Posts Tagged ‘startup’

One VC in Italy? No, two.

Friday, July 10th, 2009
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We met with Stefano Bernandi yesterday and had a really interesting chat about the startup scene in Europe. Stefano is founder of excellent blog The Startup and was just invited to become a blogger giving the Italian perspective to TechCrunch Europe, which has previously focused more on the UK and Belgium, and wants to start giving more local perspectives from across Europe. Hope it’s OK we mentioned that, Stefano ;-)

One of the many interesting tidbits Stefano had to share was the surprising fact that Italy has just two serious venture capital firms investing in tech startups. Yes, just two. The country is known for its limiting laws and it has had such an effect on the startup scene that there is virtually only a small tech community (primarily around Rome) and two VCs operating out of Milan.

Stefano’s got his finger on the pulse so if you’re interested in the emerging scene there, he’s your go-to guy. In fact he’s the blogger who broke the story about the launch of DPixel, the second VC firm.

At Grow VC we are dedicated to showcasing a global perspective, and as such, we want to start collecting more ‘go-to’ guys and gals from countries around Europe, Asia and the globe, or states in the US not necessarily ‘known’ for their startup scene (aka not the Valley). If you are a blogger with local perspective, and you don’t mind us syndicating some of your stories, please drop a comment and we’ll start tracking your stuff more closely and we’d be honoured to repost your stuff. As they say, local knowledge is everything.

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Three (+ one) great tips for entrepreneurs by Yoav Leitersdorf

Thursday, May 21st, 2009
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Bambi Francisco from vator.tv did this interview with Yoav Leitersdorf at Innovate!Europe conference, held in Zaragoza, Spain.

It shares some great and simple to understand tips for new start-up entrepreneurs:

  1. Get to revenue quickly
  2. Raise as little capital as possible
  3. Learn to be lucky (increase your opportunities to be lucky)

The one extra tip was, it’s OK to fail. European entrepreneurs seem to have VERY different viewpoint to failure. European failed entrepreneurs rarely continue as entrepreneurs and start something new, when in US. the most successful entrepreneurs have failed in past. I think this is a VERY important lesson. Europeans should understand to value their biggest lesson that they get from their failure!

See the video below for the full interview:

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