Trying to control the product roadmap. Strategics do not invest in your company to make a financial return or because they believe in the vision. They invest in you because they think you can fit into their product roadmap. As such, they will try to direct your roadmap to benefit themselves without giving thought to how it could impact you. While suggestions and advice should be welcomed, do not let strategics have any control of the roadmap.
Strategics don’t do follow-on. Rare is the strategic that does follow-on investments. Why? Because they’re already invested in you and have a seat at the table, so they don’t need to invest more. Remember, strategics are not investing for a financial return. They are only investing because they think your product can help with their roadmap so once they’re invested, there is no benefit to doubling down.
Does having a strategic matter? No. Of the 198 publicly traded tech companies we monitor, only 31 of them had a strategic investor. In other words, 84%of the tech companies in our list didn’t need a strategic to get to the promised land. In conclusion, strategics are over-rated in our view.
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