Creating a startup is a time-consuming process, requiring ideological inspirers to have a clear understanding of the final result and focus on the global market. There are many examples when a start-up started earning even before attracting investments, which attracted particular attention – among Ukrainian projects it was Petcube, EasyWay, Roamer, etc.
Along with this, the majority of Ukrainian start-ups successfully enter the foreign market, bypassing the stage of the domestic Ukrainian market, where selling their products is almost always unprofitable. Augmented Pixels, engaging in augmented reality, has attracted customers such as Samsung and National Geographic, GitLab 9 keeps the source code of projects in the cloud for NASA, IBM and CERN, and QROK develops navigation in the premises for its partner Google. So how to make a startup popular and discussed, how to achieve the integrity of the idea and properly present it to the investor in order to achieve investment in your business? And for what areas of science, technology and life in general should be taken?
The idea does not explain itself
At the meeting with the investor, the first and main mistake of the startup team is the inability to convey the essence of the project to the listener. Moreover, brilliant ideas die at the initial stage, if the team lacks the entrepreneurial ability to create a business plan and explain it. All this happens because people do not know how to do this, they lack education and experience.
We solve the problem, but do not ask to solve it for us.
The main rule is that an investor should come with ready-made solutions to the problem, and you should not lie and present incorrect or distorted financial figures (only 40% of startups can discourage the money invested, so the investor will be biased). Describe both the strengths and weaknesses of the project, admit mistakes at an early stage and show clearly how exactly you are going to solve them.
Calculating competitors
Do you know about the rule of 3D – describe, deliver, differenciate? After describing the project and self-presentation skills, it is important to convey that you are competitive and different from others, investors will have increased attention to this point. When answering the question “what else will customers use if this is not our product?”, Make clear comparative tables, taking into account also indirect competitors.
It is worth talking separately about what niches in the Ukrainian start-up market are not yet filled or not fully filled. What startups to follow or what to be a pioneer in the next 5 years? Here are some examples of areas in which you can grow, and which are followed by venture investors:
Financial technologies or fintech
Fintech companies aim to replace existing financial services. This is mobile banking, mobile trading, financial. consultations, e-wallets, bots and bitcoin mining (mining of digital currency). Fintech users are consumers, B2C for small businesses, B2B for banks and B2B for banking business customers. BitFury, which established the production of ASIC chips for mining Bitcoins, Persollo with investments from Australian partners, uCredit, Taplend, etc. are well-known pioneers in this field in Ukraine.
Biotechnology or biotech
The sale of biotechnologies is futuristic for Ukraine, however, given the fact that Ukrainian startups are valued in the global community, this area has yet to work. For example, a client who wants to replace a heart valve with himself will have to choose only from two global companies involved in their production: Medtronic and St. Jude Medical. Among the countries of the former CIS, in Russia there are the first successful attempts of biotech startups to find foreign investors; Ukraine is still at the stage of biotech conferences and congresses.
Agrotechnologies or agrotech
The agricultural complex of Ukraine already attracts a sufficient number of interested people, but this does not mean that there is no place to develop, and everything has already been invented before us. The future is a mix of ideas between agrotech and, for example, transport — like the use of drones in agriculture. Drones, by the way, is quite a fertile topic for start-up startups – in 2016, Ukrainian startup Kray Technologies, for example, won the Polish competition KRK Road to Success, where it presented a program that will allow drones to process fields automatically and reduce the number of pesticides by 70%
Outsourcing
The scope of outsourcing in Ukraine attracts almost the largest percentage of foreign investment. Outsourcing is the largest employer for IT specialists, and for beginners as well. This is the segment that, according to experts, until 2025, it will be able to catch up with agriculture in terms of exports, which will exceed $ 10 billion. Today Ukraine is in 24th place in the ranking of the best countries for outsourcing, and 1st place in the ranking of the best countries for IT outsourcing and software development.
Hardware or bioengineering and robotics
It was in this industry that Petcube made its way through, or Ecoisme, which quickly became a well-known startup that develops a “smart home” and tracks energy consumption. Developments related to robots in Ukraine most of all like to collect money for development on crowdfunding platforms. Over the past 5 years, Ukrainian startups have managed to raise more than $ 1.5 million on Kickstarter and Indiegogo. Crowdfunding allows you to work with the B2C segment directly. If you have a great idea to develop an engineering or biotech solution, go ahead with your customers. Just remember that for this you need an intelligible visual of how you are going to implement the idea, a few prototypes and an explanation of what the buyer will receive from the product.
A team preparing a startup for life should have not only ambitions and share responsibilities logically and according to its capabilities, but also possess soft skills and business skills in order to justify its investments and initiatives in the eyes of any investor. That is why in order to minimize the risks, you need to combine self-presentation training and the development of your startup in one. Please note that in DAN.IT education you will acquire soft-skills, improve English and learn how to present the project to the client and the investor – that is, combine all the missing elements to ordinary startups in order to competently submit your future project.
