In the calm demeanor of someone trying to watch her words, she answered that Advancing Cities was not going well. Multiple incidents across multiple programs had caused J.P. Morgan to freak out, according to sources familiar with the conversation, including evidence seen by <strong>TechCrunch</strong>.

Exclusive: Techstars' $80 million partnership with J.P. Morgan is on the rocks, employees say

The rooftop tent, which Rivian calls the treehouse, is equipped with a movie projector, which is run using power from the Rivian, Brian Gase, Rivian’s senior director of prototype and special projects, told <strong>TechCrunch</strong> during a customer event in Laguna Beach, California.

Rivian's new 'treehouse' rooftop tent comes with a movie projector | TechCrunch

Hey. Sorry to call you out of the blue. No, no, nothing serious. I’m fine. I wanted to apologize for freaking you out last time. I wasn’t myself. But I’ve

Hey, it’s me, Brian’s less creepy Apple Vision Pro Persona | TechCrunch

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I went to the TechCrunch first ever Blockchain conference at Zug on July 6th 2018, and here are my top 10 takeaways on Asia Crypto from my conversations with entrepreneurs and investors there. 1. Because of INBLOCK partner Li Xiaolai’s conversation-leak incident, there is increasing talks amongst the Chinese community that in the second half of the year, the Chinese government may intervene and potentially prosecute individuals that are taking advantage of the Chinese speculators (ICO and exchanges are banned in China, but doesn’t mean Chinese people are not trading and buying elsewhere. A lot of strategic and investment conversation about crypto and blockchain still happens in China and many of these Crypto funds still have their investors based there.) Potential Chinese government intervention in the second half of year. There were accusations of Li in his recorded conversation of calling retail investors dumb and taking advantage of them, which would expose him as someone who is committing fraud and taking advantage of the people. This is very risky because in China, if a large number of people start reporting an individual to the police and say that he has cheated them or made them lose money, the Chinese authority is obligated to take action and prosecute them. This is the exact reason why Li published a response to a few days after the leak and attempted to clear himself. The very first point he highlighted was that he did not call the retail investors dumb. He mentioned that he didn’t explicitly say that he was “taking advantage of the retail buyers”, or 割韭菜 in Chinese, which literally translates into “cutting chives”, with the chives referring to Chinese retail buyers. And that there is no referral of the word “chives” in his recording. He also mentioned several other clarifications such as that there is a misunderstanding of his comment on QTUM and that QTUM is not a fraud project. See the google translated section here. It appears that after Li’s incident, many investors and entrepreneurs in China are looking to stay away from associating too closely with these individuals in fear of potential prosecution risk. 2. I credit this observation to Balaji from Coinbase, as he highlighted that this is the very first time that he saw Chinese investors moving from later-stage into early-stage investing and competing for deals alongside with traditional early stage VC and Crypto-only investors. And I’ve noticed that these Chinese investors are really aggressive. They show up in large groups at Crypto researcher conferences with their checkbooks. However, looking at it from the investor angle, Crypto has also provided significantly more opportunities for non- traditional investors. One early investor with 30 crypto investments told me about his experience in the valley. He point blankly said to me that he originally wanted to invest in AI and traditional tech companies, but there was too much barrier to entry in the traditional VC space. So chances happened that he encountered Crypto and chose the Crypto investing route where the opportunities seemed significantly more fair and meritocratic. For the first time, Chinese investors are showing up in early stage investing. 