Who Invests in Startup Companies – Who uses Lean Startup
When your planning is complete and you feel, it is now time to actualize your vision of your startup company, once you know how much investment you need and how you will put it to use, the time to go out and look for investment will have arrived. Therefore, it is important to know where to look and who to approach for investment. The aim of this article is to show you where to find the investment and also delve into the phenomenon of lean startup and where and who uses it.
Lean startup is where being where business and products are developed with objectives of shortening the product development cycle through business–hypothesis oriented experimentation, iterative product releases and validated learning. It is aimed in short at reducing the need for large sums of initial project funding and expensive product launches. It is relatively new and was first put forward by Eric Ries in 2008.
Some of the groups that invest in startup companies include Angel investors. There are a number of angel networks where you can find angel investors who will not only provide investment but mentorship, advice and access to their wealth of contacts. There are angel networks that will have directories containing lists of angel investors sorted by location and which platform they prefer to invest in.
Another group that invests in startups are incubators. These will always look to play a bigger role in growing your startup up compared to the other groups but they play a much bigger role than just providing financing. There are some that are willing to provide working and/or office space as you try to build up your business. Similarly, there are directories available that chronicle the various incubators out there and how they can be found.
Startup launch platforms are also providing a simple avenue for locating investors in an efficient way. You can become a member of such platforms and access to useful tips and information on how to start your business and importantly where to find investors. Crowdfunding sites are also another platform where you are likely to find people willing to invest in your startup. Finding the right fit for you is key though.
Traditional sources of investment like making use of the small business administrators are also another avenue for getting investment. Another traditional path is approaching private equity firms so that they can invest in your startup. These are especially advisable for startup companies with huge potential for growth but in their early stages of development. Private equity firms aim to part with their stake after a couple of years for a profit. Other groups that will look to invest in your startup are online lenders who have looked to fill the void created by the tough restrictions that are you encounter when looking to procure a bank loan for your start up.
Personally, going out of your way to put yourself and your startup out there in need of funding can also secure you an investment from interested parties. Another group that will invest in your startup are your friends and family. These are easy to convince as they are naturally happy to see you succeed so will readily invest but it is also important to try and separate the personal from the business to prevent damaging relationships because of business.
On the question about who uses lean startup, it is basically applicable in virtually all fields. It is even used by governments both at national and local levels to help in cut through bureaucracies and deliver services. Some of the well-known companies to employ lean startup strategies include Dropbox, who were able to use it to iterate their product much quicker enabling them to test what their customers really wanted enabling them to boost their members exponentially in the space of just under a year and a half. General electronics is another company which has been able to use lean startup principles in developing one of their programs called Fastworks. It enables them to introduce prototypes of products to their customers, test them and then iterate accordingly. Having started on a small scale, they have now decided to scale up and having trained over 40,000 staff on the lean startup principles they are implementing their Fastworks methodology in almost everything they are developing.
Other companies using lean startup principles include Wealthfront, Grockit, imvu, Aadvark, Zappos among many more. Any business that provides a product or service of value to a customer make use of lean startup be it in IT, engineering, energy, construction etcetera. Its principles, as proved by General electronics, also transcend tech and apply too to companies dealing in hardware. In short it provides a new avenue of supplying value to customers at the same time bypassing risks of expenses of the conventional process of product development. The possibilities for the implementation of lean startup are seemingly endless, and hopefully this article helps in enlightening you as the reader on the same. As always you can learn a lot more on the same by visiting authoritative sites such as bitgale.com