Author | Editor Hu Bao | Luo Lijuan left universities and research institutes to catch up with the wave of technological entrepreneurship. More and more scientific researchers are standing in front of capital as entrepreneurs.
Zhang Ying, managing partner of Jingwei Venture Capital, found that this type of founders are very different from Internet founders in the process of starting a business.
On the one hand, scientific research entrepreneurs are highly professional and have a deep understanding of their own fields.
On the other hand, they are older than Internet entrepreneurs in the past, and their personalities are relatively more solid, and sometimes they can be a bit stubborn.
In the wave of technology entrepreneurship, the top talents among scientific research founders can easily obtain financing, become the founders with the largest shares of the company, and easily become a CEO. .
But Zhang Ying believes: "It is actually a long journey to transform from a scientific research scholar to a qualified entrepreneur.
" After contacting many scientific research entrepreneurs and After the investment, Zhang Ying discovered that a large part of Matrix Partners' daily work is to use money to help them solve problems and "help them climb out of a relatively big pit.
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p>Picture of Zhang Ying, managing partner of Jingwei Venture Capital, from: Jingwei Venture Capital public account. On the one hand, it may be because the founders themselves have not yet recognized the role change from "scientific researcher" to "entrepreneur"; on the other hand, The scientific research projects themselves are not yet ready for commercialization.
In addition to the company's own difficulties, as a technology company, it is also trapped by the development of the supply chain.
In the development process of the companies started by these founders with scientific research background, the founders had various concerns. They were not satisfied with the company developing too fast. When the number of team members increased sharply, they also had various concerns. Confused about how to effectively manage the company and replace the old with the new.
At a forum held by Matrix Partners, Zhang Ying, managing partner of Matrix Partners, Yao Song, co-CEO of Oriental Space, and Cheng Senping, founder and CEO of Triassic, discussed these issues. .
The following is the discussion content, compiled by All-Weather Technology: 01 Good technology ≠ Competitive products Q: What are the most common pitfalls in the process from scientific research projects to commercialization? Yao Song: I have prepared three short stories, all of which are my own experiences.
The first story is that when we first started our business as "Deep View Technology", several classmates from the founder team gradually left the company.
We were in the laboratory at that time, and when no one was willing, we had to push everyone out of Tsinghua University to work in the incubator next to it.
Students are very reluctant to do engineering and are only willing to do cutting-edge research and development.
But after those things are completed, there are still 90 minutes left to do pure engineering.
Forcing everyone to demand themselves from the perspective of an engineer rather than as a researcher.
Some of our classmates actually failed to persist.
The second story is that we were making AI chips and chose the drone market.
Because the drone market is friendly to new hardware, it can accept a relatively high cost, and the reliability requirements are not particularly high. If you look at consumer-grade drones, they basically only have a battery life of 30 seconds. It will take about a minute to restart.
And AI plays some entertainment role on drones, not a decisive or critical role.
We entered this industry at that time and after working for more than half a year, we mass-produced the first smart drone.
But at this time, I discovered that the ceiling of this market was too low. DJI only accounted for 70% of the market, and it was difficult for the entire DJI team to cooperate with entrepreneurial teams.
I proposed that the company should make a major transformation in its business.
At this time, all the engineering and technical personnel were opposed, because this meant that all the hard work of everyone in the first year was in vain.
Oriental Space Co-CEO Yao Song, picture from: Matrix Partners public account The third story is that in 2018 we received an acquisition offer.
We launched assisted driving products in 2017. We have a strategic cooperation with Xilinx and have entered many car manufacturers for testing. The test results are very good.
But when it came time to enter the final testing stage before mass production, the car manufacturer's contract just couldn't be awarded.
It wasn’t until we officially announced that we were acquired by Xilinx that the contract was awarded the week after.
Because for the automotive industry chain, it particularly pursues safety.
Especially for large European and American car companies, before and after a car is mass-produced, it may require you to have a stable supply and a good quality assurance within 10 years.
So they don’t dare to cooperate with startup companies.
The core thing is that they need to rely on some big power before they believe that your company can survive for a long time.
Cheng Senping: Many times we think that good scientific theories will definitely bring good technology, good technology will bring market competitive products, and finally we will usher in a better business returns, but in fact, there is no necessary causal relationship between them.
Each step is the basis for the next step, but it does not necessarily produce the next result.
Here is an unsuccessful case.
Our company’s technology prototype has come out, and we hope to apply for registration with a product.
Based on our technical advantages, we can produce very complex drug control technology and have initiated product projects.
The project has been approved and the product release curve developed is very beautiful.
But we did not consider it fully. In addition to its good release theory, technological advantages, IP protection, and smooth registration application, this product’s clinical and commercial values ??are not ideal.
As we move forward, we find that this product is likely to rush into the blue ocean when it is launched.
