DoorDash
DoorDash's new CFO Mike Dinsdale
"I took five months off from May until now and really tried to think about which companies are going to be relevant for the next 20 years, how the world is changing, and where do I want to put myself next. DoorDash just stood out to me," Dinsdale said.
His hire comes at a key point for the three-year-old food delivery startup.
DoorDash says it is now cash-flow-positive in its early markets, but is reinvesting the money into continuing to grow against a burgeoning set of deep-pocketed competitors like Amazon and Uber.
In the past year, it's launched six new markets and now covers more than 250 cities across the US.
However, that growth still needs to keep pace with a crowded delivery space, where competitors like Postmates, Amazon, Uber, Caviar, Eat24, and GrubHub all fight to deliver food. Often, that competition means discount codes and subsidizing delivery rates.
Dinsdale doesn't see his competition's cash piles as deterrents to DoorDash's growth even if Uber has raised close to $15 billion compared to DoorDash's total of $187 million.
"They have not raised billions to attack what we're doing. They've raised billions to build out their driver network," Dinsdale said. "At the end of the day, it comes down to the same prioritization and focus across the company and it's our sole focus to win in this market, and I think that's where we end up beating them. And by the way, we are beating them in most markets."
There's "no question" that DoorDash will go public in the future, but it won't be the next financing the company does, Dinsdale said. Instead, his job is to make sure DoorDash is well-funded and building the company in a way that it will become profitable naturally.
"Maybe one of the most important things for businesses like this is just the ability to raise money, and I raised over $500 million at DocuSign over four rounds," Dinsdale said. "The ability to do that is important in a CFO for companies that are building out marketplaces. You have a curve that becomes profitable over time but certainly breaking into markets does cost money and as does continuing to develop products."