A Serial Entrepreneur’s Journey into FinTech: Felix Rodriguez, Founder and CEO of finally (Part 7)

Sramana Mitra: So until this point, what you are doing has been more the SaaS business. The FinTech business is just starting to come into play.

Felix Rodriguez: Yes, but we spent most of our time and engineering resources in building an expense management platform, a card connecting with banks, handling repayments, dealing with fraud, building underwriting, getting the team, and being able to report to our credit provider.

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

Pierre and Fred Guelen bootstrapped Planon, a very significant company from The Netherlands, using the bootstrapping using services principle. Read this conversation from 2016 to learn more.

Sramana Mitra: We’re going to start at the very beginning of your personal journeys. One of you please start by telling us where you’re from, where you were born, and in what kind of background, and then we’ll do the same thing with the other person.

Pierre Guelen: I’m the CEO of Planon group. Fred is my brother. We were born in The Netherlands in a small town near the German border. We were raised in an entrepreneurial family. My father owned a large building company. He was already the fourth generation in that building company.

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Thursday, May 9 – 639th 1Mby1M Mentoring Roundtable for Entrepreneurs

Entrepreneurs are invited to the 639th FREE online 1Mby1M Mentoring Roundtable on Thursday, May 9, 2024, at 8 a.m. PDT / 11 a.m. EDT / 5 p.m. CEST / 8:30 p.m. India IST.

If you are a serious entrepreneur, register to “pitch” and sell your business idea. You’ll receive straightforward feedback, advice on next steps, and answers to any of your questions. Others can register to “attend” to watch, learn, and interact through the online chat.

You can learn more here and REGISTER TO PITCH OR ATTEND HERE. Register and you will receive the recording by email, even if you are unable to attend. Please share with any entrepreneurs in your circle who may be interested. All are welcome!

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A Serial Entrepreneur’s Journey into FinTech: Felix Rodriguez, Founder and CEO of finally (Part 6)

Sramana Mitra: When you raised the credit capital, you got four term sheets from the credit capital side. How many customers or SMBs were on your platform?

Felix Rodriguez: A little over 500.

Sramana Mitra: And what was the total amount of transactions that you were seeing on that?

Felix Rodriguez: Half a billion a year in transactions.

Best of Bootstrapping: Bootstrapped a Niche E-commerce Venture

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

I’ve always been bullish about niche e-commerce. Here’s the story from 2016 of an entrepreneur who had successfully bootstrapped a company in high-end light fixtures, Elite Fixtures CEO Steven Annese.

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?

Steven Annese: I’m a child of an Italian immigrant. I was born in New Jersey. It was in the 70s when most of the Italians migrated.

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A Serial Entrepreneur’s Journey into FinTech: Felix Rodriguez, Founder and CEO of finally (Part 5)

Sramana Mitra: Did you raise the seed round through your own network or through a startup network?

Felix Rodriguez: We had a process to raise funding, and they certainly made introductions. But I had taken matters into my own hands. I was inviting investors to Demo Day. I sent out a cold email to Pat Matthews, the founder of Active Capital. He ended up leading our round.