Startups Decoded

Every line on your cap table is a promise. Most founders don’t know what they’ve signed.
Andy Walsh sat down with Joris Delanoue, founder of Fairmint, to unpack why equity, the core of startup ownership, is still managed through systems built for a different era, and why that matters more now than ever.
The central tension: companies are staying private longer, secondary markets are growing fast, and the infrastructure holding it all together is, in many cases, still a spreadsheet.
Joris has spent two decades on both sides of this, as a founder frustrated by the cost and complexity of bringing people onto his cap table, and as an angel investor watching his capital sit trapped in paper with no clear path to liquidity. That frustration became Fairmint.
This episode goes deep on what a cap table actually is, what it costs when it’s mismanaged, and what programmable equity infrastructure looks like when it’s built correctly from day one.
Topics covered:
Why cap tables are still broken
The standardization movement that changed early fundraising
How blockchain turns equity into a programmable asset
Why liquidity is infrastructure, not an exit event
Listen: Apple || Spotify || YouTube
Presented by Deel: If you’re at the stage of making your first or fiftieth hire, and doing it across borders, Deel is worth knowing about. They’re supporting Startups Decoded for good reason. LEARN MORE.
Subscribe now
Joris Delanoue
Founder and operator with over two decades of experience building and scaling companies across tech and finance. Co-founder and CEO of Fairmint, a platform rethinking how companies raise capital and manage equity, using software and blockchain to modernize the cap table from incorporation to IPO.
Andy Walsh
2× exited founder, advisor, board member, and host of Startups Decoded (500,000 downloads + Top 2% globally).
Access All Areas.
Listen: Apple || Spotify || YouTube
Subscribe: Substack
Connect: LinkedIn
Web: startupsdecoded.com
Socials: TikTok || Instagram || X
Music Credit
“Neptuno” – Phondupe (Album: Onykia)
The Studio
​Filmed on location at 28th&Park. A content & production studio for New York’s visionary Builders, Investors, Artists, Musicians, & Creators to amplify their voice & share bold stories. Use the code “Decoded” for 25% off your first booking.

Taryn Williams started her first business at 21 with no experience and no capital. Twenty years later, she’d built four companies and exited twice. Taryn Williams doesn’t talk about the dream. She talks about what it actually costs.
Andy Walsh sat down with Taryn Williams — serial founder and multi-exit operator — to trace the full arc of building from scratch. From cold emailing at midnight to navigating a multi-continent exit process she’d been quietly preparing for years, this is a conversation about the real mechanics of building: cash flow, culture, capital, and the decisions nobody prepares you for.
Taryn was 21, still modeling, cold emailing production companies at midnight. She made one promise she couldn’t afford: models get paid in seven days. Industry standard was 90. She didn’t pay herself for two years to keep it. That decision built loyalty that became referrals that became a 20-year business. Then she spotted a bigger problem, built a marketplace, accidentally walked into a VC term sheet, scaled across APAC, and exited in 2023. Now she’s building again.
Presented by Deel: If you’re making your first or fiftieth hire — and doing it across borders — Deel is worth knowing. They’re supporting Startups Decoded this season for good reason. LEARN MORE.
Listen: Apple || Spotify || YouTube
Subscribe now
Who Should Listen
Founders in the early chaos. Anyone approaching a first raise or first exit. People who need to hear that the dream version and the real version of building can both be true — just not at the same time.
Taryn Williams
Taryn Williams is an entrepreneur at the intersection of talent, media, and technology. She is the founder of WINK Models and theright.fit, a talent-brand marketplace that was successfully acquired. Today she is the co-founder of #Gifted, a board director, investor, and frequent speaker on startups.
Andy Walsh
2× exited founder and host of Startups Decoded (500,000 downloads + Top 2% globally).
Access All Areas.
Listen: Apple || Spotify || YouTube
Subscribe: Substack
Connect: LinkedIn
Web: startupsdecoded.com
Socials: TikTok || Instagram || X
The Studio
​Filmed on location at 28th&Park. A content & production studio for New York’s visionary Builders, Investors, Artists, Musicians, & Creators to amplify their voice & share bold stories. Use the code “Decoded” for 25% off your first booking.
Music Credit
“Neptuno” – Phondupe (Album: Onykia)

