Playing it safe is risky — Seth Godin
Beginning
It was 2014, I launched the first on-demand laundromat app in Nigeria at the age of 18y/o (http://techcabal.com/2014/04/28/washlify-netflix/), this was around the time on-demand was the next big thing.
Being Young and Taking Risks
June 20th, we had one Dubai based investor reached out with a commitment of $50K investment. We were on the verge of closing this round when I got the news that have been accepted into (RTU) to study computer systems.
RTU is one of the leading technical universities in the baltic states (Europe) to study science and engineering with 3% acceptance rate.
This was rather a tough decision to make.
Stay in Nigeria to run a startup with 0 experience or move abroad to study what I’ve always loved (computers)
The first person I reached out to about this was the investor and surprisingly, this is what he had to say; He made the decision easier for me
So I made the decision of shutting down “washlify” to go get a degree.
Albeit, this decision came with another huge risk. Latvia doesn’t have an embassy in Nigeria, so students are required to travel to Egypt to apply for Latvian Visa and residence permit which isn’t 100% guaranteed.
But I’ve always loved taking risk, so with this in mind, I went for it.
6 Months down in Egypt, my Latvian residence permit is still not out and it was starting to look like the embassy wasn’t going to grant me the permit.
At this point, I have few weeks left on my Visa in Cairo which is not renewable, meaning I will be returning back to Nigeria and starting from 0.
I began working on Plan B if this doesn’t work out, which is staying in Egypt.
I started building something similar to Medium but for startups and applied to Flat6labs Cairo accelerator. It was like “about page” that is manageable.
They called me in for an interview but didn’t get into that cohort.
Gods Plan
Later that night, I got an email from the Cairo Embassy telling me that my residence permit as been granted for studying in Latvia.
Alhamdulillahi robbil alamin.
On 29 JANUARY 2015, I purchased my flight ticket to Riga to begin my studies, after almost a year that I left Nigeria for Cairo.
Its all theory here
I was excited and pumped to be among smart people from all over the world. The first thing I did was figure out the smartest guy and befriend him so we could build cool stuff together. (That entrepreneur bug follows me everywhere)
Few months down the line, I launched my second startup with my classmates (http://discuss.bootstrapped.fm/t/hi-i-am-tomi-19yr-old-founder-of-roomlify-com-zoopla-for-student-accomodation/3349).
When things started feeling practical
I met A’chille AROUKO while he was on ERASMUS program in my university. Probably one of the smartest and loyal person have met.
We worked on different projects together and made ton of money freelancing which lead to our first startup project together. We launched a slack bot in 2015 when chatbot was still very early.
At this point, I have stopped attending classes.
We racked in over 1000 users beta users and growing like crazy. We decided to apply for Flat6labs Abu Dhabi accelerator and we got in!
I told my family about this and they weren’t all excited about it but I was able to convince my brother who in turn convinced everyone else.
Around 2016, I left Riga for UAE to join the accelerator which means loosing my European residence permit which took sweats and pain to get.
99 problems but starting ain’t one of them
Myself and Achille arrived to Abu Dhabi with less than 500 bucks in our pocket but with energy and excitement to build the next sustainable thing.
During the program, we figured out that slack ecosystem was too small to build a business on-top and we pivot to customer support automation.
Our first prototype for customer support automation was used by one of the airline in UAE and over 50 Shopify stores which validated the idea.
We started working on a proper MVP and raise capital after the demo day.
I’m a Nigerian, not a criminal
6 months down the line, We ran into issues setting up a company in UAE because the banks wouldn’t open an account for me with my Nigerian Passport. Thats a story for another day
I had few weeks left to figure out a plan for us to be able to run our operations out of UAE or return back to Nigeria. We pitched angels and ventures but most are concerned about our status in the country and in turn this visa issue made focusing on our startup tough.