3. Zug was amazing, primarily because of the people that were there. Some people that you may or may not have known already but I really enjoyed speaking with and are worth following include who understands the US and Europe applied crypto ecosystem really well who has written extensively on applied crypto and security, from Balderton Capital, who has an interesting view on Asia and Europe and from Hyperledger, who has really seen everything under the sun in open-source. Additionally, people with great insights into the Asia Crypto scene include from Coindesk and from Eximchain. Of course, along with the usual suspects that you should definitely follow, CZ from Binance and Balaji from Coinbase. People to pay attention to. Pierre-Edouard Wahl, , Philip Dai an Colin Hanna Brian Behlendorf Joon Ian Wong Hope Liu 4. Chinese entrepreneurs I’ve spoken with don’t really know how to judge the top 10 large market cap companies that many have claimed to be shillcoins. Although they believe that the announcements or partnership currently may not be authentic or real, as these companies never provide much detail, it doesn’t mean they won’t be real down the road, or that they will be shillcoins down the road. These companies have raised so much money that they can build everything the fact. Even the Chinese community aren’t sure about whether the Chinese “shill” coins are actual shillcoins. after 5. With all the talks from me and perhaps others on China’s largest tech companies dominating the blockchain, it’s interesting to hear that Tencent has only explored blockchain investments for a few months and they have one person dedicated to doing so thus far. Nevertheless, Tencent has been working on blockchain projects internally. I imagine figuring out what kind of blockchain projects to invest into and what mechanism to invest into is not going to be an easy feat. Tencent’s blockchain investments. 6. I was told that a “realistic”, or “practical” crypto project to the Chinese implies that it needs to make money for investors, versus a “practical” Crypto project to me as someone who perhaps share the Silicon Valley idealist values means that it should be making an impact of some sort in the world. One Chinese entrepreneur with a team based in the US told me that he was conflicted and felt the need to make sure their tokens appreciate in the short term because his Chinese investors expected to see that, and other investments in their portfolio have been delivering. “Practicality” in Chinese Crypto projects. 7. After speaking to many folks about Asia in Zug, I realized there is a good amount of interest to learn Crypto vocabulary in Chinese. As a result, from tomorrow onwards, every other day, we will include a Chinese vocabulary related to Cryptocurrency in the newsletter. Teaching you Crypto terms in Chinese. SUBSCRIBE 8. I am just starting to learn about Europe but the ecosystem there is developing rapidly and I suspect there will be continuous innovation there. Many local investors I’ve spoken to aren’t very familiar with Asia at all and hope to learn more. Regulations appear in many ways more favorable than the US and Asia i.e.new The primary challenge for Europe from my conversations is that there are so many different countries and different cultures in the continent, so it will take more effort and time to go to market to achieve the same scale as the US and China. Europe doesn’t really understand Asia, but that is ok. Crypto exchange from Switzerland ’s stock exchange. raise is an example of where if your company is doing well, there will be plenty of pre-IPO money available to fund you. Softbank’s is looking to focus more than a 1/3 of its investments in China and they will be taking IPOs out of the market or delaying them. Liquidity has always been an issue but the secondary market is becoming increasingly more mature. This delay or elongated time frame for companies to go public will very much apply to the upcoming group of Crypto companies in Asia. Increasing trend of companies delayed from going public in China. Bitmain’s $400mn Series B $ 100bn fund I met a subscriber of the newsletter who works at Coinbase and it was amazing to have an encounter in person! All the way in Zug!! Thank YOU all for your continuous support of the newsletter. THANK YOU.

