Billion ₹ in sales in our first year.
I still lost millions of my own money.

That contradiction taught me everything.

The metrics I worshipped were GMV and valuation.
The metric that mattered was Positive cashflows and Net Profit.

I learned it the expensive way.

Look at where startups actually die.
No market need. Running out of cash.
Those two causes alone are behind roughly 70% of all shutdowns.

Now look at the funded ones. The supposed winners.
Harvard Business School studied 2,000 venture-backed startups. About 3 in 4 never returned a single dollar to their investors.
Funded. Celebrated. Valued in the millions. And still they returned nothing.

Here is where I have to be honest.

I am an investor too.

I backed many startups, and I will back many more.

Raise it when it makes the business stronger.

I am against mistaking the raise for the business.

A valuation is someone's opinion of what you might be worth one day.

A paying customer is proof you are worth something today.

The startups we watched survive, ours and the ones we funded, almost always earned the customer before they earned the valuation.

That is the bet behind @A Foundery. Profitable, self-sustaining businesses over fictitious value sitting on a term sheet.

If that is the company you want to build,
our "Founder in Residence" (FIR) program is open. Link below in comment

Would you rather be valued at millions, or earn your first real dollar?

| 𝗞𝗿𝗶𝘀𝗵𝗻𝗮 𝗟𝗮𝗸𝗮𝗺𝘀𝗮𝗻𝗶 | 𝗦𝗲𝗿𝗶𝗮𝗹 𝗘𝗻𝘁𝗿𝗲𝗽𝗿𝗲𝗻𝗲𝘂𝗿 | 𝗜𝗻𝘃𝗲𝘀𝘁𝗼𝗿 |
| 𝗕𝘂𝗶𝗹𝗱𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗽𝗿𝗼𝗳𝗶𝘁-𝗹𝗲𝗱 𝘀𝘁𝗮𝗿𝘁𝘂𝗽 𝗳𝗮𝗰𝘁𝗼𝗿𝘆 "𝗔 𝗙𝗢𝗨𝗡𝗗𝗘𝗥𝘆" | I write at the intersection of AI, capital, and the future of the human job market - sharing my life lessons, reflections, and honest takes from the founder-investor's seat.