In this conversational format, Marc will address questions on the following topics: The birth of Netflix, entrepreneurship, innovation,
Marc’s bestselling book, That Will Never Work; the value of persistence and optimism in business, leadership, company culture, tech ventures, Marc’s successes/failures at Netflix & other companies, Marc’s podcast, environmental advocacy and balance.
Netflix Founder and startup CEO Marc Randolph shares the unlikely story of how a handful of dreamers with no money and a bad idea, created the company that eventually brought down Blockbuster.
Packed with dozens of stories that trace the dramatic ups and downs of those first exciting years, Marc weaves an inspiring story that shows the value of innovation, persistence and optimism.
Along the way he shares some of the many values that he believes made Netflix successful, including a focus on analytics and testing, its novel corporate culture, and its almost fanatical obsession with focus.
Equal parts inspiration, start up story, and practical tips, it’s a message that resonates well with anyone who appreciates a good “overcoming adversity” story.
Marc Randolph is a veteran Silicon Valley entrepreneur, advisor, investor, and the co-founder and first CEO of Netflix. Widely recognized for shaping the early strategy and product vision that propelled Netflix into a global powerhouse with more than 200 million subscribers, Marc has spent more than four decades launching and scaling successful businesses. He served on Netflix’s board until 2003 and has since founded or co-founded six additional startups, mentored hundreds of early-stage founders, and invested in dozens of technology ventures.
In addition to his foundational role at Netflix, Marc most recently co-founded Looker Data Sciences, an analytics software company acquired by Google for $2.6 billion. His board work spans Solo Brands, Augment Technologies, Dishcraft Technologies, and the Truckee Donner Land Trust, reflecting his broad engagement in both tech and mission-driven organizations.
Marc is the author of the internationally bestselling memoir That Will Never Work: The Birth of Netflix and The Amazing Life of an Idea, which offers an insider’s look at the early entrepreneurial journey behind one of the world’s most transformative companies.
Marc Randolph is a veteran Silicon Valley entrepreneur, advisor, and investor. As co-founder and first CEO of Netflix, he laid much of the groundwork for a service that’s grown to over 200 million subscribers, and fundamentally altered how the world experiences media.
He also served on the Netflix board of directors until retiring from the company in 2003. Marc’s career as an entrepreneur spans four decades. He’s founded or co-founded six other successful startups, mentored hundreds of early-stage entrepreneurs, and as an investor has helped seed dozens of successful tech ventures (and just as many unsuccessful ones).
Most recently, Marc co-founded analytics software company Looker Data Sciences, which was acquired by Google in 2019 for $2.6 billion. He currently sits on the boards of Solo Brands, Augment Technologies, Dishcraft Technologies and the Truckee Donner Land Trust.
Marc Randolph is also the author of the internationally best-selling memoir, That Will Never Work: The Birth of Netflix and The Amazing Life of an Idea which tells the untold story of Netflix. He is host of the top-10 Apple podcast That Will Never Work, where he works directly with entrepreneurs to provide 1-on-1 mentoring. Marc is also a judge and investor on Entrepreneur Magazine’s Elevator Pitch web series.
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Co-founder and first CEO of Netflix, Marc Randolph delivers pivotal lessons on experimentation, risk-taking, and how scrappy problem-solving shapes the world’s most transformative companies.
In this video, Marc Randolph reflects on how curiosity, experimentation, and relentless validation shaped his entrepreneurial journey, most famously with Netflix. Drawing on decades of startup experience, Marc illustrates that innovation rarely begins with certainty — instead, it emerges from testing ideas, learning quickly from failures, and moving forward guided by real feedback rather than intuition alone.
Marc unpacks the early days of Netflix, where many ideas were tested before arriving at the final model that resembled the business we know today. He highlights the importance of rapid experimentation, low-cost testing, and iteration as core tools of entrepreneurial success. Despite naysayers and skepticism — including the notion that the idea “will never work” — Marc emphasizes that every idea deserves to be tested until it either proves itself or teaches you something valuable. summaries.com
He also discusses the broader mindset of entrepreneurs: approaching uncertainty with curiosity, accepting that there are no guarantees, and leaning into doing — rather than waiting for perfect strategy or crystal-clear answers. These traits, he suggests, are what separate impactful founders from those who stall before they start.
00:00-01:15 Introduction to entrepreneurial uncertainty and the value of testing ideas quickly.
01:16-02:30 Early Netflix experimentation: testing assumptions, learning from small failures, and iterating toward viable product-market fit.
02:31-03:45 The role of curiosity and resilience in founder success — embracing doubt, skepticism, and iteration as tools, not obstacles.
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