80% of startups fail they say. Guy Kawasaki says 99.9% of startups fail because of the evaluation of the product or idea. Is that true? How to get it right from scratch?

1. Triin Linamagi
Alexandre Covello
@triinlinamagi @angels_cube
How to avoid
Startup Failure?

2. Triin Linamagi
@triinlinamagi
Founder & Brand Strategist, Bahoui
Head of Product at Jobatar and UK correspondent for
Startup magazine Co-Founder.
Alexandre Covello
@angels_cube
Founder & CEO, AngelsCube
Co-Chair - Screening Committee,
Harvard Business School Angels of London

3. Why startups fail?

4. Bubble or not bubble?

5. Too much money chasing to few deals… or
too many deals?

6. European VC backed companies raised
$2.5bn on 264 deals

7. Early-stage deals reach highest quarter in
2 years: $1.5bn/462 deals

8. So you want to be an entrepreneur?

9. The Bad News
80-90% of the startups fail

10. The Good News
You have not failed, but just found 10,000 ways
that didn’t work!
Failure leads to success but it’s always better to
learn from others mistakes and make less of
your own!

11. Our Survey Reveals…

12. • Single founder
• Complementing each other in skill-set
• Different visions and level of commitment
• Hiring wrong people
• No trust in your people/micromanagement
• It’s nobody’s job
Wrong Team

13. How to prevent this?
1. Align yourself with individuals who have the
right combination of:
–Knowledge
–Ability
–Motivation
2. Empower them with the right tools
3. Keep them motivated and engaged
(Hint: be a leader!)

14. Ideas change, products are redesigned, markets can take
unexpected turns, but people tend not to change that
much.
Great founders attract great teams and that’s
how you create great company culture!

15. YOU DON’T
BUILD A BUSINESS
-YOU BUILD PEOPLE-
AND THEN PEOPLE
BUILD THE BUSINESS

17. Not asking simple questions
Not talking to enough prospective
customers
Avoiding already existing market
Selling a product that is not ready or
waiting for too long to sell
Product/Market fit
#Failure 1
#Failure 2
#Failure 3
#Failure 4

18. If your startup never existed,
the world would be worse off
because ….

19. How to prevent this?
1. Before starting a business spend time
researching the market, its size, its needs
and pain points
2. Conduct focus groups, market
interviews, surveys, etc.
3. Be candid: conduct your research with
people in the know (not yes-sayers)

20. Running Out Of £££ Too Fast
#Mistake 1 – relying on investment and not generating
revenue
#Mistake 2 – carelessly spending money on useless features
#Mistake 3 – spending your marketing budget with no control
#Mistake 4 – investing in wrong people
#Mistake 5 - founders don’t want to give up a piece of pie
#Mistake 6 – budgets were not planned properly

21. Hot to prevent this?
1. Identify what element of your product you can charge for
2. Determine who will pay, why they will pay and when they
will pay!
3. Understand what revenue model works best for your target
audience
4. Devise go to market strategy to reach out to your customers
5. Allocate the resources needed to execute on the strategy
6. (Not an option, or for the happy few:… keep fundraising!)
(Hint: show me the money!)

22. Not Being Able To Support Growth
Can your business model sustain growth?
Is it bringing more in than out?
How do you support growth?

23. How to prevent this?
1. Focus on retention first
2. The product is not everything
3. There is no silver bullet (except for hard work)
4. Be focused
5. Measure (invest in data and analytics)
6. Experiment
7. Dig and learn
8. Don’t be afraid to double down
9. Allocate the right resources
10. Be ready to change and adapt

24. What does the investor say?

25. Would you back these guys?

26. What investors look for…
1. Large addressable market size
2. Effective business model
3. Company uniqueness
4. Background and experience in the industry
5. Financial performance

27. What did billion dollar companies (really)
looked like at Series A
• 1. Easy to dismiss ideas
• 2. Competitive Markets
• 3. Reinventing Customer
Behaviour
• 4. Untested Founders
• 5. Zero Monetisation

28. Thank you!