At the end of last year, we decided to highlight Boston couples with a heavy hand in our local tech and venture ecosystem. We thought it'd be a short-term series spotlighting these startup power couples, but due to popular demand, we're bringing it back for an encore.
Meet Bettina Hein and Andreas Goeldi, a husband-wife duo who are execs at the same company. Hein is the founder and CEO of Pixability, a Boston-based startup offering video marketing and advertising tech. And Goeldi is the venture's CTO.
Previously, Hein co-founded SVOX, a Swiss speech technology company that was acquired by Nuance Communications for $125 million in 2011. Goeldi, on the other hand, had co-founded Namics, an online marketing agency, Blogwerk.com, the largest blog network in Germany, and Buzzient, a social media analytics startup.
We talked to Hein and Goeldi to hear more about how they came together and what it's like to work directly with your spouse on a startup.
Olivia Vanni: How did the two of you first meet?
Andreas Goeldi: We originally met at the University of St. Gallen in Switzerland, but for the first few years we were just friends of friends. We became a couple only when I was out of university and building my first startup. I helped Bettina with the startup event that she was creating at university, and things developed from there.
Bettina Hein: Two fun facts about us:
- I knew both of Andreas' parents way before we ever became a couple, so when I found out he was interested in dating me, I was already sure that he ticked the "Will I get along with his parents?" box.
- We started dating on a Friday the 13th, so it's been a lucky day for us ever since.
OV: What are the best and worst things about working with your significant other?
AG: Best: It's great to have a common professional goal and passion. It's also easier to coordinate the demands of our personal life because we work in the same business and can often tag team quite efficiently. Worst: Separating work and our personal life is not always easy. You have to make a conscious effort to not talk about business on evenings and weekends, and we sometimes have to explicitly state when we want to talk about something as spouses, not business partners.
I love a really good hack and the best ones involve hacking my husband.
BH: Best: Andreas is the most brilliant, efficient and effective person I've ever encountered. Any startup CEO would give a limb to work with someone like that. I'd give at least two. He also has the best hair in the industry. Worst: He is so maddeningly perfect that it's hard for anybody on the team (including me) to compete.
OV: How are the household responsibilities divided between the two of you?
AG: We try to split them up about equally. Bettina is better at coordinating external help, like contractors, so she does most of that. I do more of the internal stuff.
BH: We both strive for pareto optimality. For example, he hates loading the dishwasher and I hate unloading. Problem solved. Now that breaks down when our preferences align. So when it comes to changing our little son's diaper, we have a more "tag, you're it" approach.
OV: Any pet peeves you’ve learned to cope with?
AG: As a Swiss person, I'm obsessively punctual. Bettina grew up in Germany and the United States and is much more relaxed about being exactly on time, which sometimes drives me crazy. I hope I've become a bit more laid back about it, but I can still improve a lot.
BH: Andreas used to love littering our house with empty or half-empty packages of Fishermen's Friends lozenges. It drove me insane. Then I discovered that all I had to do was give him one drawer in the entryway to dump all of his stuff into at the end of the day. Problem solved. I love a really good hack and the best ones involve hacking my husband.
OV: What do you admire most about the other person?
AG: I admire Bettina's boundless energy and resilience. Without her perseverance, Pixability would never have become as successful as it is. And she is never afraid to make tough choices against all odds.
BH: I keep a running log of his admirable qualities and it's hard to pick just one. I’d need to send you a whole list. Above all, Andreas is extremely generous with his knowledge, talents, time, and money. He always puts others and the common good above himself.
