I’m Abhay Agarwal, CEO at GetBit and Crobo. Our thesis is that Bitcoin will revolutionize finance — much like the internet transformed information. 

We believe that all financial systems will eventually be built on Bitcoin.

Today we have two monetizable use cases: using Bitcoin Lightning technology, we enable instant, fee-free money transfers from the US to India. 

Users experience a Venmo-like interface, with Bitcoin technology working behind the scenes — this service is branded Crobo.

We also offer a Bitcoin-only exchange for India and Indians. We comply with crypto regulations in both the US and India — which allows us to operate in these markets — this service is branded GetBit.

We raised a $2M seed round in early 2022.

This was during prime fundraising time for crypto. We began immediately pitching multiple investors and were able to raise $1.25M within 60 days. 

We were fortunate to have the right team, a compelling story, and a large market opportunity. This was before the major backlash against crypto — we were lucky to raise when we did.

The other $750k came 18 months afterwards when the market had already become pretty tough. We were able to demonstrate our traction and push through to close the round.

We wanted to build the initial version of our product and have enough runway to showcase that there was a demand for what we were building.

In deciding how much to raise, we did some back-of-the-envelope calculations and estimated that the costs for the necessary engineers and initial GTM efforts totaled about $2M. 

We raised at a $12M post-money valuation through SAFEs. We currently have about $500k in ARR. 

We’re thinking about whether we want to do a bridge round of $1M or wait for a full Series A to get a 15-20x revenue multiple for our next funding round.

The goal was to get the product ready for launch. We planned to spend $1M on developing the core product that could be integrated via an API. 

We wanted to quickly move from an idea to something that real customers could use and pay for.

We also set aside $500k for marketing and business development — including hiring a sales/growth person to promote the product. 

We kept $250k to $300k as a contingency fund to help us boost traction and cover any unexpected needs as we grew.

We put together a broad list of potential investors by thinking about what we had to offer. 

We wanted to find people who would see value in these aspects and who had taken similar bets before that turned out well.

We focused on the Seattle area and identified the top players there. Madrona — being one of the top firms in Seattle — was one of the first names that came to mind.

We used our network to try to get introductions from people we knew. We were fortunate to get a warm introduction to Madrona from another founder who had previously worked with them. 

This founder vouched for us, emphasizing our backgrounds and the large market we were targeting — I knew this founder through friends and family. 

Although they hadn't raised from Madrona, they had pitched them and had a good relationship with the partner from their days at Microsoft. 

When we met with Madrona, they liked our idea and team, but were initially considering a full $2M investment — which would require a ton of due diligence and a priced round. 

We wanted to move quickly and preferred using a YC SAFE note. 

We ended up with a compromise: Madrona would invest $1M using a YC SAFE note — which allowed us to move fast and build our product.

This ended up working out well, because shortly after, the crypto market imploded. Had we waited for the full $2M round, the deal might not have gone through.

Before getting in touch with Madrona, we had spoken to approximately 30 India-based funds, and all of them said no. 

We were primarily interested in these over U.S. funds because our primary demographic was India — we wanted investors who understood the market better. 

They were all concerned about regulation. They couldn’t wrap their heads around how regulation would play out — without clear answers they couldn't back us.

We tried to explain that regulation was a known risk, telling them about how sending faxes in the U.S. was illegal at one point.

We told them that customer adoption comes before regulation — they didn’t seem to catch on.

My background at Amazon and the strength of our team were the main selling points. 

I had already worked on payments in the past — this was an industry I understood inside and out.

Bitcoin was seen as at the forefront of a payments revolution, so the idea was a pretty strong sell — especially during the crypto boom of 2022.

Madrona was the only fund that was interested in us in the first place. For them, we primarily pitched our team and our product. 

We gave them a demo and they really liked us. We were able to go from the first conversation to getting the money wired to our bank in just 40 days.

The biggest challenge for us was after we raised the $1.2M — when the crypto market went downhill.

Investors became super wary of crypto, and many gave immediate no’s. Madrona saw that we still had money in the bank — they probably viewed this as a great sign.

We concluded that we needed to shift our strategy to close a round by explaining that our business was built on foundational infrastructure — and that it wasn’t reliant on crypto prices.

We emphasized that we were focused on payment processing — using crypto as the underlying rails. 

Whether Bitcoin was priced at $20k or $200k, our system would still work at the same speed and deliver the same results. 

We then decided to focus on pitching those who truly understood Bitcoin as well as those with a background in payments. 

This helped us close the remaining $750k from an investor who shared our beliefs.

Don't shy away from cold calls. Many people say cold calls and cold connections don't work — that's not true. 

You should connect with all your target VCs. They are just as eager to find entrepreneurs as you are to find funding.

I've seen firsthand that VCs are just as eager because they need to deploy capital.

Reach out and do your pitch. When you receive a no, take it with a grain of salt. 

A no isn't a rejection of you personally; it's a reflection of their thesis, development, conviction, or background. If it doesn't match, that's okay. Move on and keep trying.

Madrona is a great partner. For Bitcoin-only startups I recommend Axiom. 

Nothing special apart from the detailed resources that Houck already provides.