Andrew GazdeckiSerial Entrepreneur Driving Startup Acquisitions

Valuation Killers in Startup Acquisitions

31 Jan 2026 · 0 min

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Andrew Gazdecki breaks down what tanks startup valuations in acquisition talks: no traction, too few customers, founding team red flags, weak asset growth, and high churn. Any one of these can kill a deal.

What are some things in businesses that might scare you away? Lack of traction, of course is a big one. Limited customers, only a handful of accounts, for example. If the team was was looking the runaway right away, that was something that I was hesitant about. Then all the normal characteristics that you would look at when evaluating is the asset growing? Do they have a churn problem? A few, I would say key attributes that would disqualify something within the deal flow.