Top 10 Takeaways on Asia Crypto from TechCrunch Zug

events, hosted each year in San Francisco, New York, London and Berlin, are awesome gatherings of the most innovative startups that come from all around the world. The air is filled with such a vibrant energy that makes you even more enthusiastic about your own venture.It is a unique opportunity to present your idea to the world, tell the startup community about your product, find new partners and get financing from multiple different sources. We at were not looking for any financing rather our goal was to spread the word about the that allows building without code up to 10x faster. It was our first experience participating in TechCrunch Disrupt yet a very successful one, so we’d like to share some hints and tips about how we did it :) TechCrunch Disrupt startup Zeroqode no-code development technology web and mobile apps FIND A SPONSORING ORGANIZATION — 3–4 MONTHS BEFORE THE EVENT Participation at TechCrunch Disrupt is quite a costly venture, so if you are short on budget you might want to consider investigating whether there is an organization that will sponsor startups to represent your country. Sometimes participations are sponsored by startup accelerators and incubators. Normally these startups are organized into country or accelerator pavilions. START PREPARING — AT LEAST 3–4 WEEKS BEFORE THE EVENT Don’t underestimate the amount of preparation that you’d need to do even if you are going to have just a small table. So once your participation is confirmed you might want to go ahead and start getting everything prepared as soon as possible. THE BOOTH If you are a part of the Startup Alley then all you’ll get is a small round table with 80cm diameter. Not much, right? But with some creative approach you can still get the most out of it. An absolute must is a roll-up banner. Most visitors don’t like to come and ask each startup about what exactly they are presenting. They prefer to understand the main idea by taking a quick look at the visuals and then if they get interested — they approach and talk to you. So make sure that the message on your roll-up is very clear or at least you are sure that it will catch attention of others. Don’t be afraid to be creative and come up with bold statements that will intrigue people, like we did :) Instead of describing in detail what we do we decided to simply write “NO. MORE. CODE.” So people were curious to know what we meant by it. were approaching to find out if they are going to lose their jobs — and we were explaining that it was quite the opposite — we simply want to make their work more efficient. were asking how our technology can help them launch products faster and with leaner budgets. were curious if they can start building functional apps instead of simply static designs. Developers Founders Designers We also printed a few cards with logos of famous and eye-catching web-sites and apps, like AirBNB, Slack, Trello, Instagram etc. and a sign saying “Build your own app ”: without code We have pinned them around the table so that they were visible from various angles. This got visitors even more intrigued and they were wondering whether they can build apps like those hence they were approaching us and asking questions. without code We also printed a card saying “Get your ” and put it on the top of the table — we all love freebies, TechCrunch participants are no exception :) free app template Another thing we did was to put a tablet on the table which was playing a looped recording of no-code app development process. So summing up — catchy roll-up banner, cards pinned to the table, tablet with the video and the Free Templates card created a great impression of what we do. So visitors were paying attention to at least one of the promo elements and then if interested — they looked at all others or just approached us directly. BRANDED T-SHIRTS Not only they help to create a positive image and brand awareness they can attract interest too! Usually the startups get only 1 day to exhibit while the Disrupt event is 2 days. So, the first day we were wearing these t-shirts while roaming around the startup alley and that itself was enough for people to wonder what we are doing and approach us with questions. Our t-shirts were saying “NO. MORE. CODE.” in front and “ Ask me how” on the back. So a few times we were approached with a one word question — “How?” :) Apps without code? My partnerVlad and me at TechCrunch Disrupt PRINTED (OR NOT) MATERIALS Business cards are obvious, so we printed some. A couple of hundred per person should be more than enough. But we decided not to print anything else, because web-site is doing a better job presenting the product and no one likes carrying piles of paper these days. And it’s good for the environment too to avoid printing something that will be thrown in the trash. ON-SITE LEAD CAPTURING We have set up a with a simple email capture form. Once someone enters their email it is automatically added to our list. For that list we configured an onboarding reply template that thanks for visiting us and includes the links to built by Zeroqode. landing page mailchimp free app templates Initially the plan was to get a QR code and put it on the business cards so that people would scan them and be taken to the page. But on the event day we realized that we could get faster results if we ask them to fill it out immediately! Otherwise most of them would simply forget and never return. So after presenting the product on our laptops and answering all questions we opened the site with the email capture form and asked visitors to share their emails to get the links to free templates. That way we captured in one day! (high quality leads which are interested in our product) 72 emails This will also save you time because you won’t have to process the collected cards manually after the fair. WILD CARD & INTERVIEW WITH TECHCRUNCH TechCrunch selects some startups for interviewing, however because there are so many startups exhibiting chances that you will be selected are slim.But Wild Card Winners (Visitors voting for the most interesting startup of the day) automatically get the interview secured. So we decided to go after it and do anything we could to get as many votes as possible.Voting is done through Disrupt mobile app and the attendee can vote only for 1 startup per day. The voting normally opens at 9 am and closes at 1 p.m. So we asked everyone who approached our stand to give us their vote if they were interested… Many agreed because they liked what we do. You can also make some friends there and ask them to support you. Vote for someone on day 1 and ask them to vote for you on the next day (or the other way around). ☝ some visitors don’t install the app and thus it takes time to ask them install it and vote. Only later we realized that we can use the app installed on our phones, sign out and sign in under the other person simply by scanning the QR code on their badge. Then we would look up our company in the list and ask them to press the “vote” button :) That turned out be very helpful because Disrupt Android app wasn’t working on that day and we lost quite some votes just because of that :) Useful Hack — So after we won the Wild Card we were invited on stage for an interview with from Tech Crunch. John Biggs GOOD TO KNOW : Read all the emails from TechCrunch — they are sending various updates, and short notice changes that might be important to you. Also, they will be sending you guidelines, logistics details, the hours, schedules and many other things. On your exhibition day come early (in our case doors opened at 7 a.m., we arrived at about 7:20) Tweet about your startup using TechCrunch official hashtag ( ) #TCDisrupt Install well in advance to find event participants and make appointments before the event. Brella app BONUS MATERIAL :)

How we won the “Wild Card” at TechCrunch Disrupt Berlin and got interviewed by TechCrunch

