“Your startup ecosystem will greatly influence your chances of success.”
First of all, we would like to thank Eli David, CEO of StartupBlink for agreeing to respond to our questions.
1) You have recently launched the third edition of your flagship report – The Global Startup Ecosystem Index Report 2021. Please brief our readers about the story behind the report and how different it is from other reports that measure the state of entrepreneurship?
It’s actually our fourth report since we started publishing it in 2017. The story behind the report is that we had a startup ecosystem map, and just like any startup we were struggling to understand what is our business model. And then we kind of figured it out that with this map and with this sample of startup ecosystems from around the world and a visualized sample we can actually create a very unique research and very unique algorithms. So that was the initial idea. We launched it as an experiment and we attracted a lot of interest, and then we figured out that we are into something.
How is it different from other reports? Our report is based on a platform – a public platform that is crowdsourced. While other reports have their own methodology (we have our own methodology, of course), our report is based on a very big crowdsourced open resource that is being used by tens of thousands of people every month and it is building itself. This is in addition to a few global data partners like Crunchbase and Semrush, who are also supplementing a lot of data. But the thing is that our unique power is to be in the situation when we have our own technological platform and databases that are available to the public. This makes our report very much results-driven and not so much theory-driven. We try to keep our thoughts of what is good and bad for an ecosystem, and only focus on the results, and the results are, of course, the startups and their success. One more differentiator of our report is the amount of locations that are being ranked within exact score – we are talking about 1,000 cities and 100 countries. It’s also unique that our report measures a combination between the cities and countries. But, of course, this number 1,000 absolutely unique- nobody, nobody gets close to it.
2) Some experts argue that now is the golden age to be an entrepreneur. Would you agree?
Golden age of entrepreneurship? I think it was always the golden age of entrepreneurship. Your mind is built because it was always the golden age of entrepreneurship and that has not changed. I am sometimes thinking that when something is hot, it might not be the best time, because everyone is speaking about it. But I do think that considering that the world is a little bit chaotic now, being an entrepreneur basically means that you are trusting yourself in building your own empire. And in this sense I think it’s always been a good time to do it. But especially now since the entire world is open with the internet.
3) Are you observing any trends or patterns in the way cities and countries promote their ecosystems?
Innovation is the new word . In order to be relevant in today’s economy, in order to create a success story for your country, especially if your country is relatively small, you must have a robust startup ecosystem. The pandemic also made it clear that many small countries, that were relying on tourism and services, figured out that those are fragile services, not anti-fragile, and if there is a crisis the economy is gone. Startups are very resistant because they shield the economy from the effect of the physical world. So I think those are the trends. And we see a lot of interesting things and a lot of successful smaller countries like Estonia, Lithuania, even Taiwan, that are successful.
It is also interesting that the smaller cities that are not mega hubs are also very much active in their ecosystem development and are not giving up. So even if you have a capital city, close by, the smaller cities understand that in order to prevent the brain drain they have to also do their role and develop an ecosystem. If they want to keep their most ambitious population staying in the location. So that is one more trend.
Of course there is a massive increase in the ecosystem of China, on a global level, which is interesting, because it is a very closed ecosystem offering a new model of the internet that is being censored and controlled by the government but, nevertheless, a very successful model. So, there are two internets now, and it is very interesting to see their impact and how relatively successful the experiment has been and what it might imply for our future.
4) How can aspiring entrepreneurs benefit from your Report?
Aspiring entrepreneurs can benefit from the report because the decision of where you base yourself or if you should relocate or go somewhere is a decision that is often overlooked and people are not putting enough effort into it. Your startup ecosystem will greatly influence your chances of success. Therefore, you don’t have to read the entire report but because the results are also available on StartupBlink.com, those tables are there and you can filter them, and they are interactive. The idea is to spend some time to make a conscious decision about where you are building your startup. It is not necessarily your most comfortable place or home. We are paying a very big price by staying in the same ecosystem, even if it is underperforming, and we will never understand this price. Those are missed opportunities that will not be painful because we will never realize what we have lost by not being in a great startup ecosystem.
5) How about the government officials and policy-makers?
As for the policy-makers and the governments, of course, they can benefit by understanding how their ecosystem is benchmarked against other ecosystems. This is all comparative analysis. So, as a government or policy-maker you want to make sure that your ecosystem moves ahead compared to the others. Because, at the end of the day, there is a global competition for talent, startups, exits and unicorns, so on. This is especially true for talented entrepreneurs more than anything. As a policy-maker you have to make sure that your ecosystem is ahead of the curve. Hopefully your momentum is positive and you are staying within the leading pack or, at least, developing your other cities and so on. So the idea is they should use it as a benchmark tool to understand how well their ecosystem is performing. And, of course, if it is not performing well, do the necessary changes to make sure that the ecosystem can pivot and adopt other policies that might help ecosystem perform better.
6) Our final question is whether you have any particular advice for aspiring entrepreneurs?
As for advice for aspiring entrepreneurs – it is basically to understand that it is a long term game and you need a lot of persistence and patience. Nothing comes easy, especially if startup was interesting and unique – it is a really interesting rollercoaster. However, it is also a freedom device and it is also going to allow you to build something that is unique only for you, your own personal art.
So my advice would be to basically go for it only if you are prepared for it, if you feel that you want to do it. Because if you are not, then there are going to be a lot of bad moments that will not allow you to continue. In addition, you must have a lot of patience – it is something that you need a lot of oxygen for. If you are becoming an entrepreneur, regardless if it is successful or not, it is going to be an interesting period and a relatively long period of your life. So jump into it knowing that and good luck!
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Eli DavidCEO
