Yoram Wijngaarde, Founder & CEO of Dealroom, shares his journey from investment banking at Lehman Brothers through the 2008 financial crisis to founding a failed marketplace that pivoted into Europe's leading startup and venture capital intelligence platform. He discusses how a viral blog post turned the struggling two-year-old business around, the lessons learned about customer demand versus stated interest, and Dealroom's expansion plans following a €7 million funding round to become the global source of record for startup ecosystems.
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So, When Lehman went bankrupt, we did not know what was going to happen, and even our salaries were not paid immediately because there was no money in the European entity I just want to say that governments actually often they are very motivated people And then he just started to laugh, like he thought it was such a kind of ballsy thing to ask And they have never seen anything like that I was really kind of in desperation. Already doing it for 2 years or something and not making money. It was kind of hopeless at that point. And it happened a few times that we worked for a year on a deal And then our customer was like yeah... it's not really working out and then they themselves found suddenly a buyer and then we did not got paid. Sometimes people say they are interested in something. But they just want to be nice. And people vote in the end with their feet. Media always has an agenda when they write things It is another lesson. So they were like, "oh yeah, we are going to get Boris Johnson" "Here look, this report actually says that Venture Capital isn't up 50%" I feel very vindicated by the recent trend with this founder mode, to be in the details, like, being in the details is cool again. The biggest ecosystem is obviously the Bay Area But they should not have a monopoly on building successful big companies and they actually don't. One of my main priorities right now is to get everyone in our team to think more like a CEO of agents. Hello, guys. Here we are at Wave by Vento and in this interview we are going to interview Yoram from Dealroom. Nice to meet you Yoram. Yeah, nice to meet you. So, Yoram, you have now one of the biggest companies in data sourcing data provision for VC's, and corporates startups you are really focused in Europe, new trends of AI, you are applying them, but in this interview we are gonna talk a bit in your early career and until your current status in Dealroom, CEO and founder. So, could you tell us a bit? How did you start it? So I'm from Amsterdam. I studied economics in Amsterdam. I got into corporate finance. I was at the time, really into Warren Buffett as a person, and I loved reading his letters, and this really got me into like wanting to understand like businesses and profitability and valuations this kind of stuff. And then I during my studies, towards the end, because I kind of, I had a weird... my studies, I was a bit weird. I kind of dropped out halfway and I did a lot of telemarketing and I was like travelling and having fun and not really studying, and then, but then I was like I need to graduate. I did the last 3 years in compressed into 1 year. Wow. So, yeah, kind of crazy from hindsight and then I had to start thinking about a career And then I learned about this thing called investment banking. But way too late, because you're supposed to kind of network your way in and join like these internships well, in, yeah, internships but even to just to get an internship you're supposed to go to their like open days and you have to kind of you know wiggle your way in, and I didn't know all these things I wasn't talking I didn't have any friends who did this kind of thing. Can I identify? Yeah. So that so I was way too late. And then what I did at some point is I just called Lehman Brothers, who had an office like on their like in the their the number in their phone book basically and they just pick up the phone, you know like the receptionist pick up and they said, oh, I want to speak with this and this person. Like, no one ever did something like that and so this was the first time someone just you know straight up kind of cold called them, like, how do I get an internship and they were like, no no it's too late. And then I used a trick that I learned from telemarketing, and it's a very, very simple trick I think it's like you learned this in the book, it's like a what if? Question so I said, okay, what if I still want to join as an intern what should I do? Now, how do you answer a question like that? You know. And so I had to use some all kind of things like this trying to sell people like broadband lines or insurance products. And then he just started to laugh like he thought it was such a And then he just started to laugh like he thought it was such a kind of ballsy thing to ask, you know and they had, never seen anything like that. And then he was like well asking never seen anything like that. And then he was like well asking a question like this, maybe get you gets you in you know and then they invited me, and I really threw everything into the interview. And they were like, well, this guy seems to be so eager like we might you know, and he's you know let's just give him an internship, because he seems really hungry and I worked really my ass off during the interview, during the internship they told me I couldn't