: France: Roxanne Varza (Station F), Jonathan Userovici (Headline) & Reza Malekzadeh (Partech) on the French AI Revolution, Why French Founders Win on Product and Suck at Sales, The Fight for Top ... 36:20

1M ago36:20

36:20

20Europe is a new series profiling European ecosystems. Each episode is a roundtable format featuring investors based in countries including Germany, France, UK, Sweden and more. Half of the show will focus on how these local ecosystems operate, with the other half focused the tech and venture landscape. For Episode 2, we profile France. I was join…

1
Ryan Douglas: Immersive Digital Therapeutics 1:06:11

1M ago1:06:11

1:06:11

Ryan Douglas is the co-founder of DeepWell DTx, a digital therapeutics Venture Lab focused on creating immersive experiences that address mental health concerns. Ryan has created numerous medical devices, along with several profitable startups. He has deep experience with the regulatory landscape for digital therapeutics, and is pushing to get digi…

1
20Europe: Germany: Filip Dames, Co-Founder of Cherry Ventures & Dom Wilhelm, Partner at Headline on why Germany is the top tech ecosystem in Europe, why multi-stage funds are dangerous for seed companies ... 37:37

2M ago37:37

37:37

20Europe is a new series profiling European ecosystems. Each episode is a roundtable format featuring investors based in countries including Germany, France, UK, Sweden and more. Half of the show will focus on how these local ecosystems operate, with the other half focused more generally on the tech and venture landscape. For Episode 1, we profile …

1
20Angel: Joakim Achren: Co-Founder of Next Games (Acq. Netflix) on How To Build an Angel Syndicate, What Data to Study When Investing in Gaming & The Stress & Loneliness When Building a Startup 32:57

5M ago32:57

32:57

20Angel is a series profiling European angel investors with the best Founder NPS. Episode 16 features Joakim Achren, angel investor & co-founder of Next Games, acquired by Netflix in 2022. Joakim also built Elite Game Developers, an online resource that helps entrepreneurs in starting their first games company. The newsletter and podcast have a com…

1
Starr Long: Creating Ultima Online 58:30

6M ago58:30

58:30

Long before World of Warcraft, there was Ultima Online, the first MMO. How did this highly innovative & influential game come to be? And what can we learn from its successes and failures? Starr Long is a game designer and producer who directed the team that built Ultima Online, the first popular Massively Multiplayer Online game. In this in-depth i…

1
20Angel: Paul Forster: Co-Founder of Indeed.com on Building a $7bn Revenue Business, Why Founders Are The Best Angels, Why he Said no to a Deal Led by Sequoia & Why he Passed on a $2.5bn Company at Seed ... 25:28

6M ago25:28

25:28

20Angel is a series profiling European angel investors with the best Founder NPS. Episode 15 features Paul Forster, angel investor & co-founder and former CEO of Indeed, the #1 job search and recruitment service worldwide, now with 12k employees and $7bn in revenue. He holds an MBA from INSEAD and Master’s degrees from Cambridge & Oxford Universiti…

1
20Angel: Finn Murphy: Announcing Europe's Latest Solo GP, Why Backing Google Is The Only Thing That Matters, Why European Companies Need To Raise In The US & How The Deal Process Is Like Texas Hold'em 33:08

7M ago33:08

33:08

20Angel is a series profiling European angel investors with the best Founder NPS. Episode 14 features Finn Murphy, angel investor & previously a Partner at Frontline Ventures, where he made 24 fund investments and 8 angel investments in his 4 and half year tenure. In that time, he has seen 3 companies through to exit with Workvivo selling to Zoom, …

1
Samuel Hulick: User Onboarding 38:14

8M ago38:14

38:14

Samuel Hulick, a renowned UX consultant and leading authority in user onboarding, operates the well-known website useronboard.com. Through this platform, he expertly deconstructs the initial experiences of popular apps and services, showcasing his insights into effective user onboarding processes. Check out the video here: https://youtu.be/YFFw5u_A…

