BRANDONGOTLIEB

I spend my days thinking about how we move money, spend money, and save money. Eternally optimistic.

What I'm thinking about right now ●

Agents, ads & small businesses

Three threads I keep pulling on: how AI agents will actually pay merchants — cards, acceptance, trust. What happens to advertising as people turn to AI instead of a browser to find answers, buy things, and get tasks done (this site's inbox auction is my first experiment there). And how all of it can work for small businesses instead of around them. If you're building at any of these intersections, or looking for a backer for your SMB, I want to hear about it.

Live: the inbox auctionBid now →

Experience

01
Neobank for the self-employed, backed by Sequoia, Lightspeed, and Founders Fund. I build the payments machine behind the product — the bank partnership, the money-movement rails, and the full web of partners it takes to support a large card program.
PaymentsPartnerships
2023—now
02
COO and founding team member of a neobank built for college students. Backed by Sam Altman and Village Global. Built the banking platform on Treasury Prime, landed the charter-bank partnership, and secured a $500k venture debt line.
Neobank0→1
2022
03
Launched the partnerships function at this landlord-insurance startup — built a network of 25 partners across proptech and property management, plus the marketing and onboarding that kept them.
InsurtechPartnerships
2021
04
Ran go-to-market for an employer-rewarded emergency savings platform — new channels drove a 6x increase in inbound leads and a pipeline of 50 leading benefits brokers.
GTMFintech
2021

About.

I'm a payments and partnerships operator who likes the machinery most people never see — card programs, banking rails, and the deals that hold them together. Today that's at Found, a neobank for the self-employed, where I support payments partnerships.

Before Found I was COO and a founding team member at Nox, built partnership programs at Steadily and Sunny Day Fund, founded NXTSTOR, and spent time as a Venture Partner at Contrary Capital. The through-line: early-stage companies, ambiguous problems, and revenue lines that didn't exist before.

Off the clock you'll find me hiking, skiing, or around airplanes. If I'm not outside I'm usually tinkering with some side project — occasionally they work out, but I always learn something.

Currently: Payments Partnerships @ Found
Previously: Nox, Contrary Capital, NXTSTOR
Excited about: Agentic payments, SMBs
Based in: Seattle, WA