What does a 25 Million Dollar Seed Round buy you? Lots of pressure
Blog: The Data Center
One of my favorite sites to frequent is www.venturebeat.com. It’s a site that focuses on success stories out of Silicon Valley. In my time reading it I’ve seen no name companies like SnapChat and Square be mentioned in a passing article and then go on to receive multi-billion dollar valuations.
A few months back i saw a story on Lucas Duplan. Lucas was a first time entrepreneur, fresh out of Stanford, when he convinced some of the biggest VC’s in Silicon Valley to invest in his company. Now, this isn’t such a big deal at face value. Lots of first time entrepreneurs get lucky with VC’s. However, he did something no one else had; he raise a record $25 million dollar seed round!
First off, congratulations to Lucas and his team at Clinkle. I can’t stress how hard it is to receive such a level of trust from some of the biggest VC’s in the industry.
What’s even more fascinating is that Lucas and his team received this funding without a working product. They had prototypes and very early alpha iterations of the product. But that was enough for groups like Andreesen Horowitz.to believe in him.
But there’s another side to this level of success. To quote Peter Parker’s uncle, “with great power comes great responsibility”. I would tweak that for this instance and say, “with great seed funding comes great responsibility.”
Clinkle now has a heavy weight on its young shoulders. It has 25 million expectations it has to live up to. Judging from the buzz coming out of the site and other news outlets, it looks like the team is on track to live up to these lofty expectations. However, I would guess that Lucas has had many sleepless nights due to the stress placed upon him by these expectations.
Which brings up a counterpoint to the idea of chasing VC money. Yes, VC money is invaluable and can allow an entrepreneur to do some amazing things that would otherwise be unattainable. However, the responsibility and pressure it places on the entrepreneur can be quite a load to bear. Therefore, perhaps a lone entrepreneur that bootstraps his company isn’t such an unapealing idea. After All, the solo entrepreneur is burdened only by his own aspirations and the pressures he places upon himself.
So, well done young Lucas Duplan. We’re very excited to see where your road takes you. The faith that’s been placed in you and your young company is unlike anything else that an entrepreneur in your shoes has encountered. We hope you rise to the occasion and impress your investors and us alike.
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