1. What’s Popular Advice For Founders You Do Not Agree With?

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Oh, there’s lots of “popular” pieces of advice going around that are not aligned with my views. Namely:

1. Hire only young people without commitments (like kids) that can work 24/7.

2. Avoid part-timers – you can’t work 24/7, when you are a part timer.

3. The company should be the family.

Well, at Briya, I prefer to bring older people with commitments and kids, that maybe even work part-time, but have more experience, and are therefore much more efficient with their time, and are coming to work for work, not to have a “family” and socialize. Their family should be back home, and it should be more important for them than Briya. As a matter of fact, their families are more important to me than Briya. It is important to unite the people, but it is actually better to do it around a shared goal, not about fun in the office. So in my opinion – one should hire the best people you can find, even if they are part-time employees, and a maternity/paternity leave is expected soon.

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2. What Was The Best Advice You’ve Ever Received?

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1. Delegate whatever you can. Hire an Operations Manager the same day you receive the funds – don’t do it yourself. Bring marketing/writers soon – don’t create collaterals on your own. Bring DevOps soon, it will be more of a pain a year later. Bring sales people (unlike what’s usually advised, you don’t need to do all the sales by yourself, there are better sales people than you)

2. Don’t take less money than you need and don’t compromise on the quality of the VC. It may prevent you from growing fast, because you will need to economize (a big no-no for startups), or you will run out of money, or you will be stuck with annoying investors spending most of your time on them instead of on growing the company. It took us four times longer, but now we have all the needed tools to succeed with exceptional VCs on board.

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"It is important to unite the people, but it is actually better to do it around a shared goal, not about fun in the office. So in my opinion - one should hire the best people you can find, even if they are part-time employees, and a maternity/paternity leave is expected soon."

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3. What’s One Memorable Moment Throughout Your Journey?

During Covid we rarely got to see the team in the office, we were all working in our home silos and meeting on zoom, so when we brought everyone to the Briya office to toast the new year (and the new company!), it was the first time everyone got to meet f2f. The feeling was that we are here to build something great together and the energy in the room was incredible. It was extremely exciting, not only for me but for the whole team.

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4. What Is A Hobby Others Do Not Know You Have A Passion For?

I’m a great lover of literature and writing. I’ve been writing since I was two, I think, and till this day – there are many poems and stories to be told after my retirement. I play piano and practice martial arts, with a black belt in Judo and training women in the IMPACT self defense system. I’m a huge lover of soccer.

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5. What Makes Your Founding Team Ideal?

I am very determined, a “never give up” type of guy and Guy, my co-founder, is eternally calm and pragmatic. This combination leads to great resilience, which is the secret of success for any startup. What I’d suggest is to pick a co-founder with their own set of unique skills, ones that compliment yours, not ones that necessarily amplify yours.

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