The Research Blog

How to get your startup funded There are three things that make your startup fundable: Team Product Market Fit TEAM: Investors are attracted to professional teams with good attitude that will execute and do everything within their means to make the business work. It is also essential that the team complements and works well with each other. A tam is usually composed of Leader Sales & Marketing Developer or Product Specialist PRODUCT: The product is the presentation card for the business. It is the business card you use to show to potential funders. MARKET FIT: Should comply with this: Scalable: Making hypergrowth possible Validated: Customers are paying or are willing to pay for your product Whether market is crowded or not The total addressable market needs to be big enough (usually one billion) also must be accessible (what you can reach) For funding startups use Venture Capital (VC) and Angels who usually want 20% of the business. VC's an...

Standard Documents for Starting a Business When starting a business there are a series of documents that you are going to need or that are going to facilitate the process. Although this depends on the country and place where you will be establishing your company some documents such as the shareholder's agreement are private legal documents that only need to be checked by a lawyer to insure they comply with the country's jurisdiction. Investors usually require a series of documents that tend to be similar if not the same. A great tool that offers a free package of startup documents usually required by investors is www.seriesseed.fi This resource is focused on the Finnish market but could be used as a starting point and adapted to comply with other territories. One of the key documents is the term sheet. It summarizes the principal terms and sets forward a statement of intentions. It is usually not legally biding with the exception of the exclusivity and the country of ...

Branding and Brand Protection When starting a business it is always good to be aware of your brand and always try to protect it as soon as possible. There ways to protect the brand and there are ways to discourage others from using it. The first step to take when considering how to brand your business is to make sure the brand you want to use is available. A great tool to check this is: www.searchabrand.com It will tell you if the brand is being used and where. It is also a great resource to help you in finding a great brand for your business. You should always check your brand before establishing the company in order to avoid problems down the line. In exit situations for a company, the company buying your business will also want to own the brand, trademark and social accounts of your business, for this reason it is extremely important to claim ownership of it as soon as possible. A Yield trademark which costs around €1500 will cover all Europe and Great Britain. Besides t...

Information on Starting a Company Forms of Entrepreneurship: 1. New Business Idea 2. Existing Business Idea 3. Buying a business 4. Franchisee 5. Part Time 6. Stockholder 7. Team Entrepreneurship 8. Sole trader There are many factors that influence the form of entrepreneurship, some of the key ones are: Number of founders Continuity of operations (time in business) Need for capital and its availability Attitude of investors Responsibilities and decision making Profit sharing Taxation A sole trader can be a family wedded spouse. In a partnership there are no shares and the partners own 100% of the business. When it is general or limited you own the percentage of the amount invested.  Business Idea: Your business idea needs to be able to successfully answer the following questions: What?  For whom?  How?  What products or services?  What issues are you solving?  What are the measurable benefits? Who a...

Shareholders Agreement and Team Building When starting a business if there are going to be multiple shareholders, it is important to agree beforehand on certain areas of the business before setting it up. This will allow the team to work towards one common goals and will avoid headaches and pains in the future that might lead to the failure of the business. The main elements of a shareholders agreement are: 1. The business reason; what is the reason to build the business. 2. What is agreed between the shareholders. 3. The legal side or jargon, this needs to be checked with a lawyer. The shareholder agreement is a private document intended to establish matters that could be conflicting in order to prevent the conflict from ever happening. In other words, the purpose is to go through all the possible future difficulties beforehand. If problems arise the agreement would be binding and would resolve the conflict. The target is to make it both flexible and fair but also strict (s...