Do better in 2017: Startup Guide

sstart

Do better in 2017:

Startup Guide.

An interview with thought leaders at Web Summit Lisbon by Pepipost

2 Pepipost www.pepipost.com

Do better in 2017: Startup Guide

Contents.

Contents. ......................................................................................................................................... 2

Foreword. ........................................................................................................................................ 3

Influencer Profiles. .......................................................................................................................... 4

Expert Speak. .................................................................................................................................. 7

Our Company Profile. .................................................................................................................... 17

http://www.pepipost.com/



Foreword.

Mega conferences such as the Web Summit bring lot of value and insights to entrepreneurs and

infuse growth to their companies. The Web Summit held in Lisbon in Fall 2016 witnessed 53,056

tech CEOs, founders, startups, investors and political leaders from across the world. It provided

the perfect opportunity for startups to receive constructive feedback and gain valuable learnings

from leaders in the space.

Is disruption an overrated term? What are the mistakes startups seem to be making

time and again? What do venture capitalists look for in a startups?

These are questions almost every startup has in their minds. So we went to people who know

better than anyone – influencers and thought leaders with solid experience in their field to pass

their wisdom forward and help startups learn from their experiences.

Reading this e-book won’t just leave motivated and inspired, you will leave equipped to

accelerate your startup in 2017.

Dibya Sahoo,

Co-founder, Pepipost




Influencer Profiles.




Dave Williams,

Founder & CEO At eBallers

Dave is one of Atlanta’s leading entrepreneurs recognized for his

expertise in online media, social media advertising and search engine

marketing. He is an active mentor, advisor and investor in the tech

startup scene with a perfect track record of success. A serial

entrepreneur, his companies have been consistently recognized as a

Fastest Growing Company, Healthiest Company, Best Places to Work,

and Best Workplaces for Commuters Awards. Dave has been

awarded Atlanta Small Business Person of the year, Atlanta

Marketing & Technology Lifetime Achievement Award and has been

featured in Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg TV and Adage

Brian Breslin,

Project Executive At IDA Ireland

The biggest tech companies – Google, Oracle, LinkedIn, Facebook

and Twitter have their international headquarters at Ireland. Strong

venture capital presence and incredible talent make Ireland the

perfect destination for tech companies to set up shop here, not to

mention tax opportunities. Brian is part of the IDA Ireland, a leading

global development agency that partners with multinational

companies to add value across their global operations using Ireland

as a business hub. Brian works for Growth Markets and guides clients

in growing their international footprint.

Simon Berger,

Founder Of IM2 Group

Simon is Founder of IM2 Group, who are world renowned exhibition

and conference organisers with an enviable reputation on a global

scale. Simon founded the company 22 years ago, and his experience

in the events space is recognised around the world. Simon recently

co-founded an exciting, disruptive expo called Millennial 2020, the

first expo of its kind that brings together the world’s biggest brands

and most exciting startups to uncover the future of millennial-driven

business, marketing & entrepreneurship.




Tommy Otzen,

CEO & Co-founder Of KUBO Robot

One of the hot topics at this year's Web Summit was artificial

intelligence. Kubo Robot, a robot designed to teach young children

programming, was announced as the winner of the prestigious Alpha

Startup Award at the Web Summit 2016 and won top prize of

€100,000 in VC funding from Portugal Ventures. They also won at the

Pepipost #ThatsMyPitch Web Summit contest. Tommy Otzen is the

CEO & Co-founder of Kubo Robot and the brain behind this product.

Anshuman Mihir,

Founder & CEO MyTaxiIndia

India is home to the third largest number of technology driven

startups in the world beaten only by the US and UK in terms of the

number of ventures. One such promising startup from India is

MyTaxiIndia, a car rental and leasing portal that seeks to do what

Uber has opted out of – cater to intra-city cab booking market.

MyTaxiIndia was crowned the winner of PITCH competition 2016 at

RISE Conference (Web Summit), Hong Kong. Anshuman Mihir is the

Founder & CEO of this car rental startup.




Expert Speak.




What is the most interesting/ promising sector

where globally VC investment is expected to

flow?

Artificial intelligence to automate monotonous tasks.

What are the five most important things you look

for in a startup?

1. Experience

2. Alignment

3. Focus

4. Tenacity

5. Strong culture

Dave

Founder & CEO At eBallers




Apart from the tax benefit, what is the key

reason that makes Ireland an ideal location for

startups to set up shop?

Talent, talent and more talent. That is why companies come here. Ireland gives them the best

platform in the world to scale from!

What are the key things startups must do to run

a successful offshore business?

I think the key thing is to build the right partnerships. The best companies rarely go for it alone,

whether they advertise that fact or not. When you set up an office in a new market the success

of that can be greatly help with the right strategic partners. At IDA Ireland we place huge

importance on creating these channels for companies coming to Ireland. This is why most of our

clients end up growing to a scale far beyond what they originally planned.

Brian

Project Executive At IDA Ireland


http://www.idaireland.com/



How can startups use events and conferences to

grow their business?

Go to events where they can meet customers directly – Millennial20-20 is the best example of

this!

What are the 3 tips for startups to boost social

media engagement at events and conferences?

