Start-up Lingo For Dummies

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Hate it or love it, start-up lingo is here to stay.
And if you wanna “disrupt” the IT industry, knowing
these words wouldn’t hurt (we promise).

Crowd–sourcing
Obtaining needed services, ideas, or content by soliciting contributions from a large
group of people, especially from an online community, rather than from traditional
employees or suppliers.

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Angel Investors (Micro VCs)
Angel Investors invest anywhere between 2 lacs – 2 crores. They don’t just bring
money to the table but also bring experience, connections and act like a mentor in the
early days of a Start-up.

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Prototype
A prototype deals with the technical content of the product: various aspects of the
product that would be required for a usable, marketable product are omitted in order
to reduce development cost. The goal of developing a prototype is to show potential
investors/ partners/ customers how the product would work at minimum cost.

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Angel Investor Networks
These are groups of angel investors that cover a broad spectrum of industries as
diﬀerent angels invest in diﬀerent industries. Angels have their preferred industries
depending upon their experience/ connections/ exposure/ opportunity overview.

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Venture Capitalists
VCs come into picture after a startup has demonstrated a fair amount of market
acceptability and needs a large amount of capital to make capital investments in
infrastructure, supply chain, sophisticated technology, human resource or expand in
newer markets and somewhat move into the league of relatively large companies.

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Minimum Viable Product

(MVP)

Minimum Viable Product is a working product with no bells and whistles, which is
just about good enough for it be to be rolled out in the market, get initial feedback
from real paying customers and hopefully gain some traction.

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Incubators VS. Accelerators
Incubators are suitable for development of products and technologies, which require
longer period of research and development and inputs from a wide spectrum of
innovators/scientists/researchers. For e.g., innovations in Biotech, Medtech and/or
Greentech need years of R&D effort and are more complex than building software
products or applications. Incubators generally don’t offer any funding or take stakes
either and are funded by the government or academic institutions.
Accelerators, on the other hand, work on the principal of building quickly, failing faster
and hitting the market again with a better product. Accelerators offer access to
360-degree business services, mentors who have expertise in go-to-market strategies.
Accelerators extend support for a short term, offer funding, take stake and hope for
profitable exits.
Footnote: In India, both the terms are used interchangeably but incorrectly.
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Angellist
Angellist is a platform for startups to connect with investors, talent and incubators.
Founded by Naval Ravikant and BabakNivi, a proﬁle on angellist is considered to be a
must for every Startups worth its salt.

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Viral / Viral Marketing
A method of product promotion that relies on getting customers to market an idea,
product, or service on their own by telling their friends about it usually through social
networks or e-mail.
Viral marketing is the cool new term for ‘word-of-mouth’ advertising.

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Responsive Web Design
Responsive web technology, which re-sizes text and images to ﬁt any screen has
become the norm for new websites. As tablets are replacing magazines on your coﬀee
table, and smart-phones are replacing portable computers, you need to make sure that
your content can be viewed, shared, and bought on new mobile devices.

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Gamification
Using game-thinking and game mechanics in business applications for marketing, to
enhance user engagement, accelerate revenue ﬂow, and expedite application learning.
Rewards range from becoming the “mayor” of an entertainment location via
FourSquare, to winning badges via a Badgeville campaign.

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Pivot
A quick change of direction or strategic correction by a startup, often based on
customer feedback as well as changes in technology and/ or the marketplace.

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Gen-Z
This is the youngest demographic, people born after 1995, who are sought-after by all
new businesses. Gen-Z members have grown up in an un-tethered world of
smart-phones, tablets and WIFI, and their perspective is both multi-cultural and global.
They have never seen a world without the Internet, and they now have
real spending power.
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Vesting Period
A period of time an investor holding a right to a company must wait until they are able
to fully exercise their rights. Essentially, earned ownership over time.

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Burn Rate
The speed at which a company’s cash balance is going down.
“We’re burning 1,00,000 per month.”

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Hockey Stick (Inﬂection Point)
A period of rapid growth (in revenue, sales, etc.) that, when graphed, resembles the
shape of a hockey stick.

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Hackathon
Weekend or daylong competition where guys with business ideas and coding skills jam
to create software products, these are often prototypes.

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Termsheet
A non-binding agreement between the founders and the investor/s which lays down
basic terms and conditions under which an investment will be made.

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Traction
The response demonstrated by your product in the market. It is represented by the
number of users, downloads and/or website hits.

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Pre-Money
The value VCs place on a
company’s stock prior to investing.

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Post-Money
The pre-money valuation plus the
amount invested.

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Seed Round
The ﬁrst round of funding that helps ﬁnance the initial stages of a new venture. A seed
round is hopefully followed by an even bigger Series A round.

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Ecosystem
Start-up ecosystem is a conﬂuence of success stories, talent, education, events,
mentors, incubators & accelerators, and investors in a certain geography, which
deﬁnes the support structure that exists for startups emerging in that location.

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Ramen-Profitable
A startup that proclaims to be cash-ﬂow positive, but actually makes just enough
money to cover basic expenses, such as toilet paper, running water and instant ramen
noodles for survival (no salary for the founders). It buys you time and credibility with
investors, until the big bet really starts to pay oﬀ.

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Disruptive (Innovation)
An innovation that goes on to disrupt an existing market and value network (over a
few years or decades), displacing an earlier technology. These innovations that
improve a product or service in ways that the market does not expect.

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Leverage
Often used as an equivalent of “use”, the correct meaning involves use of credit or
borrowed funds to improve one's speculative capacity and increase the rate of return
from an investment, as in buying securities on margin.

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A PRESENTATION BY

SPONSORS

Join the 10,000 Startups revolution.
Register on www.10000startups.com

/NasscomForStartUps

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Start-up Lingo For Dummies

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