esi: Who are you, what do you do and what makes you an expert on your start-upcountry?
Ian: I have founded and curated various start-up initiatives in Poland, especially in Krakow, where I live. For example, I started the Binkplus.pl business incubator, which is assisting founders and start-up teams to develop lean start-up models and focus on international expansion possibilities. Also, I brought the Global Students Entrepreneur Awards (GSEA) to Poland. The GSEA Program is the premier award for students that own and run businesses while attending a high school, college or university. Further, I had the chance to be associated with Steve Blank and Bob Dorf and to establish a blog, to further enhance and educate the Polish start-up community regarding Lean Start-up methodologies and practices. It is called the Startup Manual Poland.
esi: What is cool about your start-upcountry, what inspires you and keeps you thriving?
Ian: What keeps me thriving is that I am a serial entrepreneur myself and have started over 25 companies. I am actively connected to the start-up scene in Krakow and I try to help upcoming entrepreneurs with my experience. I have been through all the highs and lows of companies that I built, now I want to give back to the community and connect them internationally. It’s my passion. Also, Krakow is a close-knit community. Everyone knows everybody. And this creates a nice buzz, when everyone tries to help each other. I see potential especially with the highly educated students here, which often work part-time at one of the many outsourcing companies in the region. Many of them start companies, which then could apply for the Global Students Enterpreneur Award. For me, it is a unique hub for entrepreneurship.
esi: What makes you shake your head about your start-upcountry, what needs to be improved?
Ian: We need more support from government and large corporations like banks and financing companies. We do not have enough seed money because early stage investors are lacking. In fact, it is just myself and a couple of others. We wish there would be more Business angels, who commit to help start-ups qualify their ideas by giving up to 3.000 EUR. Those people should also become mentors to help start-ups develop a first prototype. Unfortunately, also the state does not offer adequate funding. There are a few programs, but they have criteria, that are too high. To me it seems they are looking for a chicken that lays the golden egg. This approach is not supportive, and it kills new ideas very quickly.
esi: What’s some cool fact we are likely not to know about your start-upcountry?
Ian: Two start-ups from Krakow have gone through the Y-Combinator program and one of them raised 3.1 Mio. USD in seed money. I find this exciting, because I do not think many other cities can say that about themselves.
esi: Thank you for the interview.
About the interviewpartner: Bild: Ian Scarffe.jpg
Ian Scarffe started a blog in association with Steve Blank, is helping to spread the lean start-up method in Poland and is founder of the Binkplus incubator.
