3 hunt entrepreneurs funding round pandemic tips 2021 - Despite the current international context of the pandemic, still marked by mobility restrictions, many Spanish companies have managed to overcome this scenario and continue to raise millions of euros in investment rounds. Some examples are those starring Glovo, Jobandtalent, Wallapop or Idealista.

Another example in our country is Belvo, the leading Spanish platform of financial APIs in Latin America, which at the beginning of the month captured 35 million euros in a round led by some funds such as Future Positive, Kibo Ventures or FJLabs.

Pablo Viguera, co-CEO and co-founder of Belvo, assures that, due to the pandemic, many processes have accelerated: "Times have been shortened, you no longer have to change cities or move."Last year, Belvo raised another 9 million euros in its third round of investment since its inception in 2019.

The relationship between entrepreneurs and investors has not been alien to the impossibility, on many occasions, of seeing each other in person. However, this has made communication much more agile.

Anindya Saha, founding partner of NERO Ventures, and professor at EAE Business School, assures that " the pandemic has not changed anything in this sense, it has only accelerated a process that had to happen. Big eaters with investors are a thing of the past."

3 hunt entrepreneurs funding round pandemic tips 2021

Iñaki Arrola, founder of Coches.com, Vitamin K and K-Fund (venture capital firm that invests in technology projects), ensures that what they are looking for in regards to startups in growth is to invest in "good people, people who are crazy ambition in the best sense, and, above all, to invest in very big markets". If these conditions are met, they even invest in" products that are not yet developed, " he adds.

For Pablo Viguera, of Belvo, it is important first of all to have a good relationship with investors. But above all, when preparing an investment round, the key is "prepare the process well, study well what you want to achieve, which investors can provide the maximum value and raise the story of why a certain amount and why now is the time".

Establishing first contact with new investors doesn't have to be traumatic. Perseverance, insistence and consistency remain key when confronting investors. "Often, the first contact is made as if it were a spam, a generic email for everyone. This is a huge mistake. You have to personalize the email, get to the point, be concise and clear, and the same goes for the funding round itself, " says Anindya Saha.

3 hunt entrepreneurs funding round pandemic tips 2021

Entrepreneurs are often under heavy pressure when faced with an investment round. It depends on the time the company is in and the plans it has both short and long term, but in general, sitting in a room to negotiate with how much money they are going to support your project is an often sleepy experience.

For Pablo Viguera, the most important thing is to get away from money. "We wear it as waterproofed as possible. I try not to be affected, a round of funding always generates hypotheses and concerns, but I sleep well." However, he clarifies:"I understand that it depends a lot on how your company is, it is not the same if you are in an expansion phase that if you have to pay salaries".

3 hunt entrepreneurs funding round pandemic tips 2021: Both Arrola and Saha point to transparency as a key issue in gaining investor confidence in a funding round. "Being transparent is the best way to approach an investor," says Arrola. "In an online funding round, you have to go practical and be transparent. If every time we give a different version, we have a problem. Coherence is the process and transparency is the result, " says Saha.

This is something that the pandemic has not changed. The current situation has streamlined processes, shortened meetings, decreased travel, something that the sector considers to be partly positive. Although in-person contact is lost, which is essential to create bonds of trust, we continue to seek to invest in promising projects that have people behind them with a coherent and exciting discourse.

In fact, the current context is in turn an opportunity for budding entrepreneurs. According to the latest study published by the Bankinter Innovation Foundation on investment trends in Spain, in 2020 the historical investment record was broken, with 36% more operations than in 2019, although with a lower investment volume.

According to the report, Series A rounds rose by 48.6% and Series B by 34.3%. However, Series C and Growth, that is, those of later phases, fell drastically (53.8%).

In the technology sector, so far in 2021, more investment has already been achieved than in the past 2020, as stated by the CNBC. In the first 6 months of 2021, Spanish startups have achieved 2,200 million euros, a figure that doubles the result obtained the previous year.

3 hunt entrepreneurs funding round pandemic tips 2021

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Under - 30s earn 52 euros less a month than a decade ago: their average salary no longer reaches mileurista and one in 3 is at risk of poverty

It is not easy to be young in Spain, at least for a large majority of those under 30. Thus, more than 40% of young Spaniards between 16 and 25 years old are unemployed, which has made the country since last summer the European leader in youth unemployment, in the absence of updated data from Greece, and in the developed economy with more young unemployed, quadrupling the unemployment rate of countries such as South Korea or Mexico, among others.

In addition to the difficulties in finding work and starting their projects vital and professionals facing these 2 out of every 5 young people in spain who are unemployed, the life is much more simple for 3 of every 5 who do have a job, but that they have experienced in recent years a strong precarization of working conditions, which is manifested in a greater temporality as in a decline in its purchasing power, and their average salary.

In fact, in addition to which young people are one of the groups most affected by the crisis caused by the pandemic, which has led to one out of every 4 young people lose their jobs in the second quarter of last year, its revenue came dragging a major decline long before coronavirus, as reflected by the fact that the pension middle of the new pensions have passed since 2011, the average monthly wage of young people under the age of 24 years old.

In particular, the average wage for young people between 16 and 29 years it has fallen more than 5% in the last decade, passing from 1.025 euros per month in 12 payments in 2011 to 973 euros per month in 2021, which represents 52 euros less per month and 626 euros less per year, given that the annual wage has been reduced 12.308 euros to just 11.682 euros, according to figures from the Youth Council of Spain collected by The Independent.

The figures of this association reflected the group under 30 years of age is the one that has suffered the loss of pay, at a time when the political debate focuses on the next revaluation of the minimum wage and in the proposals of the committee of experts in charge of designing how to elevate it to the 60% of the average wage before 2023, as claimed by the European Social Charter.

Thus, in the last 10 years, the average young worker does not even become a mileurist and his average monthly salary is 135 euros below the minimum wage, which is 1,108.33 euros per month in 12 payments. In addition, the Council has criticized the fact that 32% of young people, some 3 million people, are below the poverty line, the highest of all age groups.

This precarious income for young people has implications in other areas, such as their access to affordable housing. Thus, the Youth Council denounces that a young worker must allocate 92% of his salary to pay rent, taking into account that the average price in Spain is 904 euros per month, which is causing the emancipation rate has been reduced almost 9 points since 2008, to 17.3%, its lowest level in the last 2 decades.