Scaling AI Rocketships: ElevenLabs’ Mati Staniszewski & Lovable’s Anton Osika

Company Performance & Context

• 11 Labs (Mati): Focuses on voice AI research and product deployment with a mission to create a "voice of technology."
• Lovable (Anton): Built as a solution for the "99% who cannot code," aiming to create a new interface where users dream technical AI products into existence.
• Revenue Growth: Lovable grew from zero to over $200 million in revenue starting in 2022.
• Team Scale: 11 Labs operates with over 300 employees structured into roughly 30 teams of 5–10 people; Lovable employs fewer than 100 people but has a dedicated leadership team.
• Geographic Hubs: Both companies are based in Europe; Lovable's major hubs are in London and Poland (with strong engineering presence in Eastern Europe).
• Talent Market Shift: 11 Labs notes a 10x increase in engineering students considering startups or venture roles compared to previous years in Europe.

Founding History & Timing

• Age of Founders: Both Mati and Anton started their companies in their early 30s, leveraging 7–8 years of prior experience.
• Hypothetical Early Start: Both founders agreed that starting at age 21–22 would likely have resulted in different, less ambitious ideas due to a lack of understanding regarding customer dynamics, scaling, and talent acquisition.
• Pre-Startup Experience:
  • Mati worked at BlackRock and Palantir, gaining exposure to customer deployment and product building from scratch.
  • Anton interned at CERN (particle physics), founded the Stockholm AI community (2015–2016), co-founded Sauna (sold for $1B), and co-founded a YC-backed e-commerce recommendation system.
• Idea Validation: Lovable's pivot to no-code/voice AI was driven by the realization that 0.5% of the world can code and even fewer can build great products, creating a massive opportunity for a tool serving the remaining 99%.
• Co-Founder Dynamics: Both emphasized the critical importance of knowing a co-founder for a long time (Mati knew his since high school; Anton's co-founder worked at Palantir) to navigate hyper-growth chaos.

CEO Operations & Management Style

• Span of Control:
  • Mati (11 Labs) has 15 direct reports.
  • Anton (Lovable) has 7 direct reports (excluding his co-founder).
  • Both noted that having 50+ direct reports (like Jensen Huang) is rare and that they intentionally keep spans tight to maintain structure before adding chaos.
• Founder Mode: Both operate in "founder mode," maintaining deep involvement in product details and technical understanding to remain effective leaders.
• Delegation Challenges:
  • Mati admitted to holding onto tasks longer than necessary due to impatience, eventually shifting to hiring "spelunkers" (deep specialists) and "cloud/ground" hybrids (high-level/low-level adapters).
  • Anton described delegation as a continuous learning process, requiring a balance of understanding details while empowering leaders to own outcomes.
• Context Switching: Mati explicitly values the ability to zoom in on technical details and zoom out to strategy instantly, contrasting with his co-founder who focuses on deep, long-duration research.
• Planning Cycles:
  • 11 Labs: Uses quarterly initiatives for roadmap planning but excludes research timelines due to unpredictability; maintains a 6-month product roadmap that remains flexible.
  • Lovable: Operates with a lightweight 6-month product roadmap that changes rapidly; avoids rigid long-term planning due to AI platform volatility.
• Chaos Management Hacks:
  • Email Triage: Anton uses a hybrid system where a script auto-classifies emails (P0, P1, P2) followed by human review; P0 items (VIPs/critical partners) get same-day replies.
  • Focus Time: Anton implemented a "No Meeting Wednesday" to recharge; Mati utilizes a public "to-do list" on the company wiki to prioritize work and filter requests.
  • Travel Strategy: Anton restricts travel to one continent per month to minimize context switching, aiming to reduce travel blocks to two weeks for distributed teams.

Team Building & Culture

• Hiring Mix: Both companies aim for a 50/50 split between "homegrown" talent (high slope, grew with the company) and "been there, done that" executives with prior scaling experience.
• Senior Leadership: Lovable's leadership team includes 7 people; 11 Labs has over 300 employees but operates as small, autonomous units.
• Sales Hiring:
  • Mati hired a Head of Sales with help from external advisors and existing investors.
  • Anton's Head of Sales was an existing investor who had previously advised the company, ensuring cultural alignment.
• Compensation & Equity:
  • Europe Challenge: Anton noted it is difficult to convince European employees (particularly in Poland) of the value of equity compared to the US, requiring active education and sometimes "forcing" them to accept it.
  • Work Ethic: Both companies enforce a "996+" culture (7 days a week availability), expecting employees to be online and responsive, though not necessarily in an office, driven by the "once-in-a-lifetime" AI opportunity.
• Cultural Differences: European teams (specifically Eastern Europe) are described as more direct and straightforward, contrasting with the more confident/aggressive sales approach often seen in the US.

Competitive Landscape & Strategy

• AI Giants: Both founders acknowledge the threat of Anthropic, OpenAI, and similar giants but express confidence in their focus and iteration speed.
• Differentiation:
  • 11 Labs believes it will win through deep focus on voice, design, and taste rather than competing on general platform breadth.
  • Lovable argues that building a full platform for product engineering organizations requires too many iteration steps for giants to execute perfectly from a standing start.
• Paranoia Level: While Mati admits to feeling "paranoid" about big announcements, he believes their specific focus on voice and integration gives them a head start against generalists.

Europe-Specific Insights

• "Hard Mode": Building in Europe is harder due to less mature distribution networks and fewer investors compared to Silicon Valley.
• Talent Advantages: Europe offers lower-cost, yearning, and loyal talent that is not "spoiled" by the Valley's saturation of startup opportunities.
• Time Zone: European time zones are cited as a strategic advantage for catering to markets in the US, South America, Europe, and Asia simultaneously.
• Future Growth: 11 Labs predicts the European ecosystem will improve as the first generation of successful founders creates a new wave of repeat entrepreneurs and operators.

Forward-Looking Statements & Advice

• Scaling Advice: Young founders are advised to obsess over the problem, iterate deeply with users, and carefully select co-founders based on long-term trust.
• Founder Support: The consensus is that a CEO's co-founder is the only person to "complain to" effectively, as the CEO becomes a "shit umbrella" for the organization.
• Span of Control: Anton advises keeping the org chart as flat as possible (wide span of control) to prevent slowing down during the 100-to-1,000 employee transition.
• Skill Acquisition: Founders must learn to hire, sell, and give hard feedback immediately, even if these are not their natural strengths.
• Market Outlook: Both believe the AI space will become increasingly competitive on the research side, but product execution, brand, and "taste" will be the ultimate differentiators.