Hey — It's Nico.

This newsletter contains:

• 5 resources for founders.
• 5 startup news.
• 1 failed startup.
• 1 hot startup.

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What to read this week?

💯 The MFM podcast has Stanford students pitch their startups for a $3.5K check.

🤯 Luke Sophinos shares how two brothers built a $3.8B SaaS for weed shops.

🙌 Wilson discusses his biggest takeaways from growing his SaaS to $5K in MRR.

💪 An article on how Hootsuite went from sales-led to product-led.

✍️ Reddit thread sharing lessons learned from launching a GPT-based product.

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What happened this week?

💰 OpenAI raises another $300M after a share sale, now at an estimated $27B to $29B valuation.

📈 Greycroft closes over $1B across new funds to invest in early and growth-stage enterprises.

🚀 Drone delivery startup Zipline raises over $300M.

🤖 Replit, the web-based coding app, raises $97.4M and enters unicorn status.

👀 Jack Dorsey criticizes the sale of Twitter to Elon Musk.

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Failed startup story: Omni

Omni, a startup that started as a storage-as-a-service business, shut down in 2019. The company raised around $35M from investors such as Flybridge, Highland, Allen & Company, Founders Fund, and Ripple.

However, the company ultimately struggled to make the economics of its service work out and announced its closure.

In Between the Lines:

The service promised to send a van to a customer's home to pick up their possessions, store them in a nearby warehouse, and bring them back upon request for just a few dollars per month.

Unfortunately, this service didn’t work out, and the company then attempted to pivot its business model and evolve its service offerings.

The company tried to rent out customers' items for additional income, but it did not go as planned. They also tried to build a white-label software platform to allow brick-and-mortar businesses to rent out their items like drills or tents.

The shift in the company's business model required significant changes in user behavior, which resulted in a lack of adoption and profitability.

Lessons Learned:

Omni's failure highlights the importance of a carefully planned pivot strategy.

When pivoting, startups need to carefully evaluate whether their current target audience will be satisfied with the new offering or if they will need to start from scratch trying to attract an entirely new customer base.

Startups should conduct extensive research and gather feedback from their current customers to determine whether the new product or service will meet their needs and expectations.

Ultimately, the success of a pivot hinges on the ability of the startup to effectively communicate the benefits of the new offering to its target audience while maintaining a high level of customer satisfaction.

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Hot startup of the week: Hived

​Hived, a UK-based delivery startup, has recently announced a $12.4M Series A funding round led by Planet A Ventures.

Founded by Murvah Iqbal and Mathias Krieger, who met on a university trip to Silicon Valley, Hived is set on revolutionizing the parcel delivery industry.

Recognizing the inefficiencies and environmental impact of traditional delivery methods, the duo sought to create a sustainable, efficient, and customer-centric delivery network.

In Between the Lines:

Hived differentiates itself from traditional delivery services in two significant ways. Firstly, they utilize modern technology to optimize the delivery process.

The startup has built an in-house routing engine and introduced dynamic delivery window ETA, live tracking, in-flight redirect options, and merchant dashboards with carbon-saving reporting.

Secondly, Hived operates an entirely electric fleet, making it one of the first companies to use an electric line transportation service.

This commitment to sustainability helps their retail partners reduce their emissions and places the startup at the forefront of eco-friendly parcel delivery services.

Lessons Learned:

Hived identified a critical gap in customer satisfaction in the parcel delivery sector.

This sector in the UK is reported to have a Net Promoter Score (measuring customer satisfaction metric) of -13, indicating a negative customer sentiment and highlighting that existing solutions were not meeting customer expectations.

This provided a great opportunity for a new player that could improve on those pain points.

Hived also recognized the increasing importance of sustainability in business operations, particularly in the parcel delivery sector.

With global trends shifting towards more eco-friendly practices, there was a clear need for a sustainable delivery solution. By introducing an all-electric fleet, Hived positioned itself as an innovative and environmentally conscious choice in the market.

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What do you think of today's newsletter?

• ​🔥 Great​
• ​😒 Meh​
• ​👎 Not interesting​

Cheers,

Nico