The European VC-Funded Startup Guide: Create and Manage a Startup in Eastern Europe

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to APress Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature 2023

I. VorasThe European VC-Funded Startup Guidehttps://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4842-9520-5_1

1. Look Around You

Ivan Voras¹  

(1)

Zagreb, Croatia

 

TL;DR

• Do not found a startup to solve a purely local problem.

• But, unless you have the resources and skill to go global immediately, you must find your initial customers locally.

• Do not blindly trust books, blogs, and media from the US if your company is based in Europe.

• Build a product, not a service.

• Know the difference between your clients and your users.

What’s So Special About Being a European Startup?

The startup concept originated in the US, which has two indispensable benefits over most of the rest of the world:

• A huge ...