Nicolas Zylberstein

Head of Investments and Strategy- Americas

at Bytedance

Nicolas is an expert in Corporate Development, Corporate Strategy & Business Operations in Consumer Tech. Nicolas currently serves as Head of Investments and Strategy for the Americas at Bytedance. Prior to Bytedance, Nicolas led Pinterest’s Corporate Development efforts globally, before and after the company’s successful IPO. Before Pinterest, Nicolas was Head of Corporate Strategy & Development at YouTube, where he led the launch of YouTube’s subscription business (YouTube Premium & YouTube TV). Before YouTube, Nicolas worked at The Walt Disney Company where he focused on the early innings of Disney’s direct to consumer initiative, which resulted in the launch of Disney Plus in 2019. Nicolas also worked at McKinsey & Company and JPMorgan earlier in his career. Raised in Paris, Nicolas holds an MBA from the Wharton School where he graduated as a Palmer Scholar, and an MS degree from Sciences Po Paris.

Articles by Nicolas Zylberstein

The Founder’s Mental Health Playbook: What I Learned After Nearly Burning Out

A hard-won guide to staying mentally healthy while building a startup I founded Stitcher, the podcast platform, in 2007 and ran it for seven years until we sold in 2014....

Answer Engine Optimization (AEO) for Early Stage Companies

In our latest session from the Mucker Growth Series featuring Ethan Smith from Graphite, we explored AEO, a significant new approach for optimizing visibility in AI-driven search, particularly relevant as...

Startup Guide to AI Visibility: Be the Brand ChatGPT Recommends

Introduction Today, users aren’t just searching on Google. They’re asking ChatGPT, Claude, Google’s Gemini, Perplexity, and other AI systems for advice. AI visibility is the new frontier of brand awareness....

Practical Uses of AI & Automation for Startup Operations

In a recent Mucker Growth Series session, we invited Rock Vitale, Founder & CEO of Easie, to share how he’s helped early-stage teams move from manual, fragmented workflows to streamlined,...

2025 New York Tech Week Recap Of Mucker Sessions

Last week during New York Tech Week 2025, we joined more than 1,000 events hosted by founders, investors, and VCs. This post is a full Mucker recap of the three...

How to Build a Customer Support Function for Startups Using AI Tools with Alex Velinov

Delivering high-quality customer support can be one of the most resource-draining parts of a startup. The good news: we’re at a turning point where founders can use AI tools to...