This Monday Nils Hoegsdal and Joaquin Soucheiron, our guest from bwcon, talked about the necessity of thinking about each penny to spend when hunting up sources of capital.
Getting ready for investments
How much money do you actually need to set up your business? This time Nils tried to extract concrete numbers from you. What are your one-time expenses? What are your regular expenses? Try to figure that out before talking to an investor! Meaning do not take your grandmother’s money and invest it in something that is not thought through thoroughly. Keep your powder dry – you might need it one day. Well, the seemingly endless series of financial preparations do not, of course, stop at this point. Once your product is running, what would your monthly expense rates be? €500? €2000? No idea? The right answer would be: “Let me check that out!” – while opening an excel sheet. Investors will love that, says Nils.
However, investors are not the only source of funding. Joaquin extended on that topic by listing and explaining a lot of alternatives. He recommended to also try to get money from others than Business Angels and FFF (friends, family and fools). You can, for example, consider EXIST – a support program run by the Federal Ministry of Economic Affairs and Energy. Other options would be the Mezzanin-Fund Germany, the Small and Medium Entrepreneurs Union Europe (SME) or the High-Tech Gründerfonds (HTGF). Besides, you can ask the German employment agency for support or draw on a bank loan. Crowdsourcing can also be taken into account, but you shouldn’t put all your hopes in that particular basket.