So we decided to cancel it in 2017. This was our first product, which was very heartbreaking.
From 2018 to 2019, we adjusted our business model and I rethought how to maximize the input-output ratio.
Because we are a technology platform company, products are not the single goal we pursue.
Be able to systematize platform technology into products and quickly replicate them commercially, and seek the maximum input-output ratio between the initial investment for a single product or several products and future commercial returns. , this is what we want to think about.
02 "What we want to do is to downgrade technology, not upgrade it." Q: Scientists tend to be idealistic about their scientific research results, but the scenarios they come up with are not very applicable to the real world.
After "stepping into pitfalls" in this area, how do you quickly iterate and uncover such problems? Yao Song: If the technical bottom line accepted by the market is 60 points, and the ideal technology of your technicians is 100 points, if it reaches 70 points, sell immediately without hesitation.
To summarize the problems that many professors at Tsinghua University have made in the past and present, they fail to distinguish clearly between science and technology.
Science is when we want to find the essence of something. This matter is often theory first, and then verified by methods.
It is also difficult to predict, and things that are difficult to predict are actually not suitable for entrepreneurship and entrepreneurial funds to invest.
The fund must invest in technology. When the principles of physics and chemistry are clearly defined, I will use this thing to see what kind of thing can be made.
But this process, from an academic paper to a mature technology, often takes 3 to 5 years; for a mature technology to become a product, it may take another 1 to 2 years.
In terms of products, you have to consider the needs of customers. You need to make a complete thing. It is the product. It is definitely not just the core technology.
After the product is clearly defined, it has to become a commodity. Whether the price is acceptable to the market is another step.
In fact, users do not need your latest computing core, nor your latest so-called compression algorithm. What users want is that you can tell me to adjust three parameters at will, and I can compress my network. Come down and complete this set of user-friendly software.
In many cases, what we have to do is to downgrade technology rather than upgrade it, because you have costs and other mass production requirements.
Cheng Senping: The goals and definitions of success for technology and products are different. This is also my own realization after starting my own business.
Technology pursues advancement and uniqueness, which is reflected in good articles and good patents.
Products meet market demand and user needs, and are defined by high conversion rates and future business prospects.
When we create an emerging technology, the technology needs to meet several conditions: stable, industrially mass-produced, price-controllable, and finally widely applicable.
There is actually no emphasis on the most advanced.
From a product perspective, it must be done quickly and ensure a certain system success rate.
From a commercial perspective, for pharmaceutical people, one is called patient demand, which means it is clinically useful, and the second is called market demand.
If both requirements are met, there will be no commercial problems with the product in the future.
Here, I also share a practical case.
From 2016 to 2017, we embarked on a path of excellence in technology.
We arranged for many scientists to work on the designs of more than a dozen pharmaceutical dosage forms hand-drawn by my co-founder. Everyone was very happy and found it very interesting. We all felt that we should be able to publish a book. Book.
But one day I suddenly realized something was wrong. When I talked to investors, I needed to spend several hours explaining to them the thinking and implementation behind these technologies.
Then they think your company is doing science and theory.
Later there was a change in our direction. We decisively stopped those systematic research works and retained several pharmaceutical dosage form designs that were relatively well-researched but were actually relatively simple. In the rapid development of subsequent products.
Picture of Cheng Senping, founder and CEO of Triassic, from: Matrix Partners Public Account 03 Surrendering to Arrogance VS Defeating Arrogance Q: Companies with particularly high technological attributes are quite constrained by the development of their own industry’s supply chain level .
Have you encountered any supply chain problems in your various fields? Yao Song: Taking aerospace as an example, this supply chain issue is actually very interesting.
People often ask why the launch price of China Aerospace is 3 times, 5 times, or even higher than that of SpaceX.
A very important core reason for this is that our supply chain costs remain high.
Because so far, none of the companies has a complete checklist like consumer electronics companies, which can conduct complete product quality inspection.
Because we are a supplier in a complex system, it is impossible for me to measure everything.
If you don’t have quality testing capabilities, you can only rely on the trust relationship of previous cooperation, so now everyone can’t get rid of the original suppliers.
In fact, conversely, this is also a way for us to establish the latest core competitiveness of the entire company. Others may be subject to a set of supply chains. If you can independently build a set of supply chains based on China, In the industrial supply chain, your overall efficiency will be greatly improved, and your costs will also be reduced a lot.
Cheng Senping: It is a headache for us to purchase electrical components overseas this year.
Many are shipped from Europe and Japan, especially Europe which lags behind.
In the end, we solved it with money and went to the market to acquire it, which solved the problem of developing this large-scale production line.
Later, our relatively long-term solution was to reach strategic cooperation with overseas suppliers. In this way, we could win their attention to us and ensure stable future supply.