1. Be prepared with a full/daily social media strategy before arriving at the event

2. Schedule posts in advance and

3. Work with the Organisers’ PR & Comms team to schedule interviews, joint posts &

distribution.

Simon

Founder Of IM2 Group


http://www.millennial20-20.com/



Tell us about one of the overwhelming challenges

you faced when setting up your startup and how

you overcame it.

KUBO started as a researched based project during our master-study at the University of

Southern Denmark. Very early in the process, we received a grant from the Danish government,

which we wanted to spend on a whole new set of prototypes. The grant was around 3500€. We

found a company in Lithuania that could help us build our prototypes. Long story short, the

company did not deliver as promised and we ended up losing our only two existing prototypes

of our product and the 3500€. That was a huge disappointment, but also a critical lesson on how

to out-source your production. To fix the problem, we had work day and night to build our

prototypes from scratch, since we already had booked test session in local schools in Denmark.

What’s the biggest risk that you’ve ever taken

and how did it turn?

At the moment we have invested almost all our time and resources in our upcoming

crowdfunding campaign on Indiegogo in January. As a team, we believe this is the right way for

us to bring our solution (KUBO Robot) to the market. If our intuition is wrong, we would have to

work hard to come up with a plan B in a very short time. To answer how it turned out, you would

have to ask me that same question in February, but I’m confident that it will be a definite answer.

Tommy

CEO & Co-founder Of KUBO Robot Ireland




Tell us about one of the overwhelming challenges

you faced when setting up your startup and how

you overcame it

The journey of an entrepreneur is always challenging. I too faced many challenges in

my entrepreneur journey so far likewise finding co-founders / team, convincing investors,

execution of idea on real ground. But one of the biggest challenge was & is that “how to delight

and keep your customers with your company?" We have successfully found the mantra to give

the best experience to our customer for retention and we keep improving on this by improving

our product interface, service and after sales experience.

What’s the biggest risk that you’ve ever taken

and how did it turn out?

The biggest risk I took was when I started implementing the idea of MyTaxiIndia, I simply quit my

high salary job and started this company with my own savings. This came up as a direct hit on

pocket and when only I was confident on my doings. But this paid off, within few months

MyTaxiIndia became a bootstrapping company and in the next year we got seed and angle

funding from Singapore and Japan.

Anshuman

Founder & CEO MyTaxiIndia




Main disruptions

happening in the

startup marketplace.




Anshuman, MyTaxiIndia

Startup market place is

changing its priorities - Earlier

the focus was on GMV, number

of visitors and app downloads.

But now Investors

and companies are

focusing more on

actual business that

means - actual revenue and

profitability. It was speculated

that 2016 is not good a year for

investment but companies who

are focusing on bottom line are

getting cheque from investors.

According to me I find this is

one major disruptions in

startup market place till date.

Brian, IDA Ireland

Convergence seems to be the most important

theme within the tech industry at the moment. The

way adopting new technology and forming cross

over partnerships is fascinating. The health sector

and financial services sector are primed for major

disruption on the back of convergence. Exciting

times for the tech world! The world of IoT has

created a platform to make all companies

technology companies of sorts. It’s hard to

imagine what industry sectors won’t be

‘connected’ in the coming years!

Simon, IM2 Group

Startups are completely transforming the way

business is consumed and activated in all and

every area of business – out is not just about

technology innovation but disruption in

every department in every sector. It is not a revolution it is an evolution; and

those that fail to adapt to the new

environment and consumer will join the

other failed brands/retailers/businesses that

already little the landscape!

Dave, eBallers

Startups from all over the world

competing against

each other with very

low startup costs. And,

employees have much greater

flexibility in work time and place

than ever before.

Tommy, KUBO Robot

In a broad sense, AI and chat agents seem to be very popular at

websummit. It is going to be fascinating to see how this

domain will develop and change the landscape of online customer service and other customer oriented fields.




Startup mistakes

entrepreneurs are

making time and

again.




Brian, IDA Ireland

This is a difficult question to

answer. A lot of people would

argue that it is mistakes that

make entrepreneurs

successful in the end. I guess

to try and answer your

question though, the

biggest mistake I

see people making is

forgetting they are

building a business. Ideas are great but it’s the

execution of that idea that

really counts. If you can’t

execute, you won’t succeed.

Anshuman, MyTaxiIndia

I find many entrepreneurs focusing on customer

acquisition without knowing why

their customer acquisition cost is not

dropping even if they are enhancing

their marketing budget plans and burn

rate. Customer acquisition holds importance but

with burn rate they should also improve their

product performance, customer experience and

delight to move ahead to the top or to remain on

top in the market.

Tommy, KUBO Robot

I believe that we always should strive to lower

the number of errors that we make. That

being said, I also believe that mistakes are

the fuel of wisdom for any

entrepreneur. Entrepreneurs are risk-

takers that rather take a change and make an

error than wait for the full report to arrive.

Simon, IM2 Group

Looking for funding

as opposed to

looking for paying

customers

Dave, eBallers

1. Unwillingness to be flexible in the startup's path

2. Getting too caught up in their own ego and

lose perspective on themselves and the company

3. Spending capital too quickly




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Transcript of Do better in 2017: Startup Guide