What are the Red Flags when it comes to Startups?

Red flags. We all know the term, we all ignored them at some point in our lives. But in this Fil Rouge Capital's newsletter, Julien Coustaury discusses one specific kind of red flag, the one investors should not ignore while screening a company. Read more below!

When asked what it takes for us to invest, we find it is easier to answer the question: What it takes for us not to invest !? Well… we are always worried when a deck shows cumulative numbers, we think there is something to hide or a desire to exaggerate your growth. We are also very wary of a plethoric board of advisors especially when you are at a very early stage. We also dislike when people are not using straight metrics; no need to hide you don’t have metrics if you don’t, if you are at pre MVP or MVP stage investors are not totally dumb and will understand that. 

We are not big fans of overselling the past experiences of you and your team, rather focus on why alchemy is the right one for all of you. In short, we like straightforwardness, clarity, and humility. 

Those traits are not guarantees for success but we found them to be prerequisites!

Originally posted on the Fil Rouge Capital website.

You can follow the Fil Rouge Capital's Facebook account for more posts: https://www.facebook.com/filrougecapital/

Julien Coustaury has over 20 years of experience in manufacturing and services, much of it at the CEO level. He has worked in more than 80 countries across five continents and participated in over $1.7bn of purchase, sale, and financing transactions. He is no stranger to starting things: in his early career he traveled the world building mobile phone networks literally from the ground up, and as his career progressed he ended up building whole mobile phone companies from scratch.