2024 W22 - Raising a round in 2024
Every week I post about one thing that happened at Rows. We're building in public!
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Last Friday we announced our new round.
Our investors Cherry, Accel, Lakestar, Armilar and Shilling (and others) were joined by Indico. Our board welcomes Cristina, a startup champion from the Portugal-conquers-SaaS scene (TalkDesk.com, Cleverly.ai).
Even with AI, and with Growth, and with an amazing team, it was still hard to raise in 2024. It took us many months and many dozens of calls with investors.
What we found.
We are in an investor's market, that is, they have more leverage than before. There is some FOMO, but again less than before. Pre-seed and seed companies can still raise quickly in general, and those with working PMF in AI are in a terrific position. AI leadership (models, etc) and super high growth companies are . Everything else will be harder. This is all natural and OK, the crazy times of 2019-2021 were cool, they may come back, but for now this is the reality!
The markets are still unstable. People don't know what will happen in the world economy a year from now, inflation is down a bit but it's not over, there's a trade war between the West and China, there might be a new government in the USA later in the year, etc.
AI is an opportunity to get users and attention and investors value it. It is especially important if you are in a position to produce and use your own data for training (now or later).
Starting a funding process early and committing to it is super important. It's a long run. Took us ~6 months TOTAL to close.
Conserve cash and energy, the process can be long, and Due Diligence too.
Think about what the team needs to be super motivated (stock, etc).
Different investors will want different things, don't be afraid to lose on some terms to get others. Understand investors point of view, if needed ask them to be specific about why they want something or don't want something else. But always aim for clean terms (which is what the best investors want anyway)!
While the VC market is in a slow mode, (insert the dry powder story), some regions and markets are in a countercyclical motion, with specific money from LPs, Governments, etc being easier. AI, CleanTech, Europe's Post-covid Bazooka and local offshots, Middle East.
Plan aggressively for the 2 years post-round. Maybe it's the last time you will raise, maybe not. But delivering results faster is the job.
We don't celebrate rounds a lot, it's a financial event that allows for the continuation of our plan. We prefer to celebrate wining customers, and shipping the best spreadsheet in the world. (Ofc, we and our team are obviously motivated to share these news!)
Let's go!
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See you next week!
Humberto
