Traditional outbound sales is ineffective and 'dead' unless it is executed in a highly personalized, human-like manner, as generic outreach response rates have fallen below 0.01%.
Conventional venture capital advice, such as conquering one market at a time, is obsolete in the current AI landscape where rapid, multi-front expansion is necessary to outpace fierce competition.
A significant portion of the traditional SaaS market is over, as companies will increasingly opt to build their own custom software for core applications rather than rely on third-party vendors.
Corporate Venture Capital should be leveraged as a direct distribution channel by contractually obligating investors to generate specific amounts of revenue, with penalties for non-performance.
Internal AI agents should be treated as productive team members, with deals they close resulting in commission payouts to incentivize their development and adoption within the company.
Initial GTM Phase
Reports that ElevenLabs' initial go-to-market strategy, which targeted large media and entertainment studios, was unsuccessful, forcing a strategic pivot.
Strategic Pivot
Following the initial GTM failure, ElevenLabs successfully entered new markets, with AI agents and customer support becoming 'fantastically huge' and the fastest-growing business segments, respectively.
Internal AI Development
Describes the internal development and deployment of AI agents for sales and customer success, noting that the AI customer success manager has already closed deals and is generating revenue.
CVC Investment Strategy
Outlines the implementation of a distribution strategy involving investment from Corporate Venture Capital arms like Woven Capital, Deutsche Telekom, and Telefonica, with unique revenue-commitment clauses.
Current Year
Details plans for massive expansion, aiming to hire approximately 120 new sales staff to grow the team from 130 to under 250 people.
2026 Goal
Articulates a personal goal for 2026: for his venture fund, Baobab Ventures, to have backed three unicorns and for ElevenLabs to exceed $1 billion in revenue.
▶AI-Powered Sales & OperationsApr 2026
Reina details ElevenLabs' extensive internal use of AI for core business functions, including an AI Sales Development Representative for inbound leads, an AI proposals manager for RFPs, and a revenue-generating AI customer success manager. This theme highlights a strategy of building internal tools to achieve significant productivity gains, with a stated goal of a 50% improvement for the sales team.
This demonstrates a shift from buying third-party SaaS tools to building proprietary AI systems that are deeply integrated into workflows, potentially creating a significant operational advantage and changing the cost structure of a sales organization.
▶Unconventional Go-to-Market & Growth StrategyApr 2026
Reina champions an extremely aggressive growth model, characterized by setting sales quotas at a 20x OTE ratio, far exceeding industry norms. This is coupled with a rejection of traditional VC advice to focus on a single market, instead pursuing multiple opportunities simultaneously due to the rapid pace of the AI industry.
This high-risk, high-reward approach suggests that in hyper-competitive AI markets, the cost of moving too slowly is perceived as greater than the risk of spreading resources too thin.
▶Strategic Use of Corporate Venture CapitalApr 2026
Reina outlines a novel approach to Corporate Venture Capital (CVC) where investments are contractually tied to revenue generation. CVCs like Deutsche Telekom and Toyota's Woven Capital must bring in a specified amount of revenue for ElevenLabs within a set timeframe, or face penalties, effectively turning the cap table into a committed distribution channel.
This model aligns investor and company incentives in a uniquely direct way, transforming passive capital into an active, accountable sales and distribution partnership, which could be a new paradigm for strategic investments.
▶AI Market Consolidation and DisruptionApr 2026
Reina predicts a future where the AI landscape is dominated by a few 'blue chip' incumbents (OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, ElevenLabs) that will acquire emerging foundational model startups. He also believes the traditional SaaS market is partially over, as companies will increasingly build their own core applications, and that managed services have a strong moat against open-source alternatives.
Reina's perspective indicates he believes the AI market is maturing rapidly towards a power-law distribution, where platform-level players will capture most of the value through acquisition and by providing essential, managed infrastructure.