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Ask HN: How to start a startup that requires a high amount of initial capital?

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Re: Ask HN: How to start a startup that requires a high amount of initial capital?

#41
There are two ways to answer this question, two new questions basically.

One is "raise over $13m." How? This is not impossible. There is more investor money looking for home today than ever, I reckon. However, this is not a level playing field. Who you are and who you know and how well will make a big difference. This is probably the wrong place for advice about this strategy.

The second possibility is "what is an easier/cheaper idea, that can later become a payment bank?" This is the HN philosophy, from our founder PG.^" Say you had $13,000. What could you build that would get you customers, impress investors or otherwise put you on a less direct path to what you want? Then, you are pitching "turn this thing into a bank" instead of "start a bank" which is a little easier.

This is hacker news so conventional advice here is take on hard engineering problems, and easy business problems. If this was a forum for business people, it'd be the reverse. There, people would rather take the challenge of raising a large sum but avoid hard engineering challenges. You need to figure out what you are strongest at. Are you the kind of person that can cold call your way I to a 7 or 8 figure investment or the kind of person that can build a product in 2 months that will get you investors or customers that will get you to the next step.

Finally, what you are asking is "how do I succeed at this very hard thing." There are no formulas that are easy and will work for most people.

Read this, pay attention to the bridgehead: http://www.paulgraham.com/ambitious.html

Re: Ask HN: How to start a startup that requires a high amount of initial capital?

#42
post #34

Yeah, I read all these comments and they miss the obvious answer. Pitch large vcs and ask for a lot of money. It goes against the YC grain, but it is the reason there are silicon valley vcs. It used to be that starting a company meant building chips and buildings and assembly lines, and some vcs are structured to write 30m series a, 50m total to build product, and then 50 to scale. A friend of mine is doing this in t…

Are there any concrete examples of these larger scale VC:s and the companies they've funded? The small-fry tech startup is the most familiar story.

Re: Ask HN: How to start a startup that requires a high amount of initial capital?

#44
post #7

Start smaller. Most of the disrupter banks started as something else with the view to eventually obtaining a banking license. That way you can actually prove that you have a product worth investing in. Usually banking startups start with a Stored Value Facility license (or the local equivalent) and work up from there.

Seconded. Start smaller. The simple concept to remember is: if you need $13M to start this business, it's a business you can't start right now; it's instead an opportunity for larger businesses.

We had a similar problem: we started with "let's build the city of the future", which would have probably required a large capital (of course, we wouldn't have done it alone, but still...), and ended up focusing on creating innovation at the financial layer of real estate, which we started with a few 100,000s of $$.

Doing good so far.

Re: Ask HN: How to start a startup that requires a high amount of initial capital?

#45

you can rent a licence, there are many banks doing that in EU. I think you need to do a better research..

Can you expand on this? Never heard of this but I'm not super involved in fintech/banking. Something like Solarisbank?

Re: Ask HN: How to start a startup that requires a high amount of initial capital?

#46
post #41

There are two ways to answer this question, two new questions basically. One is "raise over $13m." How? This is not impossible. There is more investor money looking for home today than ever, I reckon. However, this is not a level playing field. Who you are and who you know and how well will make a big difference. This is probably the wrong place for advice about this strategy. The second possibility is "what is an ea…

very good answer ! (ok_hand emoji, 100 emoji)

Re: Ask HN: How to start a startup that requires a high amount of initial capital?

#47

Check out Monzo in the UK. They started as a top up payment card with great technology. This meant they didn't need a banking license. They are now moving into the current/checking account space with a license. So do you need a license from the start? Impossible to tell from your comment.

The idea is heavily borrowed from Monzo. A Payment Bank in India seemed like the closest thing to what Monzo did initially. A full banking license requires 5 times more capital than a payment bank. That is a good question. I'll see if I can still issue cards that links to one real bank account and if we can bypass being a payment bank.

You can re-issue international debit cards and sell them. The vendor will give you API and you build the interface. If you can convert local indian currency to USD, then it can work for you. From there, you get traction and then ask investors for cash.

Re: Ask HN: How to start a startup that requires a high amount of initial capital?

#49
post #34

Yeah, I read all these comments and they miss the obvious answer. Pitch large vcs and ask for a lot of money. It goes against the YC grain, but it is the reason there are silicon valley vcs. It used to be that starting a company meant building chips and buildings and assembly lines, and some vcs are structured to write 30m series a, 50m total to build product, and then 50 to scale. A friend of mine is doing this in t…

Responding to a few other replies to this thread, you can see funds that give 30mm+ seed/A rounds in Crunchbase or Pitchbook. That’s not to say those rounds are a fund’s specific thesis or the norm, only that it’s possible.
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