Presentation from Bitspiration Conference in Warsaw, Poland on June 7, 2016. Presentation describes best practices and challenges facing Central and Eastern European startups in Silicon Valley.

1. The Good, the Bad, the Ugly
When CEE Startups & Investors Come to
Silicon Valley
Tytus Cytowski
Attorney
BITSPIRATION 2016
Warsaw, Poland
Twitter: @tcytowski

2. SILICON VALLEY
Physical Place & Business Culture
• NOT HBO SV SHOW MORE LIKE
THE GOOD, THE BAD, THE UGLY
• ALL ROADS LEAD TO SV IN THE
DIGITAL ECONOMY
• FUTURE IS WRITTEN
• HIGH CONCENTRATION OF IDEAS,
CAPITAL, PEOPLE
• COMPLEX SYSTEM BASED ON
STANDARIZATION & TRUST

3. SILICON VALLEY
Business Culture
• PROBLEM/SOLUTION METHOD
• IDENTIFY MARKET OPP
• IDENTIFY BEST CUSTOMER TO
TARGET
• SCALE SMALL BUSINESS INTO
GLOBAL COMPANY

4. THE GOOD
Homework DONE
• YOU NEED TO BE IN THE SV (Y/N)
• LISTENING (TO FEEDBACK)
• NO SECRET HANDSHAKE
• NO FORMULA FOR SUCCESS
• PRODUCT MARKET FIT
• ASK FOR HELP
• NO LIFETIME EMPLOYMENT

5. THE GOOD
Successful Entrepreneurs
• 4 KEY METRICS BEFORE
-Team, Traction, Investor, Idea
• EXPLORE SV/MAKE PLAN/EXECUTE
• IT’S THE CUSTOMERS/MENTORS NOT
THE FINANCING
• LEVERAGING ASSETS OF SV
• KISS
- Plan A vs. Plan B
- Cap Table Problem

6. THE GOOD
Don’t Forget
• BUILD NETWORK
• FOLLOW UP
• POWER OF THANK YOU

7. THE BAD
”CEE Syndrome”
• NOT BIG ENOUGH
- Only Unicorns, Centaurs,
- No Ponies Please!
• TOO LATE, TOO SLOW
• RULE BREAKING
• NO NETWORKING (NOTWORKING)
• RECOGNIZE VS. REPLICATE
- New Ideas Vs. Cloning/Looking For
Similarities or Patterns
- Product, Business, Company

8. THE BAD
It gets worse….
• WANTS ONLY MONEY
• NO DREAM
• NO FOMO
• NOT COMMITTED
• EXCUSES
- “SV is too hard; we should focus on EU”
- “We can’t replicate SV. Stay in Europe”
- “We don’t have the capital/entrepreneurs”

9. THE UGLY
Not bad, but ugly…
• NO GOAL/PLAN IN SV
- Parachute Approach
• NO PAY IT FORWARD
- Not qui pro quo
• INSULAR/GHETTO
• UNCOACHABLE
• NOT COMPETITIVE
• TRANSLATING REALITIES

10. UGLY
Ugliest….
• WANTS CONSTANT INTRODUCTIONS

11. THANK YOU!!!
Q&A
PS –
YOU ARE
THE GOOD, THE BETTER, THE
PRETTIEST 