Sep 29, 2026 · 33 min · 13 segments
Fazeshift is building AI-native accounts receivable automation for mid-market and enterprise companies. In a recent episode of Front Lines, we sat down with Caitlin Leksana, Co-Founder and CEO of…
Caitlin LeksanaGuest
Brett StapperHost
So as you started to think about going after this problem, I'm sure you were studying others who've tried to do it.
Why were their efforts unsuccessful? Or where did you see as your opening and your opportunity here?
It was a very sort of like... almost like bottoms up approach to building a startup.
So our first startup, we came very much of like where we think there's the white space, what's missing in the market.
And so we learned how to do a proper startup, which means you just talk to as many people that are willing to talk to you and you just learn as much as possible.
And so I wasn't sort of asking like, oh, what did the other companies miss? And all this, you know, sort of actually like VC speak.
It was more of like, what are the problems? How many people have this problem? And can we solve it with technology? And then we took a very early startup mindset of like, find one customer who loves what you have to offer and just find the second one and then the third one.
So I cold called, cold emailed, cold LinkedIn DMed like 100 VPs, directors of finance and accounting.
Do you have 30 minutes to teach me about this? How you do AR at your company? And they'd get in a call and they would rant at me for 30 minutes about how painful accounts receivable was.
And they'd send me a very long, thoughtful message about all of the problems that they had.
And that was the sort of pull from the market I don't think I felt at the prior startup.
So as you started to think about going after this problem, I'm sure you were studying others who've tried to do it.
Why were their efforts unsuccessful? Or where did you see as your opening and your opportunity here?
It was a very sort of like... almost like bottoms up approach to building a startup.
So our first startup, we came very much of like where we think there's the white space, what's missing in the market.
And so we learned how to do a proper startup, which means you just talk to as many people that are willing to talk to you and you just learn as much as possible.
And so I wasn't sort of asking like, oh, what did the other companies miss? And all this, you know, sort of actually like VC speak.
It was more of like, what are the problems? How many people have this problem? And can we solve it with technology? And then we took a very early startup mindset of like, find one customer who loves what you have to offer and just find the second one and then the third one.
So I cold called, cold emailed, cold LinkedIn DMed like 100 VPs, directors of finance and accounting.
Do you have 30 minutes to teach me about this? How you do AR at your company? And they'd get in a call and they would rant at me for 30 minutes about how painful accounts receivable was.
And they'd send me a very long, thoughtful message about all of the problems that they had.
And that was the sort of pull from the market I don't think I felt at the prior startup.
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