Building Meter for Decades, Not an Exit

• Meter: full-stack networking infra, founded 2015 with brother Sunil.
  • 4+ years heads-down R&D before launch — no premature go-to-market.
• Plans in 25-year horizons, not startup exit cycles.
• No OKRs — tracks unhappy customers instead.
  • Flexible planning prioritizes pace and intentionality over rigid frameworks.
• Owns full stack; contrasts with Cisco’s monopolistic channel lock-in.
• Business model changes treated as equally important as product or market.
• “Seller-market fit” over traditional sales channels — direct customer knowledge only.
• Navigated COVID, Apple M1 transition, and “a thousand bad days” without pivoting.
  • Operational resilience as a deliberate founding philosophy, not luck.
• Decouples management from formal authority — avoids meta-work and process overhead.

Anil Varanasi (Co-founder & CEO, Meter) — interviewed by Brett Berson, First Round Capital · 2025-12-10 · Read on review.firstround.com