I used to be a regular TechCrunch reader, but I’ve been struggling with their messy and slow UI for a while. As a big fan of cleaner and faster interfaces and inspired by Hacker News, and the early Product Hunt, I wanted to spend a day redesigning TechCrunch. CNN Lite Disclaimer: This is a personal project that may not reflect the views of TC. Designed by and for http://fairpixels.pro Here’s the result: Upvotes The way Reddit, Hacker News, Product Hunt and other platforms use upvotes, helps a good chunk of their users quickly navigate through what’s popular. A website like TC, visited by investors and others that would love to have a quick overview of what’s trending, can dramatically improve the way people navigate by seeing what’s popular. Stories The difference between TC compared to HN and Reddit is that the stories are written by their own authors. It’s not a social network that links to other websites, they’re a news publishing company. Having the upvote system, combined with in-house written content, creates a unique experience. One could potentially even follow particular authors who regularly write about the subjects that interests you. Feeds Besides the Popular, Latest and Jobs feeds, there could be feeds that deliver more value to the users. Feeds for deals, events and other categories that could be monetized, while still keeping a clean and fast interface. That’s it. If you’d like to play around with the source files of this design, you can download and use the Sketch files for free. here I’m lead designer at — where we offer unlimited UI design for web and mobile development teams. Fairpixels.pro

Redesigning TechCrunch

I won a couple of tickets from a Pitchoff, so I will be in San Francisco from September 11th until September 14th. Stay tuned for an update on all three days on this blog — from the the most intriguing in Startup Alley to my recap of Marc Benioff’s fireside chat. TechCrunch startups A few highlights I will be looking forward to: One of the most recent IPOs in a slow IPO year From SMS to IPO Jeff Lawson (Twilio) Great show and strikingly similar to reality Satire Valley with Mike Judge (HBO’s Silicon Valley) Will this year birth another unicorn like Dropbox? Startup Battlefield Marc Benioff. Enough said Fireside Chat with Marc Benioff (Salesforce) What’s Reid Hoffman up to after LinkedIn? The New Investment Climate with Reid Hoffman and Josh Elman (Greylock Partners) As always, one of the most prominent investors in Silicon Valley Tweets, Money, Power with Marc Andreessen (a16z) It’ll be interesting to see what Sacks has to say after Zenefits’s fall from glory Looking Forward with David Sacks (Zenefits) A member of the up and coming class of unicorns The New Shop with Apoorva Mehta (Instacart) Follow and for daily updates on stirrings in Silicon Valley through Disrupt SF 2016. this blog Hacker Noon

I will be at TechCrunch Disrupt SF! Highlights coming.

, I broke down several reasons why your pitch is not successful. Thank you for the positive feedback and the sheer number of reads! In this article, I'll round up what I started by breaking down the last three PR mistakes. In the last article Avoid double pitching Journalists love two things: respect for their personality and exclusive information. If you've written to a popular media author, don't expect a quick response. It usually takes 2-3 working days and sometimes up to 5 days to reach them. Once this period has passed, ask the journalist if it would be OK if you forward the story to another journalist. An example of a good message is: "Hi Sam! I wrote to you a week ago but haven't heard back yet. I hope you don't mind if I give the story to your colleague Mike at Forbes. Best regards, Alex." This way, you not only save communication but also avoid the embarrassment of double pitching. This is a common mistake among startups who are not yet aware of the rules of the PR market. In the worst-case scenario, it may happen that both journalists publish your story. And as you remember , journalists always check the relevance of a story and are always bound to discover similar material. Then you can't keep your head on your shoulders... Just kidding! But relations with journalists from both media outlets will be irrevocably damaged. from the last article Leave their colleagues alone Proactivity, not arrogance, is good in PR. Don't try to ask your target journalist's colleagues to hurry him up with a response. That's a violation of PR ethics. Plus, you run the risk of being seen as a stickler. Such PR people are feared as hell by journalists, and they will willingly talk about them to colleagues in the community to warn them off. Trust me, this is not a case where black PR will work to your advantage! Work with their colleagues in the same way you work with journalists from different media outlets. Wait around a week for a response, and then send a pitch to a colleague of your target journalist, with a slightly different angle on the story. Another option is to send your pitch to the editorial office with the message: "Hi, I'm Alex, Apple's PR manager. I sent the pitch to your colleague Sam about a week ago, but I haven't heard back from him yet. Maybe someone in your department would be interested in this story? Best regards, Alex." Set a deadline for a response We're not in kindergarten, where it's common to complain about the mischief of your fellas to the teacher. In the professional community, there can be situations where journalists seem to be in contact with PR people but are hesitant to respond to their messages. The worst solution in this case is to call the editorial office. You are more likely to annoy them than make them want to help you. So what should you do? Put aside your feelings and be smart; set a deadline to respond to your message. This is typically a 1-2 day deadline. For example, you could write, "Hi Sam! I understand that you're busy, but I'd be glad if you could reply to my messages sooner. Let's agree to a maximum delay of 1 working day. Unfortunately, if our communication doesn't work out, I'll have to pass the story on to another media. Best regards, Alex." Were these recommendations useful for you? Let's discuss in the comments.

