Odinian Beta

My guest this week is Auren Hoffman. Auren is the CEO of Safegraph, which curates data on physical locations. He also founded LiveRamp, a public data connectivity business. Auren knows more about data businesses than almost anyone I know and that is the topic of today’s discussion. We look at the business of data from every angle and finish with a fun masterclass on how to host a dinner party. Please enjoy my conversation with Auren Hoffman.

For the full show notes, transcript, and links to mentioned content, check out the episode page here.

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Show Notes

[00:03:16] – [First question] – His 2×2 matrix for categorizing different types of data businesses

[00:04:59] – An example of what he calls a religion company in his matrix

[00:07:03] – His notion of data currency

[00:08:23] – His definition of a great business

[00:09:46] – An example of a so-called application religion company in his proverbial matrix

[00:11:24] – Co-op and non-profit business models within and outside of the data sphere

[00:13:35] – The truth application quadrant of his matrix

[00:15:00] – The more pure-data-oriented truth category of the matrix

[00:16:18] – How data has exploded in prevalence for the business world as a whole

[00:18:57] – How to think about the end market for data and its demand

[00:21:09] – Characteristics of a good data set and how to identify it

[00:23:14] – Other factors that impact the usability of a data set

[00:24:30] – Optimizing data collection itself

[00:26:30] – The slow growth that’s typical of early-stage data companies

[00:27:27] – Market share considerations for data businesses

[00:28:47] – Brand-building for data companies and how it can supercharge market share

[00:30:03] – Common struggles for data entrepreneurs

[00:31:55] – How he found a big problem that he could feasibly solve with data

[00:34:01] – The genesis of his business; SafeGraph

[00:35:15] – Progress in privacy protocols for gathering and mobilizing people’s data

[00:37:08] – The power of self-maintained and user-maintained databases

[00:38:34] – The kinds of data that SafeGraph gathers and how he foresees it expanding

[00:40:16] – Typical customers and use cases for SafeGraph’s data

[00:41:08] – How SafeGraph and other companies protect against data theft

[00:42:12] – Frequency of change as a proxy for the value of a given data set

[00:43:27] – How to optimize the systems of a business to continually gather and maintain accurate databases

[00:45:32] – Categorizing inbound data based on the most important criteria

[00:47:07] – The founder personalities he finds in the data industry

[00:48:36] – The most noteworthy or quintessential data businesses in his opinion

[00:49:53] – Why he feels the data truth quadrant of his matrix is underdeveloped

[00:50:30] – Bloomberg as an important data company to study

[00:51:42] – The importance of transparency in business and in data distribution

[00:53:07] – Failure modes that he sees most commonly in data-based startups

[00:53:53] – Data businesses becoming application businesses and vice-versa

[00:55:29] – Innovations in the join keys and mechanisms that enable data to travel

[00:57:35] – The great dinner parties he’s known for

[00:59:50] – How he makes the dinner parties appeal to introverts

[01:03:11] – Dead people he would most like to have as dinner guests

[01:04:09] – Questions he would ask the most influential religious figures

[01:04:58] – Why he thinks people are generally good and want to be inspired and passionate

[01:06:20] – The kindest thing anyone has ever done for him