The reason for this is a lot of investors are looking for unicorns, not businesses with a high(ish) probability of success. Well managed, slower growing busine

The reason for this is a lot of investors are looking for unicorns, not businesses with a high(ish) probability of success. Well managed, slower growing businesses have a vastly larger chance of success (good for the founders), but a lower NPV. As a founder you will/should be biased towards success over NPV because of your risk concentration, but an investor can spread their risk over as many startups as they like and so only care about NPV. The only thing worse that taking investors money is going bankrupt. If you can bootstrap then bootstrap - the pain is only worse in the beginning (most of the time).