Convertible Notes and Startup Funding
February 12, 2025
In the previous articles, we have already studied the basics of start-up valuation. We are also aware of the basic concepts such as pre-money valuation and post-money valuation which commonly affect the funding received by startups. However, the cases mentioned until now were very simple. These cases are only presented for the student to gain […]
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The domain of personal finance is exceptionally wide. There are lots of experts who have differing opinions, who coexist in the personal finance arena. However, in the early 2000s, a relatively unknown author by the name of Robert Kiyosaki started making waves in this area. Some of the ideas that he suggested were radically different […]
Startup companies typically have a high failure rate. It is said that 90% of all startup companies fail. The percentage of companies failing keeps on reducing as the company grows and obtains more funding.
Ideally, when a company becomes a unicorn i.e. achieves a valuation of $1 billion, then there shouldn’t be any chances of failure. However, surprisingly even unicorn companies fail. Many times, they end up causing a lot of damage to the investor’s funds as well. Hence, it is important for investors to understand the reason why unicorn companies fail.
It is important to understand the common reasons behind the failure of unicorns in order to be able to predict these failures.
Companies often try to convince investors that they will achieve dramatic growth in a very short span of time. It is not uncommon for unicorns to claim that they will grow the company at the rate of 15% per week. This immense speed comes at a cost. Often this leads to large-scale mismanagement in the company. Of course, scalability is an important aspect of the business model of startups. However, there should be reasonable assumptions, or else the growth process can turn into an operational disaster.
Public investors tend to focus on value which is found in the financial statements. On the other hand, private investors tend to focus more on the future. They believe more in the dreams being sold about the potential that the company has to change the world. Startup companies need to go public only after the transition is complete. If the company is not able to justify its valuation based on the numbers in the financial statement, then its stocks will be pounded in the open markets.
It is common for unicorns to list on the stock exchanges. However, some of them succeed whereas the others fail. Investors need to look out for some of the symptoms which are an indicator that a startup might fail.
The fact of the matter is that all types of companies are prone to failure and unicorns are no exceptions. Investors must be aware that sometimes the hype surrounding a unicorn can turn out to be just hype that is not backed by any substance.
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