Are you in seed stage A founder building a unicorn?
NFX founding partner James Currier wants to save you time.
- Network effect: The more people use your product, the more valuable it becomes.
- Embedding: Integrate services so deeply that customers cannot “pull out”.
- Data Loop: Collect, process, and process real-time data.
“This is really just talking about big, world-changing businesses with a lot of impact that could be worth $1 billion or more,” he said at TechCrunch Early Stage last month. “That’s what we’re investing in. And all I’m talking about today is for people who want to build that type of business.”
After giving presentations previously shared at Harvard Business School, Stanford University, and MIT, Currier outlines the mental model adopted by unicorn founders and offers candid advice for early-stage entrepreneurs. bottom.
“Don’t take market risk. Find what people want and do a better job. That’s the most common way to get to unicorn companies.” James Currier, Founding Partner of NFX
“The idea that 99% sweat and 1% ideas is not true, because right ideas have power,” he said. “The right idea at the right time attracts the right talent. It attracts you capital — OK, it attracts you to the press, which attracts you more talent and capital.”
Pop culture and tech journalism hold the moon-hunting founders in high esteem, so “most people come up with ideas,” Currier said, noting that unicorns like Lyft, Meta and Alphabet are simply existing companies. I pointed out that I just “copied” the . In doing so, they replaced market risk with execution risk. This is much easier to manage.
“Don’t take market risk. Find what people want and do a better job. That’s the most common way to get to unicorn companies.”
NFX considers about 8,000 deals each year, but only invests in about 30, according to Currier, who was an angel investor at Lyft, DoorDash and Patreon. “Dead Zone” — If you pursue bad thoughts, this area will waste your life energy.