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Fundraising & Equity

What If You Can't Raise? Alternatives to Venture Capital

Written by Harry Prabandham

Curated by Rubric Financial

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Revenue-First Alternatives

  • Shift to a revenue-first mindset: can you reach profitability or cash-flow breakeven with your current resources?
  • Focus on your highest-margin, fastest-closing customer segments. Cut experiments and double down on what's working
  • Consider consulting or services revenue to bridge the gap. It's not scalable, but it extends runway while you build product
  • Many successful companies (Mailchimp, Basecamp, Zoho) never raised venture capital. Profitability is always an option

About the author

Harry Prabandham

Founder & CEO

Founder and CEO of StartupCFO. MBA from Wharton, MS in Computer Science, and decades of experience building and advising venture-backed startups.

More articles by Harry →

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