1
Jason Hreha: Building Habit-Forming Products 25:02

8M ago25:02

25:02

Jason Hreha is a behavioral scientist, formerly Global Head of Behavioral Sciences at Walmart, who uses his knowledge of human behavior to build better products. With a decade of applying behavioral science to tech challenges, he co-founded Walmart's Behavioral Science Team and pioneered Behavioral Strategy as an interdisciplinary approach. He stud…

1
20Angel: Marc McCabe: Ex Airbnb Exec & Angel Investor on Why Operator Experience is Essential For an Angel, Passing on Coinbase at Seed, Punchy Y Combinator Valuations, & The Best Way to DD Investments ... 32:47

8M ago32:47

32:47

20Angel is a series profiling European angel investors with the best Founder NPS. Episode 13 features Marc McCabe, angel investor & solo GP of Nomad Capital, a seed stage fund focused on B2B software and marketplaces. Prior to starting Nomad, Marc worked at Google, SV Angel and was an early employee at Airbnb where he led numerous projects includin…

1
Alfie Kohn: Thriving Beyond Competition 29:41

8M ago29:41

29:41

Alfie Kohn is an American author and lecturer in education, parenting, and human behavior. The author of fourteen books and hundreds of articles, he is a proponent of progressive education and a strong critic of competition and rewards. Kohn has been described by Time magazine as “perhaps the country’s most outspoken critic of education’s fixation …

1
20Angel: Steve O'Hear: Ex TechCrunch Editor on The Unspoken Misalignment Between Investors & Founders, Turning Story-Flow Into Deal-Flow, & The Best Portfolio Construction Advice From Tom Blomfield, Founder ... 31:54

9M ago31:54

31:54

20Angel is a series profiling European angel investors with the best Founder NPS. Episode 12 features Steve O'Hear, CEO and Founder of strategic communications agency, O'Hear & Co, and an executive at Zapp. Previously, Steve spent over 15 years as a technology and business journalist, including more than 10 years reporting for TechCrunch, covering …

1
20Angel: Mark Cummins: Why AI is as Important as The Wheel, How He Helped Canva Before They Raised a Round, Selling Two Companies to Google, And Experiences With Bad Angel Investors 30:36

9M ago30:36

30:36

20Angel is a series profiling European angel investors with the best Founder NPS. Episode 11 features Mark Cummins, a 2x exited founder and long-time angel investor. He was the CEO and Co-Founder of computer vision company Plink, which became Google's first ever UK acquisition back in 2010. He then went on to co-found Pointy, a retail search compan…

1
Adrian Hon: Making Zombies, Run! 43:55

9M ago43:55

43:55

Adrian Hon is an English writer and game designer, known for his expertise in alternate reality games and transmedia storytelling. As the CEO of Six to Start, he created the bestselling fitness game "Zombies, Run!" and authored books like "You've Been Played" (2022) and "A History of the Future in 100 Objects" (2020). He studied neuroscience at Cam…

1
20Angel: Jens Lapinski: Co-Founder of Angel Invest, 100+ Portfolio Companies 34:39

9M ago34:39

34:39

20Angel is a series profiling European angel investors with the best Founder NPS. Episode 10 features Jens Lapinski, one Europe's most active angel investors. He is the Founding Partner of Angel Invest, an angel fund which has invested in 100+ companies. Formally, he was an MD at Techstars, Partner at Forward Labs (now Forward Partners) and co-foun…

1
20Angel: Roxanne Varza: Director of Station F, Sequoia Scout 32:43

10M ago32:43

32:43

20Angel is a series profiling European angel investors with the best Founder NPS. Episode 9 features Roxanne Varza, Director of Station F, the world's largest startup campus, located in Paris. She is also an angel investor, Sequoia Scout and previously had roles at Techcrunch and Microsoft. Some of her angel investments include Figures, Claap, Folk…

1
Robin Allenson: Creating AI-powered Tools 35:34

10M ago35:34

35:34

Robin Allenson is a serial entrepreneur who studied AI at University of Edinburgh in the early 90s, and went on to found a series of AI-powered ventures. His current venture Similar.ai uses AI to automate the important and often laborious process of optimizing web sites for SEO. Check out the video here: https://youtu.be/H6P746iG2VM…

