4 Secrets to Successfully Relocating your Company to the U.S.

Hint: Start it there in the first place and relocate yourselves ASAP. Here’s how and why Vanessa Wilson, CEO and a Co-Founder of StorReduce, Inc., did that.

For non-US based founders, you’ll need to work out whether and when to relocate your company to the US as early as possible. It’s a big decision. In your local market you’re likely to have connections, a profile, access to Government grants and investors.

For many there’s no need to move. However if your go to market (GTM) is enterprise sales and your target market is the US, or if you want to raise US venture capital funding, then you should plan for the move from day one.

StorReduce’s mission is to make it incredibly fast and affordable for enterprises to move and store large amounts of unstructured data (like backups) into and / or between clouds. We’re validated as having the first software that does that and are successfully acquiring US clients. Our target market is US enterprises and our aim was always to sell through US based cloud and channel partners. With a mix of Australian and New Zealander co-founders, it was always clear that some of the team would relocate.Before the move, however, it was essential not to lose speed in the US market during our first year with the company living in Australia and to remain investable to US venture capital companies.

Here’s 4 steps that helped us:

1. Look like a US company from day one

The obvious things are to have a US registered company, a US serviced office and US centric website.

Beyond that, check what non-competitive companies selling solutions to your target market are doing for their US presence. A number of cloud-centric companies who we asked obtained 80% of annual deal flow from sponsoring Amazon Web Service’s US conference — Invent. So we did the same and had amazing results: 60+ enterprise leads, and a 451 Research report on StorReduce.

It greatly helped us confirm our GTM with US potential clients prior to our relocation and now we are local for the follow-up.

2. Build advocates connected to the US market

Connections are everything. Face to face matters both for enterprise sales and partnerships. You need to ensure that on those expensive US trips, every meeting moves your company forward. Getting the best initial connectors to the US market paid off for us.

We stalked our first advisor Ben Kepes J. One of the top 20 global cloud thought leaders, a well-respected (and liked) storage and cloud analyst, he has founded and invested in other start-ups. We got a friendly introduction and after making us speak with around 10 of his US contacts for due diligence he agreed to advise and offered to invest in us. Our subsequent advisors are US based and some came from tapping into Ben’s network. They have been able to introduce us to CTO or WW business leads for many of the US companies we were looking to meet which has greatly accelerated our business.

Local incubators that are founder heavy and connected to the US market are also great for foreign founders. Springboard Enterprises and Heads Over Heels made and continue to provide us with crucial US introductions at a global level. Springboard’s alumni are a decade of successful US founders from whom we’ve also been able to ask advice about OEMs, investment and more.

3. Don’t be an outlier for US investment

Seed and angel rounds require a leap of faith by the investor, so if you’re like us, it’s quicker and better to raise these rounds in your home country where you’re already known (and liked).

Raising funding is competitive. If you’re raising venture capital in the US, work at getting introductions to the VCs you’re targeting from their trusted contacts. You’re expected to hit milestones and revenues with US clients and for the founders to be living in the US.

Don’t be an outlier. Ensure that your company is a US C Corp and that there are no messy foreign country flip-ups if possible. We chose a well respected Silicon Valley Law Firm — Wilson Sonsini, Goodrich & Rosati who ensured our company structure and contracts are standard from a US investment perspective. We incorporated as a C Corp from day one. We raised our bridge investment money in US dollars and held it in a US bank, which removed the currency fluctuation risk.

4. Make Necessary Cultural Adjustments

People buy from and invest in people they know and like. Australians and New Zealanders often have a dry sense of humor and are very low key. We’ve learnt that this can come off as dispassionate in the US market. We now phrase our support emails as “We’d LOVE to help you, let’s set a time!” rather than “Call us if you have any questions”, amongst other adjustments.

Overall, our move went smoothly, Americans are incredibly welcoming and the US market is much faster for StorReduce — as it very well could be for yours company as well!

Vanessa Wilson is the CEO and a Co-Founder of StorReduce, Inc. StorReduce offers break-through software that can move large volumes of data up to and between clouds up to 30x faster and reduce cloud storage cost by up to 95%. Vanessa has successfully helped grow multiple companies and is an Alumna of Springboard Enterprises, Heads over Heels, Advance Innovation Australia and a guest speaker for the Australian Graduate School of Management Entrepreneurship Masters course. She recently relocated to Silicon Valley and likes it, a lot.