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Great article, thanks a lot for posting this. I do have one question: is the goal of all the companies to raise addition funding rounds? Or, do some startups s
by edanm 16y ago
Great article, thanks a lot for posting this.
I do have one question: is the goal of all the companies to raise addition funding rounds? Or, do some startups still want to work without raising the extra capital, but rather grow organically (37 signals style). I guess another way to ask is: do you force (or even strongly expect) companies to get extra funding on demo day, do you let them choose (and they always choose to get more funding), or do some startups actually not get extra funding?
I ask because, from your article, it seems like most of the latter part of the cycle is geared towards raising capital, and I had always assumed that not raising capital was also a viable option for startups.
- pg 16y agoNo, not all of them. Some are already profitable when they apply, and a few more make it to profitability just on what we give them. But the distinction is not a sharp one: most of the profitable companies would take money on sufficiently good terms. Though I don't mention this explicitly in the article, Demo Day isn't just for raising money. It's a good way to get mindshare too, because the people in the audience are so influential. So even the startups for whom raising money is not a top priority usually try hard to be impressive on DDay.