get hired after the internship but I still worked my ass off and I think they also were like wow even we told him we will not hire him, he still works so hard. Maybe we still hire him after all and so that's kind of how I got in so maybe lesson for some of the younger listeners you know yeah. Yeah, be eager don't be afraid to throw yourself into something even if you're not sure if you're gonna get what you want. So, yeah, then I so then I got a job at Lehman Brothers which was a lot of fun and I really enjoyed, but it was also crazy working hours like, more than 100 hours a week sometimes like literally working until midnight was considered early often worked until 3:00am was very normal. So imagine, yeah, this for 4 years. Then Lehman went bankrupt, famous bankruptcy. I don't know if you know about it? The 2008 crisis. So I was Ine of those guys walking out of the building with a box, which was just a, yeah, surreal but also kind of interesting experience. I also learned a lot in that because investment banks, especially the American ones, are extremely hierarchical. You have to see all your levels. It's like a pyramid and you really look up to the people high up there like gods, like the big you know the big deal makers. And then one, suddenly on Monday, when they announced this bankruptcy, like, it was just anarchy and everybody was the same all the total breakdown of all hierarchy from one day to the other. So, and so, it also gave me a new perspective to take all this kind of facade and like a shiny building with marble everywhere to also not take these things so seriously you know, it actually doesn't necessarily mean everything is solid just because people pretend that it's also solid. One of my colleagues, kind of, not really a boss, but just, he was like a little bit above me. He started his own firm in that time in London, and I joined him. I thought it was exciting. Was that the time in when you joined Nomura or? That exactly, well, this, no, so, okay, I'm skipping one part. So when I wanted to ask you, how did your tasks differ in a crisis after the crisis like if it was more difficult to work or not? So when Lehman went bankrupt, we didn't know what was gonna happen and even our salaries were not paid immediately because there was no money in the European entity, like, of, there was a whole scandal actually that the entity, like, of, there was a whole scandal actually that the American entity did, like, a, what's called, a cash sweep. It's apparently possible if you're really big like during the weekend, day pulled out all the cash from the European entities so there was like literally no money to pay anybody even for the same month, and so we all started to look for jobs basically but I was for some reason, I remember that I was for me, it was all kind of a joke and I wasn't taking it very seriously. You know I was also still young so it was all a bit of a joke to me for some reason. And then Nomura showed up. They acquired our team. They said, ok, we'll pay your salary, pay your bonus. They thought it was an amazing opportunity to acquire a team of respected you know M&A bankers and so they took us over I worked for Nomura for about 6 months or something. But I just didn't like the culture, and all the best people left to other banks to JP Morgan, Morgan Stanley I got really demotivated. And I asked this colleague like hey can I join you? And he was like, yeah, sure, but I cannot pay your salary so then I was like, I don't care I just wanna I was just wanna get out so that was the transition. So then you did you also found that NOAH Advisors that you became equity partner? Yes, it's a bit of a complicated story but yes. Basically, yeah, I became an equity partner so with Marco, the being like the main guy and me being kind of the second guy and he gave me some equity and but especially also commission in the deals that we closed and so yeah it was just the 2 of us. Later a few more people joined. Marco was the founder was really like an amazing deal maker and networker like, people who know him know that he's like yeah it's really like a tornado, but in a good way. And I was kind of in the background you know doing the spreadsheets and the Powerpoints and actually you know yeah move the analytical guy moving things along in trying to close these deals. And every year we usually had 1 or 2 deals that we successfully so a deal means we helped a startup selling their business which was also life changing for those founders. Like, some got, you know, some made hundreds of millions or tens of millions like completely changed their life. So you also know them really, really well. These processes these sale processes can take a year sometimes they don't always go very smooth. Yeah, but the, so this is the time because it was so much work every time like selling a company and trying to find the buyers is very difficult and it happened trying to find the buyers is very difficult and it happened a few times that we worked for a year on a deal and then our customer was like, yeah, it's not really working out and then they themselves found suddenly a buyer, like, and then we did didn't get paid. found suddenly a buyer, like, and then we did didn't get paid. And it made me think, like, damn, like, how can we build a system where we don't miss like where every potential buyer gets found and that's how this the idea for Dealroom got