My intuition is that money is better when: - There is some competitive advantage to being first. - That the advantage is enduring. - There are lots of competito

My intuition is that money is better when: - There is some competitive advantage to being first. - That the advantage is enduring. - There are lots of competitors. - It is important to fail faster. For example, if you're trying to scale Google or a SaaS, and there is some kind of "Winner take all" then you need funding. Funding makes less sense when: - You're selling a service directly linked to people's time. (Consulting firms) - You have other sources of money to carry you through. - The market is less competitive. - People will take significantly less money to get equity. I kind of view funding like, "Do you need it bad enough to justify letting someone expect 30+% returns?" If it's the only way to get great growth for that individual company, great. If it's not needed, that's ok too. In terms of measurement, there are two measures. "What % succeeded with and without?" and "What was the median and mean with and without?" The funders are more likely to be stacked in the huge winners and huge losers, because funding (to use financial terms) increases the volatility.