‘The definition of an entrepreneur is someone who is abnormal’
By Francis Moran
Ottawa entrepreneurs were treated last night to a rare performance when seasoned entrepreneur and pioneering angel investor David Rose, founder or funder of more than 75 technology companies, spoke at the city’s monthly StartupGrind event. Describing himself as a third-generation entrepreneur, Rose spent fully 40 minutes answering StartupGrind organizer Cheryl Draper’s very first question about his early adventures in company creation and angel investing. As entertaining as his personal story was, it was the concrete advice he gave to entrepreneurs that made the evening valuable.
Like many other tech sector observers, Rose pointed out that it has never been easier to start a company. His first venture consumed $20-million of investors’ money to get to a revenue-producing product. His next venture cost $2-million to get to the same stage, and the third just $200,000. The costs have dropped by another order of magnitude — or maybe even two — to the point that today, he said, “almost anyone can start a web company at almost no cost.”
This low cost of entry means that too many people start companies to do easy things or to mimic things that have already been done, Rose said, a paradox that I don’t hear enough people emphasizing. The world doesn’t need another recruitment site or social shopping site, he said. Instead, “look around for real problems that haven’t been solved by anyone else…The first question (every entrepreneur needs to ask) is, ‘Does anyone want what I’m going to build?'”
