5M€ (Pre-seed) in 2 weeks

We are thrilled to announce that Zeliq has raised a pre-seed funding round of €5 million (one of the largest in Europe) before the launching project.

I’m lucky to have the experience and fundraising network that help me succeed in this first roundtable. Raising funds can take a long time (3 to 9 months). From my previous experience as CEO at Hivency and being a board member of several startups, and business angels, I can assure you that fundraising distracts the company from its core business.

I wanted to avoid falling into this pattern. So I anticipated as much as possible to be able to close our funding round in a “record” time — in 2 weeks.

We managed the signing of the termsheet between India (I was on holiday) and Martinique (Alban, the VC from Resonance, was on holiday). We had a time difference of 10h and a low connection, but nevertheless, we succeeded!

I was working on my new idea from October to December 22 and building my co-founder’s team simultaneously. Guillaume was my CFO at Hivency, and Victor was one of my investors at Hivency. I already knew them both well, making the process easier to decide that we wanted to work together. From November to December, I began to speak with some business angel/ family office friends about my new adventure so that I can warm them up to jump into the journey with me. Then, once my idea was almost clear, I made a PPT presentation and discussed it with BA/Family office and a few VCs who contacted me as they heard that I was launching the company.

When I first talked about my idea, I knew that it would be in the sales tech sector, but initially, it was to automatize the work of the call center. After different meetings and discussions with Guillaume, we thought it more interesting to compete for solutions such as Apollo.io, Salesloft, Outreach as we found pain in using them. To make the right decision, we decided to check how deep the market is and the current growth. By doing this market study, it makes us confident about the launch, and we begin to work on how we will be the market leader in the next five years.

The purpose of this article is not to make you believe that raising funds is easy, necessary, or desirable. My goal is to share transparent feedback to help entrepreneurs who want to raise funds one day or maybe to let you know what’s possible after a first exit as a repeat entrepreneur.

You will find tips to help you properly pace and organize your fundraising.

Below, I’m going to summarize in bullet points what could help you in the fundraising process

Build the right co-founder’s Team

Your past experiences and complementarity will help the investors project themselves in your project. Don’t forget that in pre-seed, you will not have so much data to share, so the only important point will be the team. Make sure to assemble a team with a diverse skill set that can work together to achieve the company’s goals.

Create relationships as early as possible Essential point

If you want to move quickly in your fundraising, you need to anticipate and create relationships with the investment funds you will approach when the time comes. Easier to get investment when they already know you. Most funds will contact you spontaneously if you display the famous “working on something new” on LinkedIn. You can also request introductions from your network.

Add intensity to the deal and try to get your first believer

Leverage your network: Reach out to friends, family, and colleagues who may be interested in investing in your business. This is a good way to start and can help you build momentum. Angel investors are typically high-net-worth individuals interested in investing in early-stage companies. Look for angel groups in your area or attend events where you can meet potential investors.

Select your potential investors carefully

Some of them will be only interesting for market study and not about your project. Time is king; you should prioritize discussions for more efficiency. Refusing an exchange will never be perceived negatively. On the contrary, it can be interpreted positively: you are focused on the essentials and place great importance on advancing your product.

Hope this helps,

Dorian