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How Old Are Successful Tech Entrepreneurs?

insight.kellogg.northwestern.edu

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Re: How Old Are Successful Tech Entrepreneurs?

#11

Post by taurath »

avighnay wrote: post #6
madaxe_again wrote: post #4

You spend half your career being told that you are too young by prospective clients and investors (I was rather astounded when we were turned down on this ground at first, rather than anything to do with the product or service, but eventually grew to accept it), and then the next half being told you are too old by the same. Ah, to be forever 34 and eight months.

This might not be the case going forward for cloud, SaaS models with zero touch sales. Most software would move to this category sooner than we think as there is high vendor motive. It is hindered only by regulatory or compliance needs in certain industries/countries

Those regulatory needs are more often than not the secret sauce and speciality of those vendors. Look at the payments space - now that every municipality is going to tax online sales it pushes more and more companies to outsource the cost of compliance to a vendor.

Re: How Old Are Successful Tech Entrepreneurs?

#12

Post by tonyedgecombe »

onion2k wrote: post #10
madaxe_again wrote: post #4

You spend half your career being told that you are too young by prospective clients and investors (I was rather astounded when we were turned down on this ground at first, rather than anything to do with the product or service, but eventually grew to accept it), and then the next half being told you are too old by the same. Ah, to be forever 34 and eight months.

Whatever reason an investor gives for turning your investment down, it's actually code for "I don't think you can pull this off."

Or "you look like the guy that ran off with my wife".

Like interview feedback, it's generally useless advice because people make emotional decisions rather than rational.

Re: How Old Are Successful Tech Entrepreneurs?

#13

Post by jath »

I presume one reason could be at 40 you dont make the mistakes you made at 20. I was 20 once and when i built a product i tried to load it with features/options. Now at 30 i make things as simple as possible. I don’t discuss which DB to use. I straight away use SQL. I don’t discuss scaling issues. I dont bother about 80% of the issues i used to discuss when i was 20. I’m better of now.

Re: How Old Are Successful Tech Entrepreneurs?

#14

Post by ganeshkrishnan »

jath wrote: post #13

I presume one reason could be at 40 you dont make the mistakes you made at 20. I was 20 once and when i built a product i tried to load it with features/options. Now at 30 i make things as simple as possible. I don’t discuss which DB to use. I straight away use SQL. I don’t discuss scaling issues. I dont bother about 80% of the issues i used to discuss when i was 20. I’m better of now.

You are right. The average entrepreneur could be 16 but the average successful will be around 40. I did the same mistake as you, adding as many features as possible so that users can use whatever they like. Now I think of it like adding as many wheels as possible to a car so that users can use whatever wheels they like.

Keep things as simple and single functionality as possible. If you can't explain your startup in one sentence, it's doing too much

Re: How Old Are Successful Tech Entrepreneurs?

#15

Post by ganeshkrishnan »

indogooner wrote: post #9
1ba9115454 wrote: post #7

The article talks of old and the young as if they were different people. All of the old people were young people once. If you consistently try to build businesses through side projects, or other means, there's a good chance you're getting better at it as the years go by. So it shouldn't come as a surprise to find you may eventually succeed.

Right. It would be more instructive to see what percentage of old entrepreneurs are first-timers.

Also subjective to define successful. I started at 16 but by no means million dollar business. Just barely enough to feed myself. Then moved on to consulting and finally now a startup

Re: How Old Are Successful Tech Entrepreneurs?

#16

Post by ganeshkrishnan »

madaxe_again wrote: post #4

You spend half your career being told that you are too young by prospective clients and investors (I was rather astounded when we were turned down on this ground at first, rather than anything to do with the product or service, but eventually grew to accept it), and then the next half being told you are too old by the same. Ah, to be forever 34 and eight months.

This is what I absolutely hate about VCs. The reasons are garbage and they are actually harming by trying to be polite. There is no such thing as too young or old for startups. Why do they even care if they think your startup is going to make it?

I got turned down by one VC because "they don't invest in India". My startup is registered in Delaware, I pitched him in US and I am not even Indian citizen

Re: How Old Are Successful Tech Entrepreneurs?

#17

Post by ganeshkrishnan »

tonyedgecombe wrote: post #12
onion2k wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Whatever reason an investor gives for turning your investment down, it's actually code for "I don't think you can pull this off."

Or "you look like the guy that ran off with my wife". Like interview feedback, it's generally useless advice because people make emotional decisions rather than rational.

Ha true! Regardless of the bullshit the VCs feed about traction, team and such nonsense everything boils down to how charming you are. Worked with plenty of startups that essentially sold perpetual motion machine but the founders could convince you to buy ice in Antarctica

Re: How Old Are Successful Tech Entrepreneurs?

#18

Post by tonyedgecombe »

taurath wrote: post #11
avighnay wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This might not be the case going forward for cloud, SaaS models with zero touch sales. Most software would move to this category sooner than we think as there is high vendor motive. It is hindered only by regulatory or compliance needs in certain industries/countries

Those regulatory needs are more often than not the secret sauce and speciality of those vendors. Look at the payments space - now that every municipality is going to tax online sales it pushes more and more companies to outsource the cost of compliance to a vendor.

That doesn't negate @avighnay's point that we are moving to zero touch sales, I just opened a bank account with a bank with no branches without making any phone calls in a couple of minutes. This is in an area that is highly regulated. The same applies to software.

Re: How Old Are Successful Tech Entrepreneurs?

#19

Post by sumedh »

ganeshkrishnan wrote: post #16
madaxe_again wrote: post #4

You spend half your career being told that you are too young by prospective clients and investors (I was rather astounded when we were turned down on this ground at first, rather than anything to do with the product or service, but eventually grew to accept it), and then the next half being told you are too old by the same. Ah, to be forever 34 and eight months.

This is what I absolutely hate about VCs. The reasons are garbage and they are actually harming by trying to be polite. There is no such thing as too young or old for startups. Why do they even care if they think your startup is going to make it? I got turned down by one VC because "they don't invest in India". My startup is registered in Delaware, I pitched him in US and I am not even Indian citizen

but was your target market Indians?

Re: How Old Are Successful Tech Entrepreneurs?

#20

Post by WalterBright »

jath wrote: post #13

I presume one reason could be at 40 you dont make the mistakes you made at 20. I was 20 once and when i built a product i tried to load it with features/options. Now at 30 i make things as simple as possible. I don’t discuss which DB to use. I straight away use SQL. I don’t discuss scaling issues. I dont bother about 80% of the issues i used to discuss when i was 20. I’m better of now.

Yeah, one thing experience teaches you is what matters and what doesn't. I still struggle with that, though.
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