Most venture-backed companies fail because they scale too quickly after raising money too early. The speaker's benchmark for fundraising is proving your business model works repeatably and predictably. Without that validation, founders hire fast and burn through capital on something that might not work.
Why do I think most companies fail, the venture-backed ones? Scaling too fast. And at the root of that is taking money too early. And so there's no set benchmark. It kind of depends on access to funds, how willing you are to take the risk that you could build it midair. I think about the benchmark for me is that when I feel, and a lot of this is qualitative, but also when I have proof of repeatability and predictability, Then I'm ready to take money because then it's not— I can actually see the potential outcome and I know exactly what I'm gonna use the money for. And I just think not enough people, they just like get money and I guess I build a team.
