Tom Chavez’s Post

A startup studio is a tricky thing—you’ve got companies solving completely different problems at completely different stages of growth. Each one needs the independence to forge its own path, but they all need to be bound together by something deeper and more durable. When Vivek and I founded super{set}, we decided that unifying force would be a shared set of values. That led to many up-all-night conversations about what those values should be. This wasn’t a branding exercise or an afterthought—we were defining the through-line for super{set}, the North Star that would guide us, our investors, and ultimately, our teams. Luckily, this wasn’t our first rodeo. One of our values practically wrote itself: we compete fiercely and honorably. And I learned that from Omar Tawakol. Back when I was building Krux, Omar was the CEO of BlueKai—our biggest competitor. When I first went to meet him, my younger, less mature self was geared up for battle. But the moment we sat down for coffee, I realized something: Omar wasn’t some villainous rival—I was facing someone just as obsessed as I was with solving the problems that kept me up at night. Today, Omar joins super{set} as a general partner. We don’t need to onboard him to our values. He embodies them already. There could be no greater endorsement of the work we’re doing at super{set} than Omar’s desire to join us and build alongside us. I can’t wait to see what we can accomplish now that we’re finally on the same side of the table.