Myfirstminute in conversation with Riccardo Zacconi.
Thursday 30 April, 5pm London
We spoke to Riccardo Zacconi, co-founder and former CEO of King ($5.9bn acquisition), and co-founder of Sweet Capital, the fund he set up with the King founding team to invest in tech-enabled consumer companies. We covered a lot of ground — from Riccardo’s early days as an Economics student and consultant to his first entrepreneurial endeavours with dot.com web portal Spray, and online dating site uDate. Finally, Riccardo shared with us the ups and downs at King, why Candy Crush became such a success, what it felt like to step down after more than 16 years, and what he is passionate about today.
Below are the points that stuck with me the most:
Trust will unite a team, greed will tear it apart
With an unusually large co-founding team at King, equality in the decision-making process was important from the get-go. Disagreements are best resolved through trust in your cofounders’ ability and competence, coupled with full team buy-in once a decision has been made.
Psychological safety is the holy grail
Everybody deserves to be treated well. By creating an environment in which your team feels safe, you will empower them to do their best work. Mistakes will be made — don’t dwell and blame. Instead, learn from them and put them past you.
Profitability yields freedom and independence
King became profitable in January 2005 and has been in the black ever since. When you’re profitable, you avoid stumbling from one fundraising round to the next and being at the mercy of your investors. Profitability was the be-all and end-all for King — a tenet that might become important as the last years’ bull market comes to an end.
Dire moments force you to take important decisions
In 2009, Yahoo (King’s largest distribution partner at the time) lost 45% of their traffic in games. This pulled the rug out from under the team’s feet, forcing King through a difficult pivot in re-orientating towards Facebook. Ultimately, this important shift of resources led the team to create Candy Crush, the franchise which became King’s most important value driver.
Transparency will serve you in the long run
During the pivot, King divided the company in two parts, with 50% of the team focusing on Facebook, whilst the remaining half continued the business on the existing platforms (e.g. Yahoo) where King was already profitable. The latter was arguably less exciting, but generated steady cash flows which allowed King to place a firm bet on Facebook. Going the extra mile in communicating how valuable their contribution was to keep the company afloat helped King to retain their key talent across both divisions during this difficult time.
So what else did we learn about Riccardo? He prefers pasta over pizza, is restless at heart (“I’m like a dog — I need to be taken out for a walk…“), and believes that in life, you always meet twice.
Thank you, Riccardo, for sharing your story with us!
