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Founders Weekly is the most important news in Tech and Startups curated in a fast-paced format for busy Startup Founders. We cover the news and have other founders' comments on the impact on the Startup ecosystem. Hosted by Vivino founder Heini Zachariassen with other founders as co-hosts and guests every week. Never miss a big story!
Based on 6 episodes we listened to · September 2026
Candid founder conversations turn hiring, team design, product-market fit and exit planning into practical operating choices.
Founders Weekly turns startup decisions into candid working sessions led by Heini Zachariassen, with co-hosts and guests testing ideas against firsthand company-building experience.
Heini Zachariassen and a co-founder revisit a hard fundraise; your next partnership chat gets sharper questions.
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Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.
A candid look back at a four-day startup sprint, with bottlenecks, momentum, and the realities of building fast.
Founders Weekly closes out its four-day startup sprint with a clear-eyed look at what the team learned, including whether the effort met its goal and whether it brought in any paying customers.
A plainspoken look at burnout and the damage it can cause.
Founders Weekly uses this hour to treat burnout as more than tiredness. Heine Sakharajan and Courtney Quattrini move past the usual stress talk and spend time on the slower damage: judgment slipping, everyday choices getting harder, and the strain showing up at home as well as…
A sharp discussion of founder judgment, scaling pressure, and the case for humility.
Founders Weekly uses Paul Graham's founder mode post as a launch point for a clear-eyed discussion of startup leadership. Heiner Sakharazny guides Thijs and Hasan through the tension between trusting founder judgment and reaching for outside help, and the conversation keeps…
A four-day startup sprint that turns into a real test once YouTube and production reality get involved.
Founders Weekly tracks a four-day startup sprint from a growing wait list into a stubborn YouTube integration problem. It works best when it stays close to the work: podcast and RSS feeds look straightforward, then platform changes, licensing choices, and the jump from a laptop…
A scrappy startup build that turns creator chores into a practical product.
Founders Weekly follows a four day build challenge and keeps the focus on the work. It looks at why creators spend so much time on show notes, descriptions, keywords, and social posts, then shows how an Apple Podcasts link can replace a clunky form.
Exit strategy, treated as a set of practical founder choices rather than a slogan.
Founders Weekly keeps the conversation on exit strategy grounded in practical tradeoffs. It returns to market fit, likely buyers, and the harder question of what the company is actually solving, instead of dressing the topic up as theory.
A grounded PMF discussion that tests startup instinct against repeat use.
Founders Weekly treats product-market fit as something to be proven, not announced. The strongest part is the practical framing: sticky users matter, repeat use helps sort the people who will stick from the ones who will drift, and a PMF score gives founders a way to look at…
A practical case for when an idea should become a pivot, and when it should stand on its own.
Founders Weekly looks at a familiar startup problem: when an idea belongs inside the main company, and when it deserves a company of its own. Using Slack as the pivot example, the episode argues that a spin-out should rest on more than enthusiasm.
Rob Walling on bootstrapped SaaS growth, plateaus, and exits — with founders who lived them.
Abbey Ashley's playbook for turning your job skills into a virtual assistant business.
Naval Ravikant on epistemology, startups, and crypto, from David Deutsch to Vitalik Buterin.
Alex Theuma interviews SaaS founders and investors on scaling to $10M-plus ARR.
Guy Raz traces founders' origin stories and fields live advice-line calls from entrepreneurs.
Alex Blumberg interviews guests like Megan Phelps-Roper and Shane McAnally about failure and reinvention.
Pivoting is tempting, but the signal has to be real.
This episode of Founders Weekly explores burnout in startups, featuring host Heini Zachariassen, psychotherapist Courtney Quattrini, and guest Oscar Werner, a CEO who recovered from burnout.
Heini Zachariassen and guest Tai Sunagop discuss a framework for evaluating founding teams, covering four key roles: idea person, dealmaker, builder, and operator.
The hosts of Founders Weekly dissect Paul Graham's viral blog post on 'founder mode,' debating its implications for startup leadership.
Heiner and Hasan open with the raw side of startup failure.
In part two of building a startup in four days, the team faces critical technical hurdles with YouTube integration and scaling infrastructure while marketing efforts on Reddit and Discord drive rapid waitlist growth.
Founders Weekly asks whether startup founders need to be in their 20s, and Heiner Sakkaraisen opens with MIT Sloan data showing the average successful founder is 45.
Founders Weekly’s “Building for an Exit” centers on Henry Rosendale, who says he has been involved in 11 startups, exited 5 of them, and realized a collective value of more than $250 million.
Founders Weekly turns to product-market fit and why it can make or break a startup.
Heine opens with a pointed question about whether AI will replace the technical co-founder.
Founders Weekly opens with a team trying to build an AI product in four days.
Heinz Sacken-Reisen opens by asking what it actually feels like to build as a solopreneur.
Heine Sakharazny and Thijs Vivino spend the episode on the messy side of hiring global teams.
Heiner Sakkaraisen and Hazan Basi frame speed as the core startup advantage, citing Vivino's weekly Friday releases and Hazan's example from Nuna, where early assumptions almost required throwing the product away.
In this episode of Founders Weekly, hosts Heine and Hassan reflect on their four-day startup hackathon to build Just Release, a tool for content creators.