Miki Kuusi: How I Scaled Wolt to $8B; Why I Sold to DoorDash | 20VC #953

Founding Thesis & Product Evolution:

• Mickey Bergman founded Wolt in 2009, leveraging the post-2008 financial crisis labor market to recruit talent and build a new company during an economic renewal phase.
• The core hypothesis was that the smartphone would become a universal remote control for all local services, starting with the "button for food."
• Wolt initially launched with a pickup model focusing on orders and transactions, but this failed to achieve immediate product-market fit due to sticky, slow user adoption.
• Key Pivot: The company discovered product-market fit only after expanding to food delivery, realizing the "magical" value lay in bringing the restaurant to the consumer rather than bringing the consumer to the restaurant.
• Current Strategy: The company redefined delivery from a slow, emergency-only service into a rapid, five-second lunch experience, aiming to capture a market previously dominated by inefficient, manual ordering processes.

Scaling, Focus, and Strategic Decisions:

• Strategic Contraction: After five years of pursuing a "everything app" vision (including groceries and movie tickets), Wolt made the difficult decision to cut all non-food verticals to focus exclusively on food delivery with high efficiency and unit economics.
• Expansion Timing: Bergman advises against expanding too early, citing the risk of splitting focus; Wolt only expanded significantly into grocery during the COVID-19 pandemic when the company had raised ~$250 million and employed 800 people, allowing for a dedicated second line of business.
• Capital Strategy: From 2016 to 2019, Wolt raised over €37 million in funding without public announcement or press, refusing to validate their growth metrics externally to avoid distraction and maintain focus on execution.
• Exit Decision: In 2017, Wolt rejected a 3x valuation acquisition offer despite a "hard year" where every other investor said no to their Series B, betting instead on long-term momentum.
• Acquisition: Wolt was acquired by DoorDash, with Bergman noting a personal "blocking right" (management director concept) negotiated in early rounds that required Tony Xu's involvement for the deal to proceed.

Leadership Philosophy and Culture:

• High Performance vs. Safety: Bergman rejects "safety" (lifetime employment) in favor of "trust" and high performance, arguing that teams are only as strong as their weakest player and that companies must fire underperformers to win.
• Ownership Mechanism: To cultivate an "owner mentality," Wolt granted stock options to every employee, including customer support and part-time roles, ensuring incentives aligned with company success regardless of job title.
• Delegation & Hiring: The CEO prioritizes hiring for potential ("people before the role") rather than prior experience with specific logos, noting that hiring for "logos" often leads to mismatches in startup environments.
• Transparency: Bergman practices full transparency with co-founders and the board regarding company struggles and personal concerns to avoid acting as a "single point of failure" and to distribute the mental burden of leadership.
• CEO Identity: He identifies the primary sacrifice of entrepreneurship as the loss of "mind space" and freedom, describing the role as a constant state of "wartime" where the CEO must live with the stress of a hyper-competitive environment.

Operational Challenges and Lessons:

• The "Single Point of Failure": Bergman describes the CEO's role as standing between two pyramids (investors and employees), creating a lonely and heavy burden that he mitigates through total transparency with his inner circle.
• Recruiting as a Core Function: He views growth companies as "glorified recruiting operations," where senior leaders must personally sell the vision to candidates, even when the company has low public profile or no brand recognition.
• Right-Sizing: Unlike service roles where headcount correlates directly to output, Bergman notes that right-sizing engineering teams is difficult, often leading to over-hiring due to fear of competitors, though Wolt avoided layoffs by maintaining a conservative, cash-flow-conscious strategy.
• Layoffs: He recounts the 2017 layoff of one-third of the staff (approx. 30 people) as his "most painful day," a decision made to ensure survival and long-term success, emphasizing that great companies are defined by their ability to execute difficult decisions.

Market Outlook and Future Vision:

• Industry Expectations: Consumer expectations continue to increase, requiring companies to simultaneously lower prices, improve quality, and reduce delivery times (shifting from hours to 10-30 minutes).
• Global Expansion: Wolt expanded globally by targeting underpenetrated markets (like Japan) where logistics inefficiencies offered the highest value creation, often entering countries with different time zones or regulatory environments.
• Future of Commerce: Bergman predicts that e-commerce will evolve from "next-day" delivery to "10-30 minute" local commerce, with food delivery companies transforming into comprehensive platforms for all local retail and services.
• European Ecosystem: He advocates for increased European startup success, arguing that while regulation is fragmented and slow, the ecosystem for supporting founders is maturing and will eventually produce more global "unicorns" from the continent.
• Legacy over Wealth: Bergman emphasizes that the true impact of a company lies not in the financial wealth generated for founders, but in the careers, experiences, and subsequent ventures of the employees the company touches.

Personal Insights and Preferences:

• Favorite Book: Hard Things About Hard Things by Ben Horowitz, specifically for its guidance on navigating "wartime" CEO scenarios, including firing loyal friends and managing competitive pressure.
• Gaming Background: His leadership experience began at age 15 running a Dota clan on Warcraft 3, where he learned early lessons in firing underperforming members and managing a community.
• Influences: He cites Tony Xu (DoorDash) as a key cultural mentor, praising Xu's ability to embed culture through language and articulation.
• Motivation: Despite a net worth in the hundreds of millions, Bergman states he has never felt he has "made it," viewing the journey as an endless cycle of climbing new, steeper mountains with no permanent "summit."
• Advice to Founders: He warns against the "exit paranoia" where founders sell too early due to fear of losing momentum, citing research that once momentum is established, it is statistically difficult to lose.