# Stripe: Patrick and John Collison (2018)

- Show: [How I Built This](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/podcast/how-i-built-this)
- Published: 2020-03-09
- Length: 42m
- Page: https://hardwarepodcasts.com/podcast/how-i-built-this/2020-03-09-stripe-patrick-and-john-collison-2018

## Summary

Patrick and John Collison, founders of Stripe, explain how they identified the friction in online payments and built a developer-focused infrastructure to solve it, starting with just seven lines of code. They detail their journey from selling their previous company, Automatic, to securing Peter Thiel's early investment and navigating complex banking partnerships to launch Stripe. The brothers discuss their strategy of partnering with financial institutions rather than fighting them, and how this approach helped them scale to serve major companies like Lyft and Shopify. They also reflect on the relentless nature of building a high-growth technology company and the importance of execution over valuation.

## Chapters

- [0:00](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/podcast/how-i-built-this/2020-03-09-stripe-patrick-and-john-collison-2018#t=0) Introduction: Stripe's $9 Billion Valuation and the Collison Brothers
- [3:46](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/podcast/how-i-built-this/2020-03-09-stripe-patrick-and-john-collison-2018#t=226) Early Life in Ireland and Learning to Code
- [8:45](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/podcast/how-i-built-this/2020-03-09-stripe-patrick-and-john-collison-2018#t=525) Automatic: Managing eBay Inventory and the Sale
- [11:19](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/podcast/how-i-built-this/2020-03-09-stripe-patrick-and-john-collison-2018#t=679) Identifying the Payment Problem at Harvard and MIT
- [15:57](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/podcast/how-i-built-this/2020-03-09-stripe-patrick-and-john-collison-2018#t=957) Building the Prototype and Securing Peter Thiel's Investment
- [23:53](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/podcast/how-i-built-this/2020-03-09-stripe-patrick-and-john-collison-2018#t=1433) Stripe's Developer-First Approach and Key Customers
- [29:03](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/podcast/how-i-built-this/2020-03-09-stripe-patrick-and-john-collison-2018#t=1743) Partnering with Banks and Avoiding Competitors
- [33:44](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/podcast/how-i-built-this/2020-03-09-stripe-patrick-and-john-collison-2018#t=2024) The Relentless Nature of Startup Growth and Valuation

## Topics

- [Starting a product company](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/topic/starting-a-company)
- [Validation & product-market fit](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/topic/validation-and-product-market-fit)
- [Pricing, margins & unit economics](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/topic/pricing-and-unit-economics)
- [Leadership, teams & culture](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/topic/leadership-and-culture)

## Most relevant to

early-stage companies

## Mentioned

- Stripe (company)
- Automatic (company)
- PayPal (company)
- Lyft (company)
- Shopify (company)
- Peter Thiel (other)
- eBay (company)
- Amazon (company)
- Instacart (company)
- Kickstarter (company)
- Target (company)
- Warby Parker (company)
- MIT (other)
- Harvard (other)
- Lisp (other)

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- [Afterschool Podcast, Episode 1 - Rich Brilliant Willing](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/podcast/core77-podcast/2013-08-19-afterschool-podcast-episode-1-rich-brilliant-willing) (Core77 Podcast)
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## Citing this page

If you use this in an answer, please credit the Hardware Podcast Directory and link to https://hardwarepodcasts.com/podcast/how-i-built-this/2020-03-09-stripe-patrick-and-john-collison-2018. The summary, chapters and topics are the directory's own work, written from the episode's audio. The episode itself, its title and its audio belong to How I Built This.