Lessons Learned about Pitching Investors from a First-Time Entrepreneur

Re:Lessons Learned about Pitching Investors from a First-Tim... by mkramlich on Friday September 10, 2010 @01:45AM (#1678018)

Why would something like Udemy need $1M investment? In a world where Django and Rails exist, etc. Just start building it and doing customer development bootstrapping it. Incrementally improve it as you go along. Keep all equity and maximize simplicity. If you don't want to spend money on a designer try to find one that will take equity. Exercise free promotion channels, also rely on word-of-mouth. Rinse, repeat.

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Re:Lessons Learned about Pitching Investors from a First-Tim... by gaganbiyani on Saturday September 11, 2010 @11:37PM (#1682983)

Good question! The simple answer is that our cofounders are immigrants and we need to support their H1B visa for them to be full-time. Unfortunately, we cannot support their visa without funding. Furthermore, investment is a way to accelerate growth. We're now able to hire additional team members and pay ourselves salaries (I had $250 left in my bank account and $3K in credit card debt when we raised money, so we were nearly broke).

Hope this helps! - Gagan, Cofounder of Udemy

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