Book Description

A comprehensive guide for tech entrepreneurs to acquire vital resources while delaying or entirely avoiding the need for highly dilutive equity sales. In today's start-up environment a common mindset among tech founders is to raise investment funds through an equity sale as a first option whenever acquiring additional resources becomes necessary. Indeed the amount of investment funds secured has become a measure of success. In reality the subsequent equity dilution and loss of decision-making control suffered by the founders only reduces the potential ROI for the founders and increases the probability that the original vision of the venture is not pursued and/or achieved. Consequently raising investment funds through an equity sale should not be the first option and when successfully executed is nothing to boast about. What is boastful and impresses most sophisticated investors is the ability to garner as much traction as possible before "settling" for an equity sale. Another recent prevailing notion amongst founders the author counters is that every aspect of a start-ups' existence can be approached scientifically and the need for strategic financial planning is no longer necessary. This could not be further from the truth. Although new processes and methodologies such as Lean and Agile give valuable guidance on how to conduct customer and product development efforts successfully, ultimately fits well within an overall bootstrapping strategy and may serve as a decisive factor on whether the innovation created by a tech start-up is commercially successful it still does not sufficiently address the issues of securing the necessary resources in a timely manner nor ensure a successful exit in financial terms for the founders. In his new book David presents an alternative mindset allowing founders to devise a bootstrapping strategy whereby the optimal amount of traction can be accomplished before an equity sale becomes necessary. Drastic changes in the start-up landscape during the past few years have increased the importance of bootstrapping as start-up cycles have lessened and the Lean era has commenced. Subsequently a premium is placed on "good" money as opposed to "bad" money and a challenge to the wealth vs. control dilemma is in order. In this new start-up environment there is less margin for error in decision-making, an increased need for efficiency and greater reliance on alternative sources of funding. All of this has necessitated a revised definition of the term "bootstrapping" from merely a descriptive term to an overall strategy that can be pursued by founders of tech ventures to increase both the probability of commercial success and a lucrative financial exit for all shareholders.