How a Failed Zoom Due Diligence Call Led to a Disaster for a Firm That Had Raised Over $70 million in VC Funds
On Sunday, September 26th, Ben Smith from the New York Times published an article entitled “Goldman Sachs, Ozy Media and a $40 Million Conference Call Gone Wrong”. What followed was a bizarre tale of how the COO of Ozy Media started a Zoom due diligence call with Goldman Sachs, then switched to a conference call. On that call, Samir Rao, the co-founder and chief operating officer of Ozy, used a voice changer and impersonated Alex Piper, the head of unscripted programming for YouTube Originals. After the call Goldman figured out what had happened and the proverbial shit hit the fan. How were sophisticated investors deceived by Oxy Media?