Winners Welcome Podcast, Episode 2 with Ryan Williams, CEO and Founder of Cadre.

Most founders talk about disruption. Ryan Williams actually did it, and he picked one of the hardest industries in the world to do it in.

In the second episode of the Winners Welcome Podcast, we sit down with Ryan Williams, Co-Founder of Cadre, the technology platform that has powered more than $5B in real estate transactions and reshaped how investors access institutional-quality opportunities. Before founding Cadre, Ryan spent time at Goldman Sachs and Blackstone, where he saw firsthand how opaque, slow, and relationship-bound private markets really were. He left to build a company aimed at one of the most stubborn corners of finance: a $20 trillion asset class that had barely moved in decades.

The conversation moves through the moments that actually shape a founder. Raising more than $100M from top-tier investors sounds clean in a headline, but Ryan is candid about the version that does not make the press release. 95% of investors said no. Revenue went to zero. The market turned. He talks about what it takes to keep conviction when the people around you are quietly stepping back, why trust is the only real currency in private markets, and how transparency, data, and speed have become the defining moats in an AI era where talent matters more than capital and the next great companies will be built by founders who move before they feel ready.

Our podcast is sponsored by Gunderson Dettmer. #PoweredByGunderson

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About The Winners Welcome Podcast

The Winners Welcome Podcast brings elite founders and top investors into thoughtful conversations on pushing past possible, sharing the conviction, standards, and lessons behind building generational companies.

About Harlem Capital

Harlem Capital is a venture capital firm that backs the next generation of winners. The firm partners with exceptional founders with the irrational motivation to build generational companies. All Winners Welcome.

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