1
20Angel: Johan Brand: Co-Founder of Norwegian Unicorn, Kahoot! and Co-Founder of We Are Human 27:56

10M ago27:56

27:56

20Angel is a series profiling European angel investors with the best Founder NPS. Episode 8 features Johan Brand, Co-Founder of Kahoot!, a Norwegian online game-based learning platform that has raised over $500m, and as of July '23, is valued over $1.3bn. Johan is also the Co-Founder of We Are Human, which builds and invests in technology enabled c…

1
20Angel: Sarah Drinkwater 32:02

10M ago32:02

32:02

20Angel is a series profiling European angel investors with the best Founder NPS. Episode 7 features Sarah Drinkwater, angel investor and Founder of Common Magic, an early stage fund backing products built with community at their core. Previously, she spent 15 years as an operator and angel investor in the European ecosystem with a focus on communi…

1
Doug Hofstadter: Reflections on AI 40:01

10M ago40:01

40:01

Douglas Hofstadter is a professor of Cognitive Science and Comparative Literature at Indiana University in Bloomington. His research into cognitive science includes concepts such as the sense of self in relation to the external world, consciousness, artistic creation, literary translation, and discovery in mathematics and physics. His 1979 book Göd…

1
20Angel: Andy Ayim 30:04

10M ago30:04

30:04

20Angel is a series profiling European angel investors with the best Founder NPS. Episode 6 features Andy Ayim MBE, angel investor and co-founder of The Angel Investing School, which has a vision to empower a new generation of angel investors. He has personally invested in over 12 startups such as Farmlend, Ava Estell and Whering. He is also an Ato…

1
20Angel: Matt Robinson 31:45

11M ago31:45

31:45

20Angel is a series profiling European angel investors with the best Founder NPS. Episode 5 features Matt Robinson, Co-Founder of Fintech Unicorn, GoCardless, and Co-Founder of Nested. He is also one of Europe's most prolific angel investors with over 200 investments. Some of the companies he’s backed include Permutive, Cleo, Codat, Hopin, Incident…

1
David Kaye - Games entrepreneur and investor 57:44

11M ago57:44

57:44

In this podcast episode from June 2023, I talk with David Kaye, who did his first games company in the 1990s. Recently, he sold his company to Embracer and is now embarking on a journey to invest in gaming founders.

1
20Angel: Joe Cross 31:08

11M ago31:08

31:08

20Angel is a series profiling European angel investors with the best Founder NPS. Episode 4 features Joe Cross, Angel Investor and ex Head of Marketing & Comms at Wise (Transferwise). Joe is also part of the Atomico Angel Programme and his angel portfolio includes Bonnet, Lightyear, Gaia, Alloy, Julienne Bruno and many more. The format for 20Angel …

1
20Angel: Carmen Alfonso Rico 29:06

11M ago29:06

29:06

20Angel is a series profiling European angel investors with the best Founder NPS. Episode 3 features Carmen Alfonso Rico, Angel Investor and Co-Founder of Cocoa Ventures, a European micro VC that invests $250k-$500k checks at pre-Seed & Seed. Cocoa positions itself as an entrepreneur’s in house VC, helping their founders hack the system from the in…

1
Dr. Julie Gurner: Unlocking Peak Performance 48:28

11M ago48:28

48:28

Dr. Julie Gurner is an executive performance coach with a Doctorate in Psychology. She has coached top-percentile executives, talent, and teams operating in fast-paced, competitive environments for over ten years, helping her clients unlock peak performance. She publishes the Ultra Successful newsletter on Substack. Check out the video here: https:…

1
Pitch Feedback from Joakim — Pavel Afanasiev, Northern Lights Entertainment 47:42

11M ago47:42

47:42

This time, Pavel Afanasiev from Northern Lights Entertainment pitches his games company to me, and I share feedback. Pavel decided not to do slides, so it's a different format with pros and cons.

