nyfi april 3 startup research: jeff stewart

7/28/2019 NYFI April 3 Startup Research: Jeff Stewart

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Startup Research

The Founder Institute

New York City

April 3rd 2013

Presented By: Jeff Stewart



Is Research a waste of time?



Research is worth the investment

4. Much cheaper to make mistakes on paper

3. Demonstrated knowledge impacts ability to attract capital

2. Impacts ability to identify & attract talent

1. Should impact strategy and tactics

Don’t just wing it..



We Hope To Address Tonight:

Context / Introduction

What to research:

– Your Passion – are you excited?

– Customer and Market – will they buy? – Business model – is there margin?

– Trends and Tailwinds – what’s changed or changing?

– Sales and mock-ups – can you sell?

– Prototype / Technology – can you build it?

– Team – Can you staff it?

– Resources – Can you fund it?

The Urgent Process™



Intro: Some Context

• Former Management Consultant

• Serial Entrepreneur (Lenddo, Square

Earth, Mimeo, Monitor110, Urgent

Group, Urgent Career, etc.)

• Inventor

• Board Member

•Angel Investor

• Blogger (www.UrgentSpeed.com)

• Nice Guy*

*Source: Mother Stewart

Who is Jeff Stewart:



Start-Ups are Hard Work…so

• Why not have at least 3 tail winds?

• What trends are In your favor?

• Why is the time now?

Trends that can help:

– Market

– Technology

–

Demographic – Cultural / Social

– Regulatory

– Economic



Example



Big ideas attract Big Talent…so

• Why not address a multibillion dollar market?

– Choose the right level of granularity

– Bigger is better than small

– Growing is better than shrinking

– Addressable is better than vague

– Potential is not actual

– Potential markets are OK

– All these companies had no actual market

(FedEx, Amazon, Mimeo)



You will make Mistakes…so

• Why not have big margins?

• Do margins change over time?

• Are Margins impacted by cost or

sales price

Considerations:

– Cost of Substitution

– Competitor Response

– Market Price Sensitivity

– Fixed vs. Variable Costs



Hints and Tips

1. The Internet and trade associations have volumes of data

2. Studying the competition is inexpensive, (and customary)

3. Surveys are easy to survey monkey

4. Search volume can be telling5. SEC filings, Wall Street Annalist Reports

6. Non-HTML sources can be key

• P2P document search (yes hard drives!)

• Scribd, PDF, XLS, PPT, FTP and Doc

• Video, Audio

• Non-English sources (google translate is your friend)

Entrepreneurs are allowed to stalk information in all 50 states



“Experts” won’t like your best Ideas

AT&T – “Why would you want to hear a voice? ”

Ford – “But we want faster horses”

Microsoft, Apple – “But PCs are toys”

ATMs – “Why would anyone need that?”

Sony Walkman – “People want bigger not smaller ”

Google – “Search is over, Yahoo won”



Experts did not like my ideas either

Square Earth – “But no one uses the Internet”

Result: Proxicom Merger, Inc500, Incorporation to IPO in 51 months, 2B

Market Cap.

Mimeo – “Who Prints over the Internet?”

Result: Inc500, 8600 corporate customers, over 300+ of the Fortune 500 as

customers, loyal customers

Lenddo – “Lending in emerging markets, over social networks that’s crazy”

Result: Tens of thousands of loans, almost everyone repays



The Urgent Process™

“A more predictable process should result ina more predictable outcome”



Start-Up Research Summary

1. Are you passionate about it?

2. Will it change the world?

3. Are there huge margins?4. Is it a billion dollar idea?

5. What’s the market …or potential market?

6. Can you field the right team?7. What is your competitive advantage?



Contact and Related Reading

Jeff StewartCEO – LenddoPhone: 646-237-3401

Blog: http://www.UrgentSpeed.com

Twitter: @UrgentSpeed

180 Questions to ask when launching a business:

http://www.urgentspeed.com/applied_disruption/2006/10/180_useful_ques.html

http://www.urgentspeed.com/




http://www.urgentspeed.com/

nyfi april 3 startup research: jeff stewart

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