Mark Straub is the founder and CEO of Smile ID, the leading digital KYC (know your customer) and identity verification provider in Africa. Smile ID helps companies scale rapidly across Africa by confirming the identity of their users in real time, using any smartphone or computer. Prior to Smile, Mark was a venture investor for more than a decade at Khosla Impact and DFJ, covering multiple continents including South Asia and Africa.
This episode is hosted by Jenny Fielding, co-founder and managing partner of Everywhere Ventures (previously The Fund). In this interview, Jenny and Mark discuss the layers of complexity involved in doing business in African countries, and how the idea of creating an “Africa stack” came about. Learn how Mark was inspired by his VC experience and portfolio founders to transition from investor to founder. Listen till the end for a comparison on the mentality of an investor vs founder and an unusual superpower!
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3,2,1...Smile ID: Mark Straub with Jenny Fielding