1
20Angel: Andreas Klinger 29:30

11M ago29:30

29:30

20Angel is a series profiling European angel investors with the best Founder NPS. Episode 2 features Andreas Klinger, Founder of Remote Capital, a small fund by remote founders, operators and early investors, investing in the next generation of global work opportunities. Investments include Mainstreet, Remote.com, Hopin, Microacquire and many more.…

1
20Angel: Henry de Zoete 29:36

11M ago29:36

29:36

20Angel is a series profiling European angel investors with the best Founder NPS. Episode 1 features Henry de Zoete, Founder of YC backed Look After My Bills, which became the largest auto-switching service in the UK, saving families money on their gas and electricity. It was acquired by GoCo Group PLC (owners of GoCompare) in July 2019. Look After…

1
Kristian Segerstrale 1:24:49

11M ago1:24:49

1:24:49

This is a repost from a few years back and it's definitely one of my favorite episodes of all time. Kristian Segerstrale is the CEO Super Evil Megacorp, a games company based out of San Francisco. Kristian is a legend in gaming. He started his first games company Macrospace twenty years ago, which IPOed as Glu Mobile a few year later. Later he sold…

1
Pitch Feedback from Joakim — Melissa McBride, Sophia Technologies 42:39

11M ago42:39

42:39

This is a new episode series where a founder pitches their company to Joakim, and then Joakim shares feedback on the pitch. The first one is with Melissa McBride from Sophia Technologies. They are using gaming and play to revolutionize education and build a digital campus where every child has access to game-based learning technology powered by VR …

1
Joakim Achrén: Investing in Games 40:45

11M ago40:45

40:45

Joakim Achrén, “the gaming startup guy”, is a games investor, and founder of Elite Game Developers, which provides advice for game founders. He co-founded Next Games (which was acquired by Netflix), and worked as Director of Analytics at Supercell. Check out the video here: https://youtu.be/VEd3uedgY7g…

1
Pavel Samsonov: Storyboarding for UX 42:04

12M ago42:04

42:04

Pavel Samsonov is a design architect and UX Practice Lead at Amazon Web Services (AWS) based in New York City. With a background in graphic design and a passion for human-computer interaction, Pavel has spent the last three years at AWS helping large companies adopt cloud computing and build innovative products using design methods. His professiona…

1
Kevin Kelly: Excellent Advice for Living 31:54

1y ago31:54

31:54

Kevin Kelly is a writer, futurist, and Senior Maverick at Wired magazine. He co-founded Wired in 1993, and served as its Executive Editor for its first seven years. His books include The Inevitable, about future trends, and What Technology Wants, a theory of technology. He is founder of the popular Cool Tools website, which has been reviewing tools…

1
Teams and Team Building In Gaming 46:29

1y ago46:29

46:29

This is a repost of an older episode I recorded some time ago on building a team in gaming. I started my first company alone as a solo founder, which was the biggest mistake I had ever made. In this episode, I talk about why you should always focus on team building when considering a startup. Here is the original description of this episode: In Apr…

1
Celia Hodent: The Gamer’s Brain 36:40

1y ago36:40

36:40

Celia Hodent, a Game UX Strategist with a PhD in Psychology, has dedicated 15 years of her career to applying user experience (UX) and cognitive science in product development, particularly in the realm of video games. Her impressive portfolio includes her role as Director of UX at Epic Games for Fortnite, as well as work on well-known franchises s…

1
Arseny Lebedev — Life of a gaming studio CEO 58:22

1y ago58:22

58:22

With 15 years in the games industry, Arseny Lebedev is the co-founder and CEO at Original Games (makers of Merge Inn) where he focuses on product and strategy. In this episode, we discuss building games, managing stress, and why some people are geared toward entrepreneurship.

