Questions

I'm the founder of a social network startup. My family and friends gave me seed money enough to build the product, and though its far from complete, I think the app is like 60% done. The problem is that I live in Ghana, where VC is virtually non-existent. My programmers are in Serbia. It's however obvious that we need external financing to pull our app through. My original plan was to finish the app, bootstrap and get some users, and then reach out for funding. I've formed some good connections on LInkedIn, but I'm wondering if it's even possible to convince someone over the internet to invest in your startup and I don't even know how to do that. Luckily one of my programers is traveling to San Francisco in a month and he wants to help find an investor. The app would be like 90% at that time. Is it possible to get an investor when your app is not completely done? How do we even go about this process of finding investors? I've already read some investment blogs, and followed Paul Graham. I need some real guidance here, possibly someone who will advice me through this process, from now till closing the deal.

Generally speaking, yes, it's possible to get money from USA investors even though your company is not local.

On the personal note, I am glad to see that all your programmers are from Serbia, as that's my home country and I live in the US now.

The app does not have to be done at all. 60% is good enough to test the market, so I would shift my focus on product--market fit validation, customer acquisition process and a business model with an emphasis on revenue potential, addressable market size, total market size.

Seed investors will put their money into pre-revenue companies, but venture capitalist, Round A are less likely to do so which makes bootstrapping incredibly important.
Here's my paper that can help you understand where does your company fall on investment readiness spectrum.
How do you know that #startup is ready for venture capital? Industry fit, $1B+ market size, big competitive advantage http://wp.me/pj2e9-by

Finally, I would be more than happy to work with you on your investor's pitch and be ready before your colleague starts making connections in SF:
http://www.anagard.com/services/InvestorReadyConsulting.html


Answered 9 years ago

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