[misja]

I was employee #4 in a startup in 2000, just before the burst. At that time the situation was crazy. For instance our founders had made an ambitious business plan to raise money in the next investment round. It was sent back by our investors because it was not ambitious enough: basically they asked to blindly multiply all the targets by 10. This was completely unrealistic but the founders did what they were asked and promptly new investment money came rushing in.

And then the bubble burst and the sentiment was 180 degrees opposite. By then our company had already acquired some customers and was making some money, and was ready to expand and grab a significant piece of the market. However it didn't matter what we did or what business plan we made, it was just impossible to raise any kind of money whatsoever. So our startup continued living its zombie life until it was taken over by a competitor a few years later. In the end I was lucky because this way I could survive the years after a crash while still having a job. But it left me with mixed feelings about the so called angel investors. It didn't appear to me that they had any idea what they were doing.