How you choose to fund your new venture depends on several things: 1) What’s the nature of the venture? 2) How deep are your pockets? 3) What’s your personality?
If you develop something that requires little or no capital and first to market is not your primary concern, like a software company, go bootstrapping for as long as you can. But on the other hand, if the venture needs a large amount money upfront and time is a critical factor to success, I highly recommend VC or angel money. I don’t believe that loosing part of equity should be your biggest concern. I firmly believe that instead of spending time on how to slice the pie, all parties should work together to make the pie bigger. Another reason is that there is fierce competition for talent, especially software engineers, and having deep pockets makes it easier to recruit the best. After all who wants to work for a company that only has two months runway left? Having a good VC as your investor just makes your company more credible. Let’s face it, only one out of 400 business plans presented to VCs actually get funded, so the simple fact that you successfully raised the money from a VC proves that you have a viable business plan. Of course, your personality and experience should be part of the decision as well. Do you have what it takes to work under the pressure to get results or prove your business plan in a relatively short period of time? I’ve learned from my two VC funded experiences that being an entrepreneur is a 24/7 job. Being a VC funded entrepreneur is a 25/8 job. It’s a little bit overwhelming if you don’t have the experience and do not know how to communicate with your VC.
In our case, uCareer is not just looking for investment; we are also looking for partnership. We want a VC or angel (s) that not can only provide financial support, but also the industry expertise we need as well. I am looking forward to talking with the right partners in the Austin area. I’ve already personally invested bootstrapping this project for several months and will continue to do so as long as I can before we team up with the right VC or angel partner.
