Meet Virginia Pozzato, Associate at Dawn
Virginia is an Associate at Dawn and covers Enterprise Software in the UK, France and the Nordics. Let’s meet her!
Why B2B software VC?
Every day I come into work (or these days, go for a fake commute around the block) and never stop learning. We meet incredibly talented teams who are bringing new disruptive products to the market, reinventing existing legacy solutions or creating entirely new categories. The transition to cloud is well underway, but there still is so much opportunity yet to be unlocked. It’s exciting to be a part of it.
Most exciting moment at Dawn?
It’s difficult to pick one! I’d say when we announced our new fund a few months ago. At the same time, we were finalising our investment in Access Fintech, and onboarding some amazing new team members… Heady days!
What do you think is the most interesting trend in the industry, and why?
In so many sectors we’re seeing a broad trend of replacing monolithic legacy stacks with best-of-breed pieces of software, cloud native, agile and tailored to the customers’ needs.
And the quick-fire round!
Netflix series you most recently binged on and would you recommend
Dark… Too many plot holes to count, but still great!
Favourite SaaS metric and why
Net retention! Even, and perhaps especially at the early stage, it’s incredibly important to find evidence that your customers love the product.
Best book for a much-needed holiday
Well, it depends on the holiday! For a long and relaxing one, I would choose a classic that I very much enjoyed: Il nome della rosa, by Umberto Eco.
Best and worst thing to see in a deck
Best: a clear definition of the problem, your solution and how it works.
Worst: as much as I love numbers, too many charts or tables, not necessarily relevant, can be misleading — less is more!
Recipe for the perfect evening/weekend?
I’m not sure where I would be — maybe climbing, skiing in the mountains, surfing in the sea — but it definitely has to involve my friends and some sport!
If you could build one company right now, what would it be?
I love productivity tools, lists and notes. I’m such a demanding customer that very often I just use pen and paper to make my own layout, so I guess I’d try to build my own!
Best piece of advice you have given or received?
“There is no such thing as bad weather, only inappropriate clothing”.
I absolutely hated hearing this phrase during my skiing days as a child — a classic reply to my “why don’t we stop for a hot chocolate? It’s cold!!”. But it is actually true, and applicable in so many ways to our daily lives.
It’s easy to feel overwhelmed and not in control sometimes; just remember that preparing a little more for a meeting, taking good care of yourself, or just putting an extra jumper on can help you turn a bad day into a good one :)
