Given the financial uncertainty in the startup and investing Ecosystem, IvyCamp organized a webinar with Ashish Wadhwani, Managing Partner, IvyCap Ventures to discuss with Pre-Series A entrepreneurs about how to think about managing their capital over the upcoming months.

Ashish shared his thoughts about impacts the current situation will have on business over the rest of the year, sectors that will be impacted positively and negatively, gave guidance on how & what to prioritize efforts on, etc.

Some specific feedback Ashish gave, was to focus more on Cash flow statements rather than the Profit & Loss statement. He suggested founders explore options of discounted billing to make sure there is a cash flow in business and deferred payments in rents and other operational parts. He suggested the founders to work together and explore the opportunities to share the human resources with the companies so that the costs are managed and critical talent is retained.

[ SOME QUESTIONS RAISED BY FOUNDERS ]

1. If the business is promoting digital behaviour, for startups having 12-15 months of cash, how long should we wait to seek the optimal valuation for the business ?
2. Do you think ed-tech/online education is going to be the new way of learning which will continue to attract more investors? Or is this short term ?
3. Will companies in the digital health space who are offering health services to customers directly continue to take advantage of the consumer behavioural shift even after the lockdown ends over the long term ?
4. While calculating runway, should we consider the receivables or should we work towards the conservative scenario present during when receivables will not pay up ?
5. We are a product development company. Should we look at deferring salaries, or use cash to retain talent because if we lost talent, it will take a long time to ramp back up. ?