1
Vinayak Joglekar: Game Thinking in India 46:56

1y ago46:56

46:56

Vinayak Joglekar is head of India Operations and Chief Technology Officer at Excellarate, with more than three decades of professional software development and delivery experience. Joglekar earned his mechanical engineering degree from the Indian Institute of Technology and a master’s degree from the Indian Institute of Management and mentors brigh…

1
Osama Dorias: Reviewing the Top 10 Games of 2022 1:50:14

1+ y ago1:50:14

1:50:14

Osama Dorias is a Lead Content Designer at Blizzard Entertainment. In the past, he’s worked at Unity, Warner Brothers, Gameloft, GEE Media, Ubisoft, and Minority Media. He also teaches game design at Dawson College and loves to empower people in expressing themselves through game-making, especially marginalized people and causes.…

1
First chapter of my audiobook "Long Term Game: How to Build a Video Games Company" 33:10

1+ y ago33:10

33:10

My book, "Long Term Game: How to Build a Video Games Company," came out in March 2020. It was also released as an audiobook version, which you can find on Audible and other major online audiobook stores. I want to share with you the first chapter of the book. I hope you enjoy this read from Keith O’Brien. Get the book from here. Note that this epis…

1
Steve Meretzky: Game Monetization 51:11

1+ y ago51:11

51:11

Steve Meretzky is an American video game developer best known for creating Infocom games in the early 1980s, including collaborating with author Douglas Adams on the hit interactive fiction version of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, and the comically titled Leather Goddesses of Phobos. Later, he created the Spellcasting trilogy, the flagship …

1
Hilmar Pétursson: Why EVE Online has insane retention 36:31

1+ y ago36:31

36:31

Hilmar Pétursson is CEO of CCP Games in Iceland, makers of the long-running space battle game EVE Online. Billed as the world’s largest living work of science fiction, EVE has a highly developed internal economy and deep social structure that makes it an ideal testbed for how the coming Metaverse could work.…

1
Brendan Greene: Building a Virtual Planet 33:58

1+ y ago33:58

33:58

Brendan Greene, better known as PlayerUnknown is a video game developer best known for creating PUBG: Battlegrounds. In 2019 he left active development on the game to form PUBG Special Projects and PlayerUnknown Productions, where he is developing an ambitious virtual world far larger than the one in PUBG.…

1
EGD Podcast Highlights From 2022 48:30

1+ y ago48:30

48:30

Here are the Elite Game Developers podcast highlights from 2022. This year, 36 podcast episodes went live, and I spoke to founders and investors from all over the globe, who all are working to build great gaming companies. Now, I want to end this year with my favorite highlights. The transcript is available here.…

1
Cyril Barrow — Interoperability of assets between games 41:18

1+ y ago41:18

41:18

Cyril Barrow is the co-founder and COO of Village Studio, a new kind of games company that is building cross-game avatars that act as portable avatars dressed in NFT wearables with unique attributes that can be utilized across multiple games. Cyril has been in the games industry for a long time. He has had leadership roles at companies like Digital…

1
Kelly Wallick — 1Up Venture's Community of Founders 50:12

1+ y ago50:12

50:12

Kelly Wallick has worked in the tech and video game industry for over ten years. She’s the founder of the Indie MEGABOOTH and is now a Partner at 1Up Ventures. She has also been the longest-sitting Chair of the Independent Games Festival and the first woman to hold the title. In addition, Kelly is proud to serve on the GLAAD Media Award Advisory Bo…

1
Maor Sadra — Measuring your marketing and entrepreneurship lessons 40:18

1+ y ago40:18

40:18

Today I'm talking with Maor Sadra, the co-founder and CEO of INCRMNTAL, which is a company that evolves digital marketing from measuring traffic to measuring value. In this episode, we talk about how Maor's company changes the daily life of online marketers, including UA professionals in gaming. Then we cover Maor's background, how he approaches en…

1
Rei Wang: From Investor to Entrepreneur 34:53

1+ y ago34:53

34:53

Entrepreneur and angel investor, Rei Wang is the Co-Founder and Chief Product Officer at The Grand, a group coaching platform to help people navigate transitions at the intersection of work and life. Before The Grand she served as CEO of Dorm Room Fund at First Round Capital where she nurtured a community of 250+ startups, and counseled entrepreneu…

1
Tom Hammond — On entrepreneurship and doing a startup 53:08

1+ y ago53:08

53:08

Tom Hammond is the co-founder and CEO of Userwise, a company that is shaping up live-ops in gaming, and they call themselves the world’s first player experience management platform trusted by teams to power their Liveops all-in-one place. Tom is an entrepreneur who shares a lot about his founder's journey on social media and also on his podcast, Ma…

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