3 Main Reasons Why TechCrunch Won't Feature Your Startup - Part 2

3 razones principales por las que TechCrunch no presentará su inicio - Parte 2

3 principales raisons pour lesquelles TechCrunch ne présentera pas votre startup - Partie 2

टेकक्रंच में आपके स्टार्टअप की सुविधा नहीं होने के 3 मुख्य कारण - भाग 2

TechCrunch があなたのスタートアップを取り上げない 3 つの主な理由 - パート 2

3 principais razões pelas quais o TechCrunch não apresentará sua startup - Parte 2

3 lý do chính khiến TechCrunch không làm nổi bật công việc khởi nghiệp của bạn - Phần 2

TechCrunch 不推荐您的初创公司的 3 个主要原因 - 第 2 部分

Getting published on TechCrunch is like getting a golden ticket. You have to learn from your mistakes before you get there. But when you succeed, you'll be pleased to find more attention to your product or service. The more people know about you, the easier it is to sell them. Haven't been featured on TechCrunch yet?  In this article, I'll give you 6 reasons why. Be attentive and try to apply each of them in your company's practice. Write a Quality Pitch Don't say, "My product is unique and has no competitors." There would be no market without competitors. Even a unique item solves a problem in a certain area, and therefore it can be compared to other companies' goods. Analyze your competitors, highlight your strengths in comparison with theirs, and then write a text emphasizing why the world should know about you. Don't Mix up Journalists with Marketers Being sassy is cool, but getting people to advertise your product for free is wrong. If you believe your product is right for TechCrunch, put together a quality presentation about it and a speech with an interesting headline that can be read in one minute. If the journalist likes it, he or she will forward it for approval. The journalist chooses what to write about according to guidelines, not just personal desire. Give it Time to Respond TechCrunch is a giant company, to which thousands of PR folks at startups write. When you send a pitch to a journalist for that website, give him time to reply. That's usually 3-5 business days. If you don't get a response, try again, and if that doesn't work, you can write to other media outlets. Do not Fool the Professionals Before publishing the news, the journalist will check if it has appeared in the media before. Don't undermine credibility – give only up-to-date information about the company and don't exaggerate statistics. Be Quick to React to Problems Not everyone respects agreements, so it's important for you to be proactive and mediate PR activities. For example, if you agree on an exclusive with a journalist, warn the authors of the following publications of a deadline that cannot be broken. Make sure to give journalists different information and tell them if they ask similar questions to their competitors. This can be difficult in the beginning, but be persistent. You need to earn their trust. Otherwise, journalists will hesitate to work with you. Speed up Communication When inviting a journalist, immediately send him the event from the Google Calendar, which will include the topic of the meeting, the date, time, and exact address. This will save you time on communication — the journalist can immediately confirm participation or cancel. Use your responsibility to prepare the pitch, and then just do your best.

