On the Rocks with Josh Felser, Serial Entrepreneur

Written by D’Mya Gernae Sanford (ECU ’22)

A couple of months ago before being swamped by finals and internships, [the space bar] gang was honored to conduct an interview with current Duke’s Center of Entrepreneurship and Innovation board member, Josh Felser. From my initial research of him co-founding startups like Spinner (acquired by AOL in 1999 for $320 million), Crackle (acquired by Sony in 2006 for $65 million), and Freestyle Capital, to DJ-ing a Britney Spears mix of “Toxic” at Burning Man — I knew this was a tech entrepreneur I genuinely wanted to be like. Aside from the dollar signs and accolades, the temperament of this interview read like that of a direct fireside chat with a true life and career mentor rather than a virtue signaling businessperson, which is an all-too-common archetype in today’s sociopolitical business climate.

To start off, I was interested in asking a question like this to someone so objectively successful because I personally have a challenging time explaining to people that I am a Sociology major going into Data Science and eventually tech startup acceleration/incubation, and some parts of me still doubt if I’m studying the correct thing. So, I immediately began to ask about the degrees in Political Science and Economics (’86) Felser earned as well as his MBA (’90) from Fuqua and how they relate to what he ended up doing after graduation. While Economics gave him a decent set of hard business skills, he also stated that during the time of his studies, Political Science as a major was much more psychologically based in its teachings than it is today. His interest lied deeply in what made people “tick” and after reading The Epic of Gilgamesh for a class. This gained awareness and knowledge of power dynamics from this reading among others helped him pilot this continued mindset into the business world, a place where motive, ambition, and the decisions of people are the entire backbone. Continuing with the personalization of business, he also emphasized self-expression, especially to communicate to an audience, as an integral skill to propel ideas forward.

The next question was relative to finding an ideal co-founder. From other entrepreneur and technology podcast interviews I listen to in my free time (one of my favorites being How I Built This by NPR with Guy Raz), some of the most successful people say that you must find someone smarter than you. This point was reiterated by Felser almost instantaneously but also stating the schism between traditional intelligence/hard skills versus creativity, both of which are equally as important.

A common idealized phrase people have used to describe utmost career fulfillment and financial stability is “chasing their bag” to eventually accumulate enough wealth during their early working life to label themselves as rich with time to enjoy it. Once reaching the status of a venture capitalist as well as an angel investor while hardly being middle-aged, why continue innovate and help others when you can easily retreat into the anonymity of comfort that comes with wealth? Like the wonder of tick, motive, ambition, decision framed in the first question, I have always asked myself if the answer to all of this in business is simply just money or the pursuit of power but never known of anyone at a large scale who could answer. Felser stated his motivation to be enjoying challenge, breaking out of your comfort zone, and using what he has acquired to give back. At 56, he says that he has a new career involving climate change that is uncomfortable, super difficult, but he absolutely loves it.

As an entrepreneur that is passionate about climate change and social issues, it is exceedingly difficult to mitigate the reputation of business as a discipline without perpetuating the very things you advocate against. With this statement, Felser offers the concept of helping the world by investing in companies and organizations that track for truly helping the causes they claim. This concept simplifies down to a specialized type of investor sovereignty while problem solving and generating capital are not mutually exclusive but can occur if you do careful enough in where funds are distributed and placed.

For the last question, I decided to put my own lived experience at pitch competitions, watching Shark Tank, and sociological knowledge to use by asking a question that very well could have been a self-inflicted shot to the foot for many white men of his caliber. Especially in the era of Stop AAPI Hate, Black Lives Matter, #MeToo and many other stories of marginalized groups being in the forefront of news for everyone, I asked how he, as an investor and mentor, has used his own privileges and experience to help aid entrepreneurs from these groups to have the same potential to reach the heights that he has had. Noted as a rough estimate of 2/3rds, Felser agreed that either unconsciously or consciously with most investors being white men, they tend to back those who look like them or remind them of themselves. From his own challenges in his life and not going to a renowned elite college (Duke is renowned however this was mentioned to differentiate between Zuckerberg’s Harvard or Buffet’s Columbia), the general adversities he experienced in those arenas made him step back to include intentionally focusing on gender and racial minorities as part of his own mentorship and investing. Lastly with the 2/3rds comparison he finds that though larger, the majority lacks quality, working with 1/3rd will result in more quality consideration from investors.

Themes of thriving in creativity and knowledge of people or thriving in linear focus and knowledge of the status quo, with the conjunction of both being unified through the same goal of seeking discomfort is the main idea I collected through this interview. This experience provided amazing insight into the more business side of things, which I am thankful to have been able to ask questions about. I will definitely remember this interview as I venture into my career since these are probably the most interesting perspectives I’ve gained from an entrepreneur thus far.