Starting a Company at 15: The Advantage of Time and Persistence

As the founder and CEO of Vesto, a cash management platform for startups, Benjamin Döpfner shares his entrepreneurial journey, from dropping out of school at 15 to building a successful company that has grown exponentially since its inception.

1. Benjamin Döpfner, founder and CEO of Vesto, started his first company at age 15 in Germany.
2. He believes starting a company young provides time to make mistakes and learn from them, which compounds as a "superpower" over time.
3. Döpfner advocates diving into a good business idea without waiting for years to gain experience or formal education.
4. Vesto is a cash management platform for startups that helps invest and manage cash, currently assisting more than 100 companies with tens of millions in assets under management.
5. Döpfner's first company grew from a side project into a successful software business for photographers and designers, generating $70-80k/month within months.
6. His frustration with cash management tools led him to create Vesto, initially focusing on making treasury and money market fund management accessible to startups and small businesses.
7. Persistence has been a crucial factor in Döpfner's success, overcoming skepticism about his ideas and weathering rejections during fundraising.
8. The first version of Vesto took longer than anticipated due to the high stakes in financial services, contrasting with typical startup wisdom of releasing an early MVP.
9. Early on, Döpfner's team focused too much on product development and neglected distribution and go-to-market strategy.
10. Competitors for Vesto include simple, self-serve platforms that may leave money on the table and sophisticated institutional banks requiring significant resources to access.
11. Vesto aims to create an institutional-grade experience accessible in just ten minutes instead of ten months.
12. The long-term vision is building a financial operating system or control center for companies, using cash management as a foundation.
13. Startups should regularly review and understand their finances, avoiding common mistakes such as neglecting cash management and profitability.
14. Döpfner believes in being persistent, looking at finances consistently, and focusing on profitability from the start when building a company.
15. Being young and taking risks can motivate entrepreneurs to work harder and maintain persistence.
16. Döpfner's goal is not material wealth but creating a lasting product or company that will endure for hundreds of years, challenging the short-term thinking in the startup world.

Source: EO via YouTube

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