Why you should not start a company

Venture Cup, January 2011

In most cases you will fail (forget about 1/10 odds, it’s more like 1/1 million chance of creating something valuable)

Why is it stupid to create a startup?

People will look down upon you when you fail

(your banking advisor will tell you he told you so and people will be whispering behind your back)

You will on average earn more the rest of your life if you take one of the many easy safe jobs

(Like banker, venture capitalist or start-up advisor)

So when should you create a startup?

If you feel like this after listening to why not to do it

The story about how Tradeshift became an overnight success

We spent 2 years failing with our first startups.

We then spent 5 years working really really hard learning about a domain and the business rules behind it

…and then we launched Tradeshift.

Wait a second… you didn’t just like create a plugin for twitter and put it on the Interwebs?

(3500bc)

(1933)

(Today)

10 pct. of all trees cut down worldwide 64B € in EU alone spend on typing and retyping

50 pct. of all business mail Stupid…

Business software is broken

Global  5.000  

500.000  –  1.000.000  middle  0er  business  

125  million  small  business  globally  without  accoun0ng  so<ware  

SAP  ORACLE  

1000x  legacy  accoun0ng  systems,  ver0cals  

(Microso<,  Netsuite,  Salesforce,  etc.  )    

?  

The market was broken down into millions of small islands of software, not connected.

And an army of people, printing, carrying and typing paper in between these islands

But it’s about more than just wasting time and paper, it’s about the speed and cost of relations between business…

…globally!

That’s (luckily) a tough problem to solve

Enterprise deal status

The solution, a new kind of business platform, working just like a social network

Supporting real business relations

We then got a frontpage on Wired

Today Tradeshift is used in more than 120 countries

Advice

§  DON’T compromise, ever! §  Avoid the MBA’s the bankers and the

start-up advisors §  Pick people with a bias for action §  Know your self and pick people who

challenge your weaknesses §  Get the best designer you possibly

can…

Team

§  Build something real!

§  Make sure it is something that can make you passionate, angry/happy every day!

§  Solve the right problems everyday and dont care if everything else is on fire

§  All the good stuff is really complex, so LEARN

Product

§  Start pitching now!

§  We pitched more than 100 VC’s before we got the valuation we wanted. §  Dont believe in smart-money, it’s all just money.

§  Having somebody on the team who understands the game is ideal, just make sure your interests are aligned!

Funding

The mobile network in Sri Lanka is faster than the one I have here

The cost of technology is now so low that you can start the next Google everywhere

Build technology for the world market, you are competing there anyways

In the end if you WANT do it, don’t be afraid, nothing can stop you

Christian Lanng CEO, Co-founder Email: chl@tradeshift.com Twitter: @christianlanng Skype: christian_lanng

Contact:

SHIFT HAPPENS We are hiring! tradeshift.com/jobs