6 Main Reasons Why TechCrunch Won't Feature Your Startup - Part 1

Instabug is based in Cairo, Egypt and was founded during Omar Gabr and Moataz Soliman’s last semester at Cairo University. From graduating college in 2012 to graduating from Y Combinator in 2016, the duo built a team, launched an MVP aimed at customers abroad, developed the core product, expanded into an adjacent vertical, grew Instabug’s user base, and secured larger and larger investments. This article is part of a series of blog posts about Instabug’s startup journey — the struggles behind the scenes of the company’s “wins” and lessons learned from overcoming them. Instabug Untold Stories Episode 1: TechCrunched I first heard about Instabug two years ago through a friend who told me about their latest funding round. At the time, it was the biggest investment an Egyptian startup had ever received. The entrepreneurship scene in Cairo was young, but . Every week, you’d hear about a promising new startup that aimed to solve problems and change the world. Every week, another promising startup silently disappeared. And every so often, a startup would achieve a new industry milestone, pushing the entire entrepreneurship ecosystem forward. passionate After joining the Instabug team last year, I wanted to understand why the startup wasn’t part of the 90% who silently disappeared. Through discussions about the company’s history and interviews with various team members, I discovered that the stories about Instabug that are public knowledge are just the tip of the iceberg. There were always more layers, more humanity, and more compelling details behind the scenes. I decided to share these untold stories not only because they are fascinating, but also to document the characteristics about Instabug that make it uniquely positioned to be Egypt’s first unicorn. Instabug’s 2016 investment was announced on , the tech blog where every startup around the world aspires to be featured. With millions of monthly visitors to the blog, being “TechCrunched” means a huge spike in traffic to your startup’s website, and the attention of investors, competitors, peers, and potential customers. Instabug had been mentioned on in three other articles before, but they knew that this time was special. TechCrunch TechCrunch Instead of a photo of the founders or a mockup of the product, as is the usual case, the article featured a picture of the Instabug team in front of the Great Pyramids of Giza. “We knew that the investment would be a huge deal for the country, and we knew that the article would be propagated easily, and we knew it would be a huge milestone in the company’s history,” Omar told me. “So we wanted to get this shot right. We didn’t want it to be just a product update. We wanted the team in the picture, the people who built Instabug.” TechCrunch “The pyramids picture resonated in a huge way in the tech community in Egypt. They were very proud that there was a picture of an Egyptian team in front of the pyramids on ,” Moataz explained. “We got 10x the effect of being ‘TechCrunched’ because we’re an Egyptian company and this doesn’t happen every day for an Egyptian company. Plus, it was a streak of coverage, starting with the and ending with .” TechCrunch Instabug 3.0 release in February 2016 the pyramids picture in June 2016 The pyramids picture represents just how “relentlessly resourceful” the BugSquad is. “The plan was to take two hours to go take the picture, then come back to the office and continue working. But we ended up spending the whole day there, so we all went home after just to get enough sleep to get back to work the next day,” Android Team Lead Mohamed Nagy said. “It’s not easy to grow a startup in Egypt, and that’s why the photo was so important.” This is the story behind that photo. TechCrunched When Instabug raised $1.7 million immediately after completing Y Combinator’s Winter 2016 batch, the founders were shocked. They believed in their vision and the product and the team, but they didn’t expect to actually raise that much money. “We went to YC with maybe $150,000 from investments in the bank and we were profitable, which meant that we had infinite runway. But at the same time, we didn’t have any space to experiment; we were still capped by the amount in the bank. And then after the seed round, all of a sudden we realized that we had $1.9 million in the bank,” Moataz explained. After Y Combinator, Omar and Moataz returned to Cairo earlier than expected in the spring of 2016. They thought it would take one month after YC to close an investment round before they could go back to Egypt. They closed the round within three days. “We kept refreshing the bank account page and when the money was in there, we decided it was time to get back to Egypt so we could focus 100% on the most important thing: building the product. We had a lot of work to do with the team to move things forward and we wanted to make sure that we brought back that momentum with us and transferred that excitement to the rest of team. We closed the deal on Tuesday, returned to Cairo on Friday, and were in the office on Sunday,” Moataz recalled. “We didn’t know they were coming,” People Partner Donia Shaarawy said. “We were in the office and all of a sudden Moataz comes in. We asked him, ‘How was it?’ He just said, ‘It was good, it was okay.’ And he continued working. Later that day, we had a meeting and Omar made the announcement. We didn’t expect the valuation and investment to be that high. Right after the meeting, we went back to work.” One of Instabug’s first offices in Cairo, Egypt. At that time, Instabug’s office was in a small, two-bedroom apartment with thin walls on the Eastern edge of sprawling Cairo. The cramped living room was the 15-person team’s shared workspace, and the bedrooms were used for meetings, interviews, one on ones, lunch, dinner, and FIFA matches. In a room the size of a wide hallway, with screaming kids at the daycare next door and teenagers blasting their music upstairs, Omar announced that the company had secured $1.7 million in a fundraising round led by venture capital firm along with angel investors. Accel “He talked about Accel and , our plans for the future. We didn’t have every single detail worked out at the time, but we knew that we had a lot of money in the bank, so we’d have courage to do new things and make wrong bets to know what we should bet on. And as a company, we knew that we should stay as resourceful as we always have been,” Moataz said. Rich Wong Instabug’s partnership with Accel wasn’t just a milestone for the company, it was a milestone for the Egyptian startup ecosystem. “Working in a startup wasn’t a typical career path in Egypt. But currently, the idea of entrepreneurship as a valid trajectory has grown and it’s pushing people to try new things and work on a global level. Instabug showed that it’s possible,” Senior Growth Marketer Yasmine Helmy explained. Two months later, announced Instabug’s investment to the world, and the picture of the team at the pyramids spread throughout the Egyptian entrepreneurship scene. TechCrunch Local news coverage of Instabug’s 2016 seed round in which it raised $1.7 million led by Accel. The Instabug BugSquad at the Great Pyramids of Giza in the summer of 2016. The Pyramids Picture Before the article was published, Mike Butcher, the author of the article, asked for an image to go along with it. Omar and Moataz decided that they wanted it to be a picture of the team, the people behind the product. They were also proud of being an Egyptian company that achieved this milestone. They just needed a location. TechCrunch “How about the pyramids?” Omar suggested. “Oh, thats crazy,” Moataz replied. “Let’s do it.” To take the picture, the team planned to take a quick trip to the pyramids in the middle of their workday. What was supposed to be a two-hour outing ended up being a full-day mission. But at the end of the day, the team made it happen. “To get into the pyramids complex as a group of 15 people wearing the same T-shirt, the officials told us we had to get permits from like five different ministries because they thought we were going to shoot a TV commercial or something,” Nagy said. “It was absurd. We just wanted to get in, take the picture, and get out. But they wouldn’t allow us to enter.” So the team decided to wing it. “We’re very resourceful, so we decided to scatter into groups and find a way to get the best shot,” Yasmine said. “We operated just like we did at the office. We worked in groups to tackle a common problem and when we faced any challenge, we looked for workarounds until we succeeded,” Donia explained. One group rode horses into the desert to find a back entrance to the pyramids complex. Others entered with un-branded T-shirts to look for a different way in for the rest of the team. Another group attempted to negotiate with nearby buildings to gain access to their rooftops in order to take the photo. Hungry and dehydrated after hours of searching in the sun, the team decided to take a break and eat at Pizza Hut, which is located right across the street from the pyramids complex. While resourcefulness is a critical ingredient in achieving a goal, sheer luck can sometimes make or break it. “We were starving, so we ordered everything on the menu, but there wasn’t enough space for all of us, so they sent us to the roof,” Nagy said. When the team got up there, they found the perfect view for the photo. Their first choice for the picture was denied, and they spent the whole day unsuccessfully searching for other ways to take the picture, only to find the ideal location by chance. “It looks like we’re at the pyramids, but we were actually on the roof of Pizza Hut and we just hacked the picture,” Nagy told me. The team had finally found a good enough view, but actually taking the photo proved to be another challenge on its own. “We took photos from many angles with professional cameras, but none of them worked. Either you couldn’t see the pyramids or you couldn’t see the team’s faces,” Nagy explained. The solution that worked ended up being the simplest option, although it involved a sacrifice. “It took us several tries to get the shot. We even asked some tourists that were there to take the picture for us. In the end, the picture that was published on was the one that I took of the team just with my mobile phone,” Nagy said. TechCrunch “Now when I see this picture, I have no regrets that I’m not in it,” he continued. “I’m actually very proud that it was taken by me.” How Did Instabug Survive? The Instabug case seems to illustrate what much of psychology and management studies have told us for decades: that resilience to adversity and success are positively correlated. One of Instabug’s core values — the standards of behavior that the company culture is built on and that all team members must possess — is “Make It Happen”. Through grit or resilience or luck, make it happen. When I asked Omar and Moataz why Instabug has made it happen this far, they didn’t realize it, but their answers reflected everything these studies have proven. “Just showing up, just keeping at it,” Moataz told me. “Definitely luck. I think it’s mainly that we didn’t give up in any of these situations — and not just Omar and me, the entire team. We were all living through the same conditions, pulling all-nighters while everything was happening in the country.” “Consistency,” Omar replied. “Consistently working hard. We know that we’re not the smartest people. We try one thing, if we don’t succeed, we try another thing. This is one of the most important characteristics that I appreciate in people, and it’s built into the culture of the company. We don’t get motivated easily and we don’t get demotivated easily. It’s not that we’re stubborn, that we need to make this happen regardless of anything. We pivoted a few times. We backed out of a couple things. It’s a combination of consistency and perseverance.” Originally published at instabug.com on September 26, 2018.

