The Startup Velocity Question: What Hinders Acceleration in VC Funded Companies?

I have been running 1Mby1M since 2010. I find myself saying to entrepreneurs ad nauseam that VCs want to invest in startups that can go from zero to $100 million in revenue in 5 to 7 years.

Startups that do not have what it takes to achieve velocity should not be venture funded.

Experienced VCs, over time, have developed heuristics to gauge what constitutes a high growth venture investment thesis. 

1Mby1M Udemy Courses with Sramana Mitra: Bootstrapping

Over the course of two years, we have released over 70 courses on Udemy with the aim to democratize entrepreneurship education at scale globally. This series of posts aims to help you find the one you need easily and provide you with discount coupons.

Raising Money From Eighty Investors and Steering to a Successful Exit: Ludovic Huraux, CEO of Attractive World (Part 1)

If you haven’t already, please study our Bootstrapping Course and Investor Introductions page.

Entrepreneurs have done crowd funding before the term crowd funding existed. Ludovic’s story is a very interesting case in point.

Sramana Mitra: Let’s start by going to the very beginning of your personal journey. Where are you from? Where were you born, raised, and in what kind of background?

Ludovic Huraux: I was born in Paris in 1982. I’m almost 34 years old. I’ve worked in finance with a private equity firm. I was very lucky to be involved in a fund. I was only 22 years old back then and I had a lot of responsibilities. I was a Board Member of a company with hundreds of employees. I just wanted to create my own company. >>>

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Scaling a Cloud-Based Disaster Recovery Business in Silicon Valley: Axcient CEO Justin Moore (Part 1)

If you haven’t already, please study our Bootstrapping Course and Investor Introductions page.

Justin tried his hand in other businesses and never had the time to go back and finish his degree at Stanford. He learnt business on the job. Today, he has a thriving Disaster Recovery Cloud venture, for which he has raised over $60 million. The company has not IPO’d or exited yet. Instead, it is moving upmarket from its SME customer roots.

Sramana Mitra: Let’s start at the very beginning of your story. Where are you from? Where were you born and raised? What is your backstory?

Justin Moore: I was born and raised in Manhattan. I moved to London when I was in my early to mid teens and then came out to California for college. >>>

Winning Against Heavily-Funded Competitors: Al Lalani, CEO of Social Annex (Part 1)

If you haven’t already, please study our Bootstrapping Course and Investor Introductions page.

We often get this question: how do you compete with a bootstrapped startup against heavily venture-funded competitors. We’ve done other stories on this topic. Here’s one that will give you additional perspective.

Sramana Mitra: Let’s start at the very beginning of your journey. Where are you from? Where were you born, raised, and in what kind of background?

Al Lalani: I was born in India. I moved here about 15 years ago. I was 21 when I first moved to the United States. I have an engineering background. I was hired by a company based in Los Angeles. This was around the 1999 timeframe around a year before the dot-com bust. The company had raised around $1 million. At >>>

Bootstrapping to $20 Million: Jagan Reddy, CEO of Leeyo Software (Part 1)

If you haven’t already, please study our Bootstrapping Course and Investor Introductions page. 

Jagan built a niche software that solved a very specific problem and started selling it to enterprises for a lot of money. This story is a textbook case study of how well you can scale with no outside financing if you can identify a burning pain point in customers who are willing to pay a LOT to solve that pain.

Sramana Mitra: Let’s start at the very beginning of your journey. Where were you born, raised, and in what kind of background?

Jagan Reddy: I was born in India. All my schooling was done in India.

Sramana Mitra: Where in India?

Jagan Reddy: In Chennai. My schooling was all done in Chennai. >>>

Morphing a B-to-C Idea to a B-to-B Business: Andrew Witkin, CEO of StickerYou (Part 1)

If you haven’t already, please study our Bootstrapping Course and Investor Introductions page.

Andrew started with a B-to-C idea but has built a business that is primarily B-to-B from a revenue standpoint. Learn more about the nuances.

Sramana Mitra: Let’s start at the very beginning of your journey. Where are you from? Where were you born, raised, and in what kind of background?

Andrew Witkin: I was born in Toronto, Canada. My mom was a German immigrant and my dad was a Canadian citizen who happens to be Jewish. I grew up in a pretty loving family. I went through school and then decided to enter into an undergraduate business program because I was most intrigued with business. I went out to a school in eastern Canada.

