Canadian Startup Fostrum Completes Barclays Accelerator, Powered by Techstars
“Entrepreneurship is jumping off a cliff and assembling a plane on the way down.” — Reid Hoffman
‘Guys… we got an interview!!!’, I half-screamed in excitement nearly spilling over my fresh Tim Hortons coffee. Salman confusedly looked up from his laptop and Kelso raised an eyebrow, then quickly rushed to close the door in our downtown Vancouver WeWorks office, correctly anticipating my overly-loud excitement. ‘We got an interview with Techstars! It’s the top FinTech accelerator out there!’, I beamed.
After 7 virtual interviews (several taking place right at midnight) with individuals ranging from FinTech leaders in New York, to Barclays executives in London, to Techstars directors in Malaysia, we were invited for an in-person interview.
Up to this point, we had been hustling on a quick-oats diet for months. One lesson I’ve learned over the last year is that Startup life is like a rickety car approaching a steep cliff. An overwhelmingly obvious impending sense of doom arises, logic-driven doubts bubble to the surface. If you persist to the very edge of the cliff, somehow as you go over… a parachute appears in ways you could never have possibly predicted… and you… just… sort of keep going.
I truly believe that every startup has an intriguing story that could be turned into a hit Hollywood suspense film. That is, if the founders have the grit to strive through all the challenges and uncertainties that come rushing towards them the second they set foot towards this epic journey into the mist, guided by a vision of a destination that starts only in their mind.
To help us through the fog and create a culture that embraced opportunities free of the debilitating fear of failure, we made a mantra out of our earliest motto, ‘Burn the Ships’. This was a saying attributed to both the historical Tariq ibn Ziyad and the later Cortes, a saying encrusted with much wisdom, one that saves you from the dreaded ‘analysis paralysis’ many founders face.
We flew for 30 hours halfway across the world. The pitch lasted for 15 minutes, including a Q&A. If we got into the program, doors would open. If we didn’t, we would have been a cash-strapped, early-stage startup that just burned several grand on plane tickets for peanut packets and economy class meals. We burned ships in the hopes of exploring a new world.
Two weeks later, we got an offer, immensely proud to be one of only a few Canadian startups, the first from Western Canada, to be admitted. We were the youngest team in the cohort. Everything was about to change, and we were excited for it.
The Barclays Accelerator, Powered by Techstars is a unique program born of a collaboration between Barclays, one of the oldest and largest banks in the world and Techstars, one of the largest technology accelerators. Startups in the program get access to both networks presenting invaluable opportunities.
The program is split into 3 months.
Month 1: Mentor Madness
Purpose: Direction — Grow Your Network
We arrived at Rise, a co-working space created by Barclays that acts as your office for the duration of the accelerator. We were greeted with our logos and designated desks filled with Techstars & Barclays swag, including the most comfortable hoodie I’ve ever owned. Memories of the plethora of past Hackathons I used to attend in my undergrad flashed before me and my inner swag-pirate came out as I gleefully tried all the Merch out.
As a technical founder, the first thing I did was directly log into our cohort’s Slack, change my avatar to Yoda, and create a channel for CTOs to share memes. The most important skill any team needs is strong communication, and memes can be the strongest form of communication. The CTOs quickly became friends — as the saying Maya Angelo played a role in popularizing goes, “People may not remember exactly what you did, or what you said, but they will always remember how you made them feel.’’ Memes feel great.
For the first three weeks of the program we went through what was called ‘Mentor Madness’. At first we were uncertain if we misheard the rather bizarre name — we did not. Six hours were booked almost daily for meetings with mentors. These meetings were very similar to speed-dating. They consisted of 20-minute long sessions where we were asked all the common questions startups get asked and pitched our problem, solution, business model etc.
The mentors came from diverse backgrounds — founders of unicorn startups, marketing geniuses, cunning investors, product wizards and strategy gurus. The whole idea was that within a very short amount of time, we would integrate with the entire local ecosystem. If the mentors couldn’t directly help us, they could connect us with someone that could. This type of networking is meant to very quickly catalyze connections and opportunities. Techstars really does emphasize a ‘give-first’ kind of culture, this is particularly exemplified through the mentorship sessions.
We utilized one strategy that we learned from UBC’s Lean Launchpad incubator of ending conversations by asking if there was anyone that the mentor could introduce us to. This tactic proved to be a great success with countless warm intros being generated.
The program has half a dozen ‘associates’ with backgrounds in everything from law to marketing as well as three entrepreneurs in residence. They’re present in the office every day of the week for the full day and are devoted to helping the founders with their business needs. The associates organized weekly CTO/CEO breakfasts with daily workshops, most workshops being optional and covering every topic one can imagine.
The CTO breakfasts were one of the things I looked forward to the most. Going full nerd, talking about ethics pertaining to Artificial Intelligence, how to prevent Skynet from taking over the world, Microservices architecture and Kubernetes. The CEOs would finish their lunches a full half hour before us because we would get so absorbed into our conversations.
By the end of the month we were to choose 2–3 lead mentors that would meet regularly with us for the remainder of the program. They would be committed to helping us with product development, marketing and introductions to help quickly scale our company. We also got the chance to have office hours with leading startups who explained their journey and Techstars partners like Twillio, Sendgrid and AWS.
Month 2: Product
Purpose; Progress — Gain Traction
This whole stage was about moving your business forward as much as possible, really delving deep with your chosen mentors and making traction. We had a lot more breathing room once the non-stop mentorship meetings were over. We made huge strides in signing our first beta users. We also further refined our product, hit strong marketing goals, added new functionality and created a very streamlined demo process for investors.
Half-way through the month the startups in our cohort were invited to the FinTech capital of the world, on a trip termed the ‘London Roadshow’. It comprised an intense several days of meetings and events while also managing to fit in some time for the more touristy stuff. From pitching at Barclays headquarters, where we got to engage with Barclays executives, to visiting Rise, the city’s leading FinTech workspace, it was a truly unforgettable experience. It even managed to convince a few of the startups to actually relocate to London post-program. The scrumptious marmite-covered crumpets may have also played a persuading factor.
Month 3: Fundraising
Purpose: Accelerate Your Business
The main theme in the final month was preparing the team for the ‘Demo Day’ end of program pitch and the sea of investor meetings that follows. They brought in expert public speaking coaches with experience training TEDx speakers, celebrities and politicians to refine our communication on stage, messaging and presentation. We would stay up with some of the other teams late into the night practicing. There’s a certain solidarity found in memorizing pitches late into the night. Bonds that can only be forged in the near-drunken state of sleep deprivation where every little antic somehow seems like the most hilarious thing ever.
Finally, it was the big day. 400 CEOs, investors, bank representatives, journalists and FinTechs converged, fancy hors d’oeuvres were scattered on silver platters being buzzed around by sharply dressed servers. Just like the short pitch that started the journey, the accelerator was over with a similar adrenaline-packed pitch that lasted minutes, a pitch that ended with a sea of applause in a gladiator-like spectacle.
Aftermath
Founders don’t simply get abandoned post-program, they still have meetings and access to the invaluable and enormous networks that they’re plugged into. The main things we got out of the program was mentorship, branding, investment, access to powerful networks and friendships that would last a lifetime. It’s a program I would recommend to any founder looking to take their early-stage startup to the next level, especially millennial founders that could greatly benefit from the mentorship of experienced leaders. The accelerator was a period of great refinement, one that for certain propelled our business. It’s now up to us to drive this vehicle to our next destination.
