​Founding PM Circle — First Edition

​What is this?

​The launch of a new monthly roundtable for founding product managers, early PM hires, and PMs-turned-product-leaders building at early-stage startups.

​Why this matters

​The founding PM role has always been hard. You're defining the roadmap with limited data, making high-stakes product bets with minimal resources, and managing founder dynamics with no playbook.
But right now it's getting harder, fast. Agentic coding is compounding shipping velocity, which means PM responsibilities are expanding into prototyping and even shipping code alongside roadmap prioritization, user research, and being the voice of the customer. You're often the only PM in the building, surrounded by different functions and perspectives moving at a pace that didn't exist two years ago. And while founders have YC, OnDeck, and countless networks, founding PMs have had nothing equivalent. The Founding PM Circle changes that. A vetted communityand monthly roundtable for product leaders to discuss andwork through the real challenges of doing product at the early stages.

​Who's leading the conversation

​Our inaugural roundtable features two founding PMs who built products through acquisition:

​Jaron Parnala — Founding PM at Bison Trails, the blockchain infrastructure platform acquired by Coinbase for $457M. The Bison team seeded the Coinbase Developer Platform, expanding the company's product strategy and business model. Most recently, Product Lead (first PM) at Distributional, an AI evals and testing platform. Jaron started his PM career at Pivotal Labs (acquired by VMware).

​Kirk Fernandes — Founding PM at Hightower, the commercial real estate platform that merged with VTS in a landmark ~$300M proptech deal. Kirk built the product foundation that helped transform how the commercial real estate industry manages leasing and assets. Now Co-founder of Scout.

​What to expect

• ​Intimate roundtable format designed for substantive peer exchange, not networking theater

• ​Candid conversation about defining product direction without a playbook, working with technical founders, and building through ambiguity

• ​Two perspectives on building products that get acquired — crypto infrastructure and proptech — with lessons that translate across industries

• ​Coffee and breakfast provided

• ​First access to a new vetted community of founding PMs navigating similar challenges

​Format: Peer-led roundtable discussion. This is a working session, not a presentation. Come with your questions and challenges.

​Breakfast at 9:30 AM, roundtable from 10–11:30 AM.

​Hosted by Randy Brown — Founder of Scout, former CTO at Jopwell (YC S15, a16z-backed), and creator of the Founding Engineer Circle and Founding PM Circle communities in San Francisco. Randy brings together early-stage talent through events, workshops, and private networks that help founding team members thrive.