We were loosing momentum and running out of runway. I felt like the world was coming down on me. I moved out of my hotel apartment to live and work out of our accelerator. Thank God we had sleeping sofa inside the accelerator
During this time, I applied to different government accelerators offering startup visa for entrepreneurs. One of them was French Tech Ticket
Time to go home
My UAE visa is now expired and we didn’t get into the French tech ticket programme (We were added to the waiting list).
Baba, Watin you bring?
Its 6.30AM in Lagos, Nigeria, my flight arrived at the tarmac. I was somewhat happy and really sad to be back home with no degree that I went abroad for.
I arrived with two luggages, one with my belongings and the other with regrets that maybe have made so many bad decisions.
Operative word being “Maybe”
Depressed, tired, almost gave up
3 weeks later, I got an email from french government that we’ve been accepted into the program with 50k euros grant and four years residence permit to work on our project in France.
Money won’t save you
Five months later in France, we completed the MVP we set out to develop eight months ago which got delayed because of visa issues etc.
The market already moved along and getting to product market fit was getting harder but we still love what we built and started selling.
RFQ, RFP, “RFNO”
The first client in Europe we talked to was Airfrance due to the previous client we had in UAE that used our prototype which as an airline but we something happened that was out of our hand that killed the deal.
We started selling to small businesses on shopify which was moving slowly and steady but wasn’t any exciting.
Great product, Great team, But..
At this point we were generating little revenue but the team wasn’t gonna give up easily. We had a great product and and small customers, so we decided to hit the fundraising town and setup a meeting with VC in France.
Wow, have never seen a platform like this
Thats what one of the partner at a leading VC in Paris said after our demo. He was particularly wow’ed about the product easy to use and the technology.
After the meeting, I actually thought we had a deal. But after two weeks then comes in the rejection with vague reason on why. I was particularly intrigued to know why but didn’t get any.
Don’t sleep here, GTFO
To increase our runway, I moved to our incubator to start sleeping and working from a sleeping pod they had. Keep in mind, we had about five employees that depends on me getting their salary at month end.
Meanwhile, the incubator kicked me out from sleeping in the “pods” that its not for sleeping. Funny enough, a week later, they started renting it out for people to “sleep and work” ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Debit and Credit cards
We got accepted into “another accelerator” in Amsterdam specifically targeted at startups selling to brands which is exactly what we needed at this point.
“Getting brands onboard”
But getting an investment requires us to move our company incorporation to the Netherlands and our first investors weren’t too excited which dragged along the process making things complicated for us.
At this point, I’ve racked up personal debts on my credit card and the bank started chasing me up and down which made them cancel my card in turn making me stranded in the hostel I was staying at in Amsterdam.
We had some money in the bank account but its for our employees and server cost. The Founders weren’t taking salary from inception.
I then called up the accelerator MD that I’m stranded at the hostel because credit card got declined and ended up paying for my hostel.
Not sure..
At the accelerator, the MD and I discussed on our future with the accelerator because of the delays for incorporation and us missing some of the classes.
I had to take bus/flight from Paris to Amsterdam every week for the accelerator classes, which was hell. My legs wont forgive me on this one
Burn out is real
I got back to Paris the next day after 8hrs bus from Amsterdam.
Had a call with our entire team and gave them the bad news “We’re pulling out of the accelerator” and “shutting down the company”
Evidence shows that entrepreneurs are more at risk of burnout because “we” tend to be extremely passionate about work and more socially isolated, have limited safety nets, and operate in high uncertainty.
That sums up exactly what hit me and the entire team in August 2017.
Know when to Quit
I emailed our investors and customers to deliver the news. We started the process of winding down the company in Delaware.
We paid our employees last salaries and used the last dollar to do necessary process for winding down the company.
What next
And I just took another risk leaving one of the leading companies in the AI space in Europe to move back home for no salary but I love every minute of this new hustle!
And I finally get to go for the medical check up after years of delaying it.
Now I’m working on this exciting project with some talented folks in Nigeria.
Wish me good luck :)
Please excuse any grammatical errors, written under Lagos hot weather.
-Abdul
