funding Archives - Startup Economist

Why We Teach Startups to Pitch to Investors Even If They Don’t Want Venture Capital

Friday, 06 February 2026 by Paul O'Brien

I realized this week, that this is a discussion point I have with almost every founder, and yet I’ve never bothered to write it up. Every founder. Particularly in our work in Founder Institute, when teaching or mentoring dozens of founders in the same room, the question is always posed, “why are we working on

Published in Startups

14 Comments

The Great Startup Delusion: What Web3 Failures Teach About Confusing Business with Innovation

Monday, 15 December 2025 by Paul O'Brien

There’s a nasty little lie that keeps getting passed around the economy like a like a VC quote on LinkedIn: that every new business built on a new technology is a “startup.” It’s how we got here, misunderstanding the difference between a startup and a business. The bloated graveyard of Web3 ventures, now being backfilled

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Published in AI, Insights / Research, Quantum, Social Media, Startups

28 Comments

There Is No “Era of the Bootstrapped Startup,” There’s Math, Memory Loss, and Better Advice

Tuesday, 02 December 2025 by Paul O'Brien

Every few years, someone declares a new epoch in entrepreneurship. We’ve had the “Era of Lean,” the “Rise of the Micro-VC,” the “Democratization of Innovation,” and (God help us) the phase where every city believed a coworking space with a yellow logo and a couple late career bankers counted as a “startup ecosystem.” With AI

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Published in Startup Ecosystems, Startups, Uncategorized

35 Comments

The Customer of Venture Capital Isn’t the Founder, It’s the Investor

Wednesday, 22 October 2025 by Paul O'Brien

Until Cities Get That Straight, Startups Will Keep Starving for Capital It’s a weird day when the world’s entrepreneurs sound like customers complaining about a bad product. “We can’t find funding.” “Investors aren’t taking risks.” “There’s no capital in our city.” You’ve heard it a thousand times; it’s the economic equivalent of Yelp reviews from

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Published in Economic Development, Raising Capital

23 Comments

“I’ll See It When I Believe It,” Entrepreneurs and Startup Investors Put Conviction Before Cash Flow

Thursday, 11 September 2025 by Paul O'Brien

That tired phrase has been responsible for more missed fortunes than bad timing or bad luck. It’s the refrain of cautious uncles, small-town bankers, and risk-averse executives who prefer their innovation the way they prefer their wine: aged, tested, bottled, and priced at a predictable markup. But in the world of entrepreneurship, that order of

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Published in Insights / Research, Raising Capital

20 Comments

Bootstrap or Raise Capital: How to Decide What’s Right for Your Startup

Monday, 01 September 2025 by Paul O'Brien

If you’re like me, it might have been Labor Day in the U.S., and it was a beautiful one here in Austin, not putting in any work is more or less impossible; besides, entrepreneurs throughout the world were working and so with the focus on work, I couldn’t help but put thought to this frequently

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Published in Raising Capital, Startups

29 Comments

Solutions to Overcome Ignorance

Monday, 28 July 2025 by Paul O'Brien

Startup Funding Isn’t Broken, It’s Behind Ready for a spicy topic likely to frustrate some friends in my criticism of good intentions? Let’s begin with a blunt but necessary truth: venture capital isn’t broken, most of it just doesn’t know what the hell it’s doing. The problem isn’t capital. It’s experience. And the startup ecosystem,

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Published in Startups

27 Comments