Our Director of Community Niraj Mulani caught up with our Co-founder Suresh Madhuvarsu to discuss what they mean by "saas startup co-creation" and what they focus 🔭 on as part of that process.

Niraj: Hi, guys. Thank You for joining in. I'm the Director of Community at Product10x. And today I'm joined by the Co-founder of Product10x to shed some more light on who we are and what do we do? Suresh, Product10x is a startup co-creator. One of the questions we get quite often is what do we really mean by SaaS startup co-creation? And what do we do as part of that?

Suresh: This is a great opportunity to really talk about who we are, and what we do. So, we've worked with 180 plus startups at this point in time. Each startup has a different way of how they go through the startup journey. I think that is very clear and the kind of challenges that everybody goes through is also very unique.

And sometimes people talk about patterns, but I don't really see it that way. Everybody's unique. And then everybody should have that exact attention to how they can be successful in their startup journey. So looking at all these different startups, we've come to three core pillars that any startup needs in the early stages of pre-seed, seed and even up to Series A company.

The one aspect is that everybody should have a product-market fit. Sometimes it's funny that even Series B companies are talking about product-market fit in the right sense. That's very surprising, but that is how it is. So that's really where I think when we talk about the pre-seed and pre series a companies, it is super important that every one of them should find product-market fit. I think that's very important.

The second aspect is to really talk about, yes, you have, let's say 10 customers, 50 customers, and then you're going to raise some money to accelerate your growth, which is great. But then what are the components that are really needed to be fundraise ready?

I think that is something that many founders miss, as part of the company building process simple things like, are you sales-ready? Or, are you marketing ready? Do you have a sales process? You should have a product strategy put in place. And what kind of leadership team do you have? So these are the things that are very important, but are often missed.

The third aspect is about the whole of the advisory and mentorship. And the unfortunate part is in the industry, mentorship has gotten some negative publicity, because anybody can be an advisor out there. And anybody can be a mentor out there, but what we strongly believe in is it should be coming out of the people who've been in the shoes before who've been there, done that. And that's really where I think the real pain points come out. Think about the simple questions. Like, Hey, should you hire a CTO or a technology architect or how should they be dealing with a non-performing co-founder? These are the kinds of questions that every founder has to deal with in the journey. And it's super difficult for you to go and look at a YouTube video or go to a hundred cohort-based programs to learn about it. So that's where, as part of this SaaS startup co-creation model-we bring together exactly those three core components.

To recap, first do we achieve the product-market fit quickly? Second, do we really think about how you be fundraise ready? Third, we provide long-term mentorship and advisory.

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Interested in starting your co-creation journey with us? Head on to product10x.com and find out how we can help you.

About the Author: Suresh Madhuvarsu is a serial entrepreneur and investor. He is the Managing Partner of Product10x Accelerator, a SaaS accelerator that helps founders build and launch successful startups. He is also the Co-Founder and CEO of Salestable, a purpose-built sales readiness platform for SMBs.

Suresh has over 20 years of experience in the technology/SaaS industry. He is a 4x founder with 2 exits. He is also an active angel investor and mentor to early-stage startups. Suresh is passionate about helping entrepreneurs build successful businesses. He believes that technology can be used to solve real-world problems and improve people's lives.

About Product10x: Product10x is a SaaS accelerator that helps founders build and launch successful startups. The accelerator is run by experienced operating partners who have "been there and done that." Product10x provides founders with mentorship, advisory, and access to a network of investors and partners. The accelerator focuses on Product Led Growth (PLG), Sales readiness, and Fundraise readiness, helping founders all the way from product to go-to-market.