'Shark Tank' Sneak Peek: Uber Investor Troy Carter Previews His Stint as a Guest Shark

Watch out, entrepreneurs: There’s a new Shark swimming in the tank.

This week on ABC’s Shark Tank, ultra-successful music manager and tech investor Troy Carter joins the panel as a guest Shark — and it doesn’t take him long to prove he’s got some bite.

In the exclusive sneak peek posted above, Carter grills Wayne Johnson, owner of ValPark, a “mobile parking solution” app that lets you pre-pay for valet parking. Carter lets Johnson know he has experience in this field — “I invested in Uber in 2011, when it was only in San Francisco” — then warns him that he’ll be facing fierce competition in this space: “There’s another kid in a garage that wants to eat your lunch right now.”

Related: ‘Shark Tank’ Premiere Recap: Did Ashton Kutcher Sink or Swim as a Guest Shark?

Yahoo TV reached out to Carter this week to get his take on his Shark Tank experience. A self-described “huge fan of the show,” Carter never had any business dealings with any of the other Sharks before stepping onto the set, but he says “they all welcomed me with open arms, and I kind of felt like I was family.” But that family atmosphere quickly vanished, he says, when the deals started flying: “Once those cameras come on, the Sharks come out.”

Shark Tank may be just a TV show, but there’s real money at stake here, and that got Carter’s attention, he says: “As an entrepreneur and an investor, once I realized I was spending my own money, my instincts went off. You just naturally kick into negotiation mode.” He doesn’t want to give too much away, but it does seem like he may have struck a deal or two: “I’m in diligence on a couple companies right now."

A self-made man who worked his way up in the music industry to manage superstars like Lady Gaga (above) and John Legend, Carter says he brings a different perspective than the other Sharks: "I’m from the streets, so I look at investing through a very unique lens. I didn’t go to business school. I actually didn’t even graduate high school. I ended up with a GED. So everything that I’ve learned in business, I’ve learned through experience.”

And with savvy investments in Uber, Spotify, Warby Parker, and other buzzy start-ups, Carter’s been through his share of negotiations before. What makes Shark Tank different, he says, is the accelerated pace at which the deals are made. “You have to make a quick judgment call on an entrepreneur, and that’s hard to do within that short period of time… The good thing is, at the end, we still get to look under the hood. So we don’t take what they say at face value."

So could we see Carter back in the tank for another episode? "I still have a day job, so I don’t think I’ll be a full-time Shark,” he says, “but if they ever invited me back, I’d be more than happy to do it.” Sounds like somebody’s got a taste for blood already.

Shark Tank airs Fridays at 9 p.m. on ABC.