Eric Ries, author of The Lean Startup, joins Startups Decoded to discuss his new book Incorruptible and why many successful companies slowly drift away from their founding ideals.
Andy Walsh sat down with Eric to explore the forces that reshape organizations as they scale — from governance and incentives to leadership dynamics and investor pressure.
Drawing on examples from companies like Costco and FedMart, Eric explains how culture, trust, and long-term thinking are often eroded by systems designed for short-term outcomes.
This episode examines why success can quietly corrupt company purpose — and what founders must do to build organizations that remain principled as they grow.
Presented by Deel: If you're making your first or fiftieth hire — and doing it across borders — Deel is worth knowing. They're supporting Startups Decoded this season for good reason. LEARN MORE.
Listen: Apple || Spotify || YouTube
What We Cover
• The legacy and influence of The Lean Startup
• Why companies drift away from their founding purpose
• The hidden forces that shape corporate culture
• The founder-to-CEO transition and shifting power dynamics
• Governance, incentives, and long-term decision making
• Lessons from Costco and the collapse of FedMart
• How founders can design companies that stay mission-driven
Get Incorruptible: Order here
Eric Ries
Eric Ries is the author of The Lean Startup, one of the most influential books in modern entrepreneurship. His work has shaped how startups and large companies approach innovation, product development, and experimentation.
Andy Walsh
2× exited founder and host of Startups Decoded (500,000 downloads + Top 2% globally).
Access All Areas.
Listen: Apple || Spotify || YouTube
Subscribe: Substack
Connect: LinkedIn
Web: startupsdecoded.com
Socials: TikTok || Instagram || X
Music Credit
“Neptuno” – Phondupe (Album: Onykia)
The Studio
​Filmed on location at 28th&Park. A content & production studio for New York’s visionary Builders, Investors, Artists, Musicians, & Creators to amplify their voice & share bold stories. Use the code "Decoded" for 25% off your first booking.

Rachel ten Brink spent two decades inside Fortune 500 companies — P&G, Estée Lauder, L’Oréal — before co-founding Scentbird and scaling it past $300M in revenue. She got rejected by YC three times. Today, Scentbird is in their top 2% by revenue. Now she’s a GP at Red Bike Capital, investing in vertical AI, fintech, and digital health.
This conversation is about what changes when you’ve been the client, the founder, and the investor — and why that sequence matters more than most people admit.
We cover:
Why Fortune 500 experience is an underrated training ground for founders
What enterprise clients actually evaluate before they say yes — and it’s not your product
How Scentbird pivoted three times before hitting product-market fit
The real cost of fundraising too long — and what to do instead
How Red Bike Capital helps founders land their first enterprise clients
If you’re building toward your first enterprise deal, thinking about raising, or just want to understand how operators think differently — this one’s worth your time.
Listen: Apple || Spotify || YouTube
Presented by Deel
If you’re making your first or fiftieth hire — and doing it across borders — Deel is worth knowing. They’re supporting Startups Decoded this season for good reason. LEARN MORE.
Subscribe now
Rachel ten Brink
Rachel ten Brink is General Partner and co-founder of Red Bike Capital, an early-stage VC fund investing in Vertical AI, Fintech, and Health & Wellness. Previously co-founder and CMO/CRO of Scentbird — a YC-backed subscription she scaled to $300M+ in revenue and top 2% of all YC companies — she spent two decades before that building billion-dollar brands at P&G, Estée Lauder, and L’Oréal.
Andy Walsh
2× exited founder, brand, growth, GTM, and host of Startups Decoded (500,000 downloads + Top 2% globally).
The Studio
​Filmed on location at 28th&Park. A content & production studio for New York’s visionary Builders, Investors, Artists, Musicians, & Creators to amplify their voice & share bold stories. Use the code “Decoded” for 25% off your first booking.
Access All Areas
Listen: Apple || Spotify || YouTube
Subscribe: Substack
Connect: LinkedIn
Web: startupsdecoded.com
Socials: TikTok || Instagram || X
Music Credit
“Neptuno” – Phondupe (Album: Onykia)

We’re more connected than ever. More lonely than ever. Along the way, something broke.
Michelle Parsons left ed-tech to build Lora — a platform using astrology as a framework for genuine human connection.
The twist? The tech isn’t the point. The vulnerability is.
Andy Walsh sat down with Michelle Parsons, co-founder of Lora, to unpack one of the most uncomfortable truths in tech: we built tools for connection and ended up more isolated.
Michelle is a product leader (Kayak, Netflix, Spotify) who spent years watching personalization shape content discovery — and started asking why we weren’t applying that thinking to how people find each other. Lora is her answer.
Listen: Apple || Spotify || YouTube
Subscribe now
Presented by Deel: If you’re at the stage of making your first or second hire — and doing it across borders — Deel is worth knowing about. They’re supporting Startups Decoded this season for good reason. → LEARN MORE ←
What We Cover:
Why social media broke the promise of connection — and why it’s structural
Astrology as an onboarding framework for vulnerability (yes, really)
The difference between shallow engagement and meaningful relationship
How Lora uses personalization to facilitate depth, not just retention
What community impact looks like when you measure connection, not clicks
Michelle Parsons
A product leader who’s built and scaled at Kayak, Spotify, Netflix, and Hinge — where she served as CPO and tripled both the user base and revenue. Most recently, she co-founded Lex, a queer-first social platform named one of Fast Company’s Most Innovative Companies. Now she’s building Lora, a platform for deeper, more authentic human connection.
Andy Walsh
2× exited founder and host of Startups Decoded (500,000+ downloads + Top 2% globally).
Access All Areas.
Listen: Apple || Spotify || YouTube
Subscribe: Substack
Connect: LinkedIn
Web: startupsdecoded.com
Socials: TikTok || Instagram || X
The Studio
​Filmed on location at 28th&Park. A content & production studio for New York’s visionary Builders, Investors, Artists, Musicians, & Creators to amplify their voice & share bold stories. Use the code “Decoded” for 25% off your first booking.
Music Credit
“Neptuno” – Phondupe (Album: Onykia)