How a Unicorn Is Being Built in Egypt — Ep. 1: TechCrunched

Since I got involved in the startup community one of my greatest wishes was to spend some time in Silicon Valley, to explore San Francisco and see where ‘the startup magic’ happens. Let’s talk about destiny and the right things coming to you at the right time… This Spring, one our incoming short term experts was One of the things we did together was to organize the The winners got 2 tickets and a booth for TC Disrupt San Francisco and I remember saying to John that if an opportunity arises I would also come to ‘ . Still not knowing about my . #SwissEP John Biggs. 1st ever TechCrunch meet up in Skopje. Letz the holy grail of tech conferences’ YTILI fellowship and Seattle as my placement Fast forward to September, where in the same period as my fellowship, TC Disrupt SanFran was taking place. This to me, was an opportunity of a lifetime, especially since I found out that My excitement just skyrocketed. I am the first woman from Macedonia to take part in TechCrunch Disrupt in San Francisco . One thing that I’ve learned in the past period is that when you go to conferences (especially big ones) you have to prepare in advance and set your goals. For this time my was to advocate for the only Macedonian startup there — Letz, and help them in anyway to get connected to investors (since they were in for the Series A round). was to meet as many highly qualified professionals for our . was to learn more about doing business in the Silicon Valley and of course go to Googleplex and/or Facebook HQ. highest priority Second goal Western Balkans Entrepreneur-in-Residence program Third goal Seattle to San Francisco flight was keeping me on my toes, since I couldn’t wait to start this Silicon Valley journey… And once you get through the airport you can see and experience the high tech presence! Day #1 at TechCrunch Disrupt San Francisco and Goal #1 With the two founders of Letz, and we got early in the am to Pier48 and arranged the booth in the AI sector of the Startup Alley. Since they already had pre-arranged meetings with investors, my main responsibility was to represent Letz and engage with participants at our booth. It was an experience to be able to story-tell and ‘sell the product’ to maybe more than 1000 people that stopped by the booth that day. One encounter made my day… A lady stopped by the booth and said that she knows Lucy (Letz productivity assistant and 1st character), because her boyfriend keeps on talking with ‘her’. Soon after I learned that this lady, April, works at a Chinese/US VC fund that is investing in AI startups in Series A. That was the right moment for me to share that we are raising up to 1 million US dollars, to which she replied:” Oh, you are raising too little. Our series A is from 3–4 million!”. And I told April that we are here to discuss details, so I immediately connected her with the founders, so they could take the next steps. Nino Martin There is an interest of US VC’s for European startups. But, do (Eastern) European startups get valuated less in comparison to US based startups? There are many factors that will impact the valuation, but probably best thing before raising a round is to triple check your valuation. That’s your company that you give equity away from! Lesson learned: One of my favorite TV Series is Silicon Valley (the geek in me), being able to meet Jared IRL (in real life) was a moment that will be highlighted in my memory for a very long time! Fun Fact: Day 2 and Goal 2: Entrepreneurs in Residence During the three day conference, I was able to reconnect with friends from different startup communities, as well as to meet many new people. As soon as I shared the Entrepreneur-in-Residence program as an opportunity, they were all interested to dive into more details. The Western Balkan region for the vast majority was an unknown ‘startup’ territory and they didn’t have any idea of what is happening there and how developed the eco-systems actually are. Hopefully many of them will sign up, complete the matching process and come to our four countries to selflessly share their know-how and practical experience. . At the moment you might not be aware of what that could mean or what could turn into. In the long run, everything will make perfect sense. This transatlantic bridge can be strengthened with entrepreneurial support and exchange of expertise. Lesson learned: Share existing opportunities with as much people as possible A guy with the exact same last name as mine approached me, stating this fact. That was a pleasant surprise, to meet someone like that 10 000 km away from where you’re both from. is a young and aspiring entrepreneur with a potential to become an EiR in the following period. Fun fact: Dimitrije Day 3 and Goal 3: Visiting Googleplex Some may think that you can show up at Googleplex and roam around. Thanks to my friend and her connections, we were introduced to who works at Google. This is how the three of us were able to get a guided tour in the complex that is probably as big as my hometown. It was excellent to learn more about the speedy growth of Google and to see how it looks like to work for a huge corporation. There is everything that a person would need at any given time. Marilyn Pablo It’s a lot of hard work when you start small to become a giant. Then again, with a well set platform, right timing, supporting system, creating a company culture that retains Millennials you can come close to becoming this giant that Google is now. Lesson learned: At least for 3 hours I felt like I am a Google employee, part of the Google family, grabbing a coffee in one of the snack rooms, riding a Google bike around the campus, talking with employees… It is a surreal feeling, to be at the HQ of something I use in my everyday life! Fun fact: Silicon Valley lesson learned: Maybe I had high expectations for San Francisco and Silicon Valley in general, that influenced my overall experience. I was shocked to witness this huge discrepancy of extremely rich people and so many homeless people, in the same streets, in the same urban city… it was heartbreaking. Spending some time in Silicon Valley, SanFran… got me to this realization… Mainly when it comes to #3: Recognize that business and society are together — not in separate worlds! Hopefully by next time I’m there, some things will be changed, for the better… Cheers

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