There are only a few suppliers of our printing materials in the world, and there is no mature supplier in China.
Their global supply is limited, and there is currently no problem. However, when we apply the universal 3D printing formulation process to dozens or even hundreds of products in the future, it will The supply must be insufficient.
So this is a problem we need to find ways to solve in the future.
Zhang Ying: If you end up with an overall product, such as a car, a rocket, or a technology platform, in fact, everyone should pay more attention to the supply chain and the production process.
To provide you with raw materials and core components, how do you pull them together to develop rapidly and make them become your overall competitiveness.
This is reflected in all aspects, such as supply chain, automated production, processes, and optimization of certain links, rather than just spending all time developing and iterating your own final products.
I chatted with several founders of new car-making forces, and they said that during this period of time, what troubled them the most was the inaction of large international companies.
They are arrogant, slow to act, have no sense of responsibility, and look down on Chinese automobile companies.
When domestic car manufacturers have problems with chips and core components, the big companies will make you collapse.
You can buy new chips at high prices from channels to solve current problems and compromise with big companies.
In addition, there are some very innovative and bold founders who are looking for potential substitutes in China. For example, if the international chip score is 80 points, if others can achieve more than 60 points, they dare to look for this company.
Startups like this in China are usually very hard-working. After you go and chat in the morning, they will come in in the afternoon. When they enter this new car-making force, they start polishing their products and developing a solution. A short- to medium-term replacement plan.
Soon they will be able to solve the problem, and then sales will increase and interactions will increase.
Of course, in the automotive field, it may take 5 to 7 years to fully Chineseize the entire supply chain. This is the pressure and trouble we face.
Either I have to accept it passively, and I will accept no matter how much it is ravaged; or I have to accept the slow climb of the supply chain, and I will be too exhausted to do anything else.
The truly excellent founders and truly excellent teams here will not only do their own things well, but also try their best in the supply chain, production links, various optimization links, and raw materials. Put yourself in a better place.
I think this kind of company that has been actually polished will become even stronger in the future.
04 To overcome willfulness, you must also understand human nature Q: What pitfalls did you encounter during the identity transformation process between scientist and founder, or are there any experiences you can share? Yao Song: As a scientist and technician, in fact, we often don’t think about things in 3, 5, or 10 years. We basically achieve one stage and then think about what to do in the next stage.
But a company’s strategy must start with the end in mind. It is necessary to think clearly about the big goals it wants to achieve in 10 years, and then break it down to see what the company will be like in 7, 5, and 3 years. .
This is a change from short-term thinking to long-term strategic thinking.
In addition, from a scientist to an entrepreneur, you need a comprehensive ability. You must gradually withdraw from a very deep single point, think more and more macroscopically, and use it to cover different areas. field.
Cheng Senping: There are three differences between scientific research work and entrepreneurship. The first one is that scientific research focuses on digging a well deeply, while entrepreneurship focuses on digging a well wide. You have to keep an eye on all directions and listen to all directions.
The second is core competency. Scientific research requires imagination, which is a very important ability to turn science into technology.
But in the process of building a company, execution comes first.
These are two different abilities.
Third, scientific researchers focus on static things, such as things and data.
But running a company is dynamic, and the world structure and characters are actually more complicated.
Picture from: Jingwei Venture Capital public account Zhang Ying: From a scientific researcher to an entrepreneur, and then from an entrepreneur to an entrepreneur.
This kind of role reversal actually requires founders to constantly iterate and become more comprehensive.
This kind of comprehensiveness is actually relative. Some people can run wildly on the road of comprehensiveness, become better and better, and keep jumping over the dragon's door.
But for some scientists and technical talents, when they reach a certain ceiling, their comprehensiveness stops and they can never break through the ceiling.
In this case, I think a comprehensive team is very important, that is, there must be business partners, joint ventures, and complementary talents around you.
The important point here is that you need to truly understand yourself first, then be honest with yourself, and have a more objective comment on your shortcomings and growth.
If you know your ceiling, there are some things you just can't break through, and there are some things you just don't like to do, and the people around you should make up for it.
You may get hurt in the process of over-matching and over-matching, and you may end up in a pit. This is inevitable.
You can only hope that you will become stronger through correcting mistakes and falling down, and then get up and move in the right direction.
Lastly, I want to talk about human nature.
If we want to become better and eventually become an entrepreneur, in fact, you must pay more attention to the consideration of human nature and accumulate experience.
Because human nature is around us every second. You deal with people every day and understand human nature internally and externally.
In many complex situations, it is actually quite important to be able to think from someone else’s perspective, understand human nature, and then find solutions.
This is a very profound topic. Everyone has their own understanding of this matter, and how to use it to their own strengths. They also have different rhythms and effects.
I think everyone pays enough attention to the word "human nature".