started. Is one question, last question before that. How do media and tech deals differ from other types of deals in M&A? Well, so I was, I, what I did at Lehman was called media and telecommunications so at that time these were kind of like big B2B publishers like companies like Elsevier, and your question is how they are different from tech or? From media and tech, how they differ from other industries? From other industries. Do you have something particular particularly special about them? Probably yes. Like, for example, consumer or industrial where other and oil and gas are probably more predictable in a sense and so the do you have specific multiples and or fintech for example banks are valued with very consistent frameworks let's say, you have all these frameworks. Media is kind of a, it's very diverse you know it's actually a mix of very very types different types of different businesses what you also have in tech now it's actually not really a sector it's more like almost like a motion of a company or something so it's very diverse and so you have companies it included like Tom Tom which was at that time a very hot navigation company but then you also had like some cable companies so there is a lot of hype, and it's less predictable let's say. And then you started Dealroom and from what I research it a bit, Dealroom wasn't the big database that we know now. It is, it was like a kind of marketplace at the beginning? Yeah, exactly. So back to the like the original idea was when I was working on all those deals I we didn't we were not able to close certain deals I couldn't find the right buyer that made me think, I, we need some system to connect companies and investors and so initially I wanted to build some kind of CRM and yeah some kind of two sided marketplace. That was actually the initial idea. That, hence the name Dealroom like it was kind of like meant as a room a virtual room where people can make deals. People like the idea but it was in practice a bit harder to make it work because what ends up happening is that actually the best deals don't go to they don't want to use something innovative like that they want to go the traditional way and more keep it hush hush and it yeah it's a bit like online dating, like, it, although that has changed but in the past that was kind of for losers let's say that has changed of course. I think. But this was also like people said yeah this is an amazing idea. Ok, do you want to use it? No, no, I prefer to keep it private and so that's also a lesson if sometimes people say they are interested in something but they just wanna be nice and they people vote in the end with their feet, you know. And so to get it off the ground someone said with their feet, you know. And so to get it off the ground someone said you know, why don't you add some data yourself to create to start the flywheel? Because I was still believing in the idea we published some lists of start ups and that you know that got traction and then some VC from the US contacted us. Oh, can we buy this data? And I was like, ok, sure like, I needed revenue, like, ASAP. Yes. So I sold it I think they didn't come back after this, but so it was a one off. The city of Amsterdam, I got into a meeting with them and they said, oh, we want a map of, well, I pitched them actually the idea to build a map of startups in Amsterdam that got us a bit of money. It was really in kind of in desperation already doing it for 2 years or something and not making money and kind of it was kind of hopeless at that point. it was kind of hopeless at that point. Even my own few angel investors were like they were clearly not believing in it anymore but yeah I was I kept on hustling, writing a newsletter, writing a blog. I started writing more. And one day during a vacation, I was in Brazil. I wrote a blog and it's like I saw something and I had this instinct to write about it. And that went really viral. So it was a competitor like a much bigger American competitor wrote some kind of research about the UK, like saying, like, oh, the UK funding is got like doubled or something like that and according to my data, it wasn't doubling. So then I wrote about it so I, like, I wrote, like, it's like, hey, you know, like, hey, the roast. Yeah I roasted. It was a bit of a roast exactly. I was very polite because it was the time of Boris Johnson was the mayor of London. It was actually about London and the media and hated Boris Johnson. You know, that's they always, media always has an agenda when they write things this is they always, media always has an agenda when they write things this is another lesson. So they were like, oh yeah, we're now we're gonna get Boris Johnson, like, here, look, this report actually says that venture capital isn't up 50% and then with a photo venture capital isn't up 50% and then with a photo of Boris Johnson with his head through his hair like making him look like an idiot. And so, yeah, that whole story. And then that other American company made the mistake to reply to my roast, so it went only more viral and then like literally the next week I got 2 big venture capital customers. Actually, it's not that they came to buy but they came to inquire and then I did sell to them pretty hard and convince them to become customers. And then, you know, then it started like ah, okay, maybe I'm don't quit just yet and like very slowly it turned into a