karri saarinen

Karri advocates raising only when on the cusp of a clear next step, selecting investors for value alignment (long-term view, no markup pressure) over brand, keeping boards lean with pure investors who know their place, and using angels/operators off-board for tactical help.

Linear demonstrates a capital-efficient SaaS model: 3→5→10→20→120 people while doubling ARR each year ($1M→$5M→$10-15M→...), staying default alive, and delaying hires until design/engineering bandwidth visibly breaks.

AI gives every role code access, blurring traditional swim lanes; however, Karri argues the winning teams will still separate exploration (designers in Figma/Canvas) from production (engineers reviewing agent output) and will pause to reflect on feedback rather than ship continuously.

Linear is moving beyond pure issue tracking by ingesting Salesforce notes and customer requests, closing the feedback loop between sales/customers and product teams so engineers see raw voice-of-customer without PM translation loss.