In my final year, I actually went to the US and attended a US school. I was in Providence, Rhode Island in my final year. I found the pulse of >>>

Bootstrapping to $23 Million: Michael Nemeroff, CEO of RushOrderTees (Part 1)

If you haven’t already, please study our Bootstrapping Course and Investor Introductions page.

From setting up a printing machine in the dining room to $23 million in revenue, Mike’s RushOrderTees journey is one of steady, diligent execution.

Sramana Mitra: Let’s start at the very beginning of your journey. Where are you from? Where were your born, raised, and in what kind of background?

Michael Nemeroff: I was born and raised right outside Philadelphia. That’s where I’ve lived my whole life. It all started in high school. My parents were entrepreneurs. They owned a clothing line. It’s a lot different from what we do today.

Sramana Mitra: Having an entrepreneurial family is a very big driver in a lot of people becoming entrepreneurs because you grow up in >>>

Scaling a SaaS Business to 11,000 Customers: Booker.com CEO Josh McCarter (Part 1)

If you haven’t already, please study our Bootstrapping Course and Investor Introductions page.

In 2010, SaaS investors were less rigorous than they are today about unit economics. Josh managed to raise a $15 million Series A and acquired a significant runway to figure out the metrics of his SMB-focused SaaS business. Read more about his journey.

Sramana Mitra: Let’s go to the very beginning of your journey. Where are you from? Where were you born, raised, and in what kind of background?

Josh McCarter: I was born in Sacramento, California. I lived there till I was about 12. Then we moved down to San Diego. My mom’s family was an immigrant family from Greece and has a bunch of entrepreneurs. My grandfather and uncle on that side were very >>>

Building a Mobile Security Company in Silicon Valley: Domingo Guerra, Co-Founder and President of Appthority (Part 1)

If you haven’t already, please study our Bootstrapping Course and Investor Introductions page.

Domingo came into the market at a time when his original value proposition to enterprises wasn’t that urgent. Over time, however, the mobile security challenge has grown into a critical issue, and now the company is thriving.

Sramana Mitra: Let’s start at the very beginning of your personal journey. Where are you from? Where were you born, raised, and in what kind of background?

Domingo Guerra: I’m originally from Monterey, Mexico. I didn’t move to the US until I was 18. Ever since I was a kid, I always wanted to be an entrepreneur. Monterey is very well-known for some of the largest companies in Mexico. A lot of folks wanted to be soccer players when they grew up, but I wasn’t very good at sports. I wanted to focus on academics and try to do well. I remember a talk when I was a kid where they said, “You need a lot of luck to do well in >>>

Building a Cutting-Edge Telecollaboration Company: John Underkoffler, CEO of Oblong Industries (Part 1)

If you haven’t already, please study our Bootstrapping Course and Investor Introductions page.

John worked on Minority Report after finishing his PhD at the MIT Media Lab. Read on how he parlayed that experience into a supercool company that is scaling nicely, while reinventing collaboration.

Sramana Mitra: Where are you from? Where were you born, raised and in what kind of background?

John Underkoffler: I was born in a hospital in Philadelphia but from the time I was a few months old until I left for college, I lived in a very small town in Southeastern Pennsylvania. My parents had bought a farm. I grew up in a non-working farm, but it was populated with lots and lots of creatures and that kind of proximity to nature had a big effect on my design practice in later years. >>>

Bootstrapping Using Services: Taylor Tyng, CEO of Wiredrive (Part 1)

If you haven’t already, please study our Bootstrapping Course and Investor Introductions page.

Taylor has bootstrapped Wiredrive over a 17-year period to about $10 million. Today, he has options ahead to grow organically or raise money. Either way, an interesting journey.

Sramana Mitra: Let’s start at the very beginning of your personal journey. Where are you from? Where were you born, raised, and in what kind of background?

Taylor Tyng: I was born south of Boston, Massachusetts in a town called Duxbury. I was born the son of two entrepreneurs who went through a line of businesses from early plastic mold injection technology companies and ended up working in a luxury travel business. I got bitten by the entrepreneurial bug early. I was raised in a middle class setting and my parents made sure that they raised children who were thoughtful and mindful. I had a real good platform to practice >>>