At Manchester Digital, we like to conduct interviews with our members to delve deeper into their areas of passion within the dynamic digital and technology landscape of Greater Manchester. This week we're speaking with Martin Bryant, Founder of PreSeed Now
What has surprised you the most about the UK pre-seed startup landscape based on the founders and companies you have profiled so far?
Despite the investment landscape having slowed down over the past 18 months, founders aren’t being held back. Given that many startups fail within their first year, it’s great to see so many of the early startups I covered when we launched are still going.
Because we run our Startup Tracker database, we get updates from the startups we’ve covered in the past. Whether they raise funding quickly or slowly, or pivot to a new product or business model, most of them are still pushing onwards through the adverse funding environment.
What is one key piece of advice you would give to pre-seed founders that you feel is critical to success based on the patterns you've seen?
Make sure you understand the motivations of investors. Venture capitalists have very specific requirements from the growth trajectory of the businesses they fund.
It’s important to match your ambitions for yourself and your business with the right way of funding your business. The VC path isn’t right for everyone and it’s possible to build a successful company without it - it just requires a different approach.
How have you seen founders benefit the most from being featured in your profiling project? What opportunities does it open up for them?
Sometimes investors get in touch within minutes of a newsletter going out, and we have heard that some deals have happened as a result of coverage in PreSeed Now.
But even when that doesn’t happen, having someone write a third-party profile of a business can be a real benefit, as it casts a new light on a startup that they would probably never put in a deck.
For example, one investor told us she passed on a startup’s deck, but then read about the same startup in PreSeed Now and the business suddenly made so much more sense than the deck did.
Some startups link to their PreSeed Now profiles on their website homepages as a clear explainer about what they’re working on.
Can you share any examples of founders you profiled early on that have gone on to successfully raise a seed round or see significant growth?
A couple of examples: Eleven Labs quickly went on to become one of Europe’s most exciting AI startups soon after we covered them. And Manchester’s Versori went on to join the world’s best-known accelerator, Y Combinator, and then raised a $3.5 million Seed round.
If you could pick one overlooked or underrated founder from your project that the community should keep an eye on, who would it be and why?
Early on, we covered Manchester-based Jakub Lenski, who founded Ecom Pilot. Rather than focus on the local scene, he built an international network of contacts online and ended up getting pre-seed funding from Shutterstock founder Jon Oringer. And this was less than a decade after he moved from Poland to the UK not knowing a word of English.
Founders like this have a rare breed of tenacity and are worth keeping an eye on.
Thank you Martin!
To find out more about PreSeed Now click here.