business. How do different investors differ? Investors or profiles, because you have investors VCs corporate governments in the use or Dealroom, when there are technological shifts like AI quantum like how do they react to these changes these kind of investors like VCs? And let's say personas, customer personas, right? I mean, VCs are, yeah, they are always looking for the next thing that's that is their job but they are also yeah they are also kind of followers of trends, but yeah, the best VCs they that's that is the unique thing that they see trends actually before they happen. And yeah, our role is to help them actually with that. In these shifts how do you react you are answering me that they jump on the trends but some of them are anticipate the trends. Some trends are just very, very obvious, like AI. How do you play on a trend like AI? Like, it's I think it's very, very difficult. I'm glad I'm not a VC. But there, then there were other things like crypto where yeah I don't know like I do respect the VCs that just like stay true they keep believing in it even if it takes 30 years it doesn't matter they stick to what they believe in. Personally, I was never yeah I was never I never it never excited me this technology because I have a finance background I think anybody who has a finance background doesn't get it including me. The AI is like, yeah, I'm completely AI peeled, and yes, it is change, it changes everything. I really liked the Goldman Sachs guy I actually don't know who it was, and I randomly listen to him talking but yeah that I what he said this exactly what I said to my team is you move from an individual contributor to, yeah, first you be then you became a manager of agents. But actually, if you really get it you manage a team of agents, you basically become an executive and it's really like that everybody in my team is yeah, I am, I want them to become mini CEO''s because the possibilities are endless and we're still coping with it. And also, regarding governments and corporates, what did you learn about working with them in Dealroom? Yeah, well, I, governments have the reputation of being very slow and difficult to work with. It's not really like I don't really agree with that. Corporates, like, take Microsoft or some of these other big companies are much more difficult to work with than governments to go through their compliance and bureaucracy you have no idea. And also, there's always a lot of like turn around there are people who are in those organizations who are not motivated at all. They just wanna do as little work as possible and you are just kind of making their, you know, they just wanna go home basically, and not deal with any new vendors obviously it's not all like that, but I just wanna say that government like that, but I just wanna say that government actually often they are very motivated people, they often are very excited by what we do and what we can do for them, and they are very fun to work with. Yes, there is for them, and they are very fun to work with. Yes, there is some bureaucracy. Sometimes it takes very long to close a deal but they are very reliable during that process and so you can you have faith that you will you know win the deal once you go through the yeah through the process. How would you say in short form your role evolved across the different stages of Dealroom? It's a very good question. So it does evolve, obviously there, yeah, I mean, I know I remember in the beginning you know I do my own VAT returns and all this kind of admin things and I'm glad I could delegate lots of things. But I keep learning a lot about delegation, and I really love to be in the details and I'm very I feel very vindicated by the recent and I'm very I feel very vindicated by the recent trend with this founder mode to be in the details, and, like, being in the details is cool again. in the details, and, like, being in the details is cool again. And I have felt actually a lot of pressure implicit pressure from people that they think the way to run a business is to, you know, hire good people and let them do what they do. I think a lot of people I have learned the same lesson. I have heard this from a lot of founders. I'm very in I in all of let's say Nik Storonsky, the founder of Revolut, who was just talking here right now he seems to have really like there is a lot of delegation definitely happening convinced that he knows a lot of details about what's going on everywhere and he has built the system around that. He mentioned something about having a system where he kind of knows everybody's strengths the system knows everybody's strengths and weaknesses. Like, it sounds like he has really nailed the how to build a large organization so you don't you never wanna lose touch of the smallest details and I try sometimes to make the analogy with a restaurant. When you go to a restaurant you and the chef is still there, you know and still pays attention to all the details that's what you want, right? And that's why I think in also now in Silicon Valley, this the most successful companies have still the founder running it so you want that founder energy in the company. Recently raised a 7 million this year around, I assume. I was wondering what is the purpose of this new round? Very good question. So the purpose is to invest more in our data capabilities especially outside of Europe so one of our yeah the government