Is it your idea or your industry?

We often come across entrepreneurs who have a business idea they wish to execute whether it’s something they had read about or see an existing business and think it’s something they would like to run.  However when it comes to execution and even fundraising from various local and regional angel investors, venture capitalists or existing business startup funds they are often rejected.  At times it’s related to lack of team knowledge, lack of proper financial planning and modeling or even market entry; but it can sometimes go beyond your idea or your plans, sometimes it’s just the industry.

Despite having a proven business model, the team and the technology, it can be difficult to get funded, so we have made a list of various industries we have seen our past clients fail to receive funding due to the following industry reasons.

In the part we have worked with clients who have successfully received funding from various local funds such as Khalifa Fund, as well as notable angel investors and VCs; however this is not about them, this is about the others who have failed to receive funding for various reasons.

We compiled a list of reasons for their rejections before they came to us.  At their heart one can see it is a lack of innovation or original concepts that is often a criteria for business ideas to become funded.  The vision plays a large role.

The above table is from various sources and experience we have within the Dubai, Abu Dhabi and UAE market.  Depending on where your market and the time you are launching market conditions can change.