that we talked about is an important segment. So the public sector includes government but also government related agencies, universities, R&D centers. We help them with mapping the ecosystem. It's like understanding holistically what's the talent situation like? Capital? Where are the bottlenecks where is the ecosystem working? That's like a close to 40% of our revenue. And we are yeah, very successful in Europe and we wanted to still keep building in Europe but we also wanna expand globally and we've started to get a lot of inbound interest from the US and from the Middle East, all over the world actually and so we raise this money to strengthen our data capabilities and do that rollout. I was wondering, before we talk about M&A bankers, about human relations how to get deals that usually are not on the digital world right? How does, how would you get deals with for Dealroom that are really interesting if all that all these deals happen really on 1 to 1 conversations or others right how do you incentivize startups or investors to put their data in the platform? How do you get the best deals? How do you get the data on those? Well, I mean, once a deal gets announced, usually deals get announced and so then we just go get it from the announcement there are also deals funding rounds that sometimes do not get announced and then we still try to get our hands on it but it's harder. So you can sometimes find it from the official records and it depends a bit per country whether you're actually required to disclose this or not. And even if you are it's sometimes a bit difficult to shift through all those filings, because they are not all relevant. Sometimes it's a filing of 1 employee selling their shares and sometimes it's actually a funding round. But that's what we do, and that's what we're specialized in and like we have a yeah a team half of our team works either on data collection or like building the infrastructure for data collection. So there is a still groundwork basically to do a lot. What's the vision for Dealroom in this upcoming years? So the we raised this 7 million as you mentioned to expand globally. Yeah, we want to turn Dealroom into the source of record for ecosystems globally. We basically focus on every ecosystem in the world, if you think about it the biggest ecosystem is obviously the biggest ecosystem is obviously the Bay Area but they shouldn't have a monopoly on building successful big companies, and they actually don't on building successful big companies, and they actually don't so we focus. I mean, we would love to have the Bay Area also as a customer, but our main focus is everybody outside of the Bay Area, because, yeah, while I'm in awe of the businesses that are being built there and it's a huge inspiration to have such a concentration of value creation and power is not healthy for anyone. I would love to see SPACE X equivalent you know it's one of the most amazing companies ever built, I think, but to have more of them built in the rest of the world so it's I hope you know I'm against trying to rein in the success of others but we should actually try to have more of those successes all over the world. And if you look at the talent is much more distributed. Ideas are distributed but you need the infrastructure and the culture to also be more distributed and our platform helps with that. And how AI is shaping Dealroom? It's totally changing everything. So our data collection methods are now heavily agentic. And, yeah, I'm one of my main priorities right now is to get everyone in our team to think more like a CEO of agents. to think more like a CEO of agents. And which are the challenges of Dealroom as per 2026? I think the main challenge of Dealroom is maintaining a entrepreneurial culture so we've existed already for 12 years. For a startup that's quite old but as a some investors said like early stage is a stage of mind, state of mind. And I totally agree with that. So even if you are a very large successful company you want to have that early stage state of mind, and we need to have that like sense of urgency we need to kind of be a little bit in crisis mode every day and not everybody likes that, actually. Like, a lot of people want to work at a startup because they you know they think it's cool with like playing ping pong and things like that but you need to have that really that urgency and every day is a bit of a it is a bit of a fire drill and you need to kind of just be able to relax but also enjoy it but also you know embrace that: pressure makes diamonds. Pressure makes diamonds. So that's the that's always the biggest challenge it the biggest challenge always comes from within. And if you could say it to yourself when you started in Lehman any anything or any lesson what would you say to yourself? Have kids early. Ok, good one. And if you would who's one character either historical or current one that you would like to meet? Yeah, I would go back to the what I said in the beginning Warren Buffett. I think, like, I think he's really yeah, such a amazing character as like so much wisdom maybe. Nro 2 would be Paul Graham from YC although I feel like I don't know I actually don't really feel like I need to meet him because his Twitter feed is amazing and I'm getting everything from there if there's yeah maybe to have dinner with someone, it would be Warren Buffett. Ok, perfect. That was it. Thank you, Yoram.
