The Exchanges

Q level of professionalism and that preparation can really be the difference between, uh, Successful acquisition and no acquisition. So, uh, good job on that. I guess my next question would be, um, what was your like impression of acquire? Like you, you listed on acquire, um, how many NDAs did you get? Like, tell me about just kind of the overall, you know, experience where you found the initial buyer.

A Yeah. Um, so I don't remember exactly how many NDAs we got, but at least a few dozen, I'd say probably in the thirty-ish, 30 to forty-ish range, um, and, you know, had conversations with about maybe 20% of them afterwards, um, who were interested, uh, and then, um, you know, deeper conversations with the buyer that we ultimately went with, and then we also had another buyer, um, who was interested that we met outside of the platform, someone that we had been talking to before, Beforehand, um, who was sort of a larger player who had raised a fund, uh, solely looking to purchase Health and wellness type products like ours. Um, so, you know, ultimately it came down to sort of fire that we went with and also this, this other buyer that was off platform. Um, we decided to go with the buyer on acquired because they were able to make an all cash offer. Um, the other buyer wanted to do sort of a mix of stock and earn outs, um, which just made it a little bit more messy. And, uh, we were looking for something A little bit more clean, uh, which is what we found, um, with Byron acquired. Um, the diligence process was, uh, about a month. And then also, uh, they, we also went into exclusivity with them for deeper diligence, um, where we didn't talk to, uh, any other buyers. Um, so I think from when we joined the platform, we got few NDAs and conversations over a couple of weeks. Uh, did a b…

AI assessment note: “probably in the thirty-ish, 30 to forty-ish range”

Q Nice. Tell me about, um, how did you get your first customers? What sort of, like, marketing strategies were you using? Um, how did you get this thing off the ground?

A Yeah, um, the first ones mostly were through organic social, um, so, uh, I had never used TikTok. Uh, my partners had never used it either until we started Moxa, but, We had heard that, you know, TikTok was a great way to showcase, um, and also educate people on interesting topics. I had thought that it was just dance videos for teenagers, um, but clearly, uh, there was such a larger market there that I wasn't aware of, and I think the stat that sort of convinced me over was, you know, like, 50% of people using TikTok were over the ages of, I think, 23 or 25 or something like that. Um, so then, uh, because our product required a bit of education, We thought that it would be a good platform, uh, at least in short form video to teach people, uh, how active pressure works and some of the benefits of it. Um, and, you know, I think we were able to capture a little bit of the wave up from COVID and people downloading, uh, social media more and downloading TikTok more, but we had a few videos go viral, um, which helped, uh, get some demand and downloads for our app.

AI assessment note: “the first ones mostly were through organic social, um, so, uh, I had never used TikTok.”

Q shift over towards, you know, a new paradigm of whatever sort of technology or service you're offering. Yeah. But more on that, Acquisition. Um, now I'm wondering, okay, so you found, sounds like the app was performing really well in one region. You found a buyer in that region as well. Um, how did you prepare for the acquisition? How did you, um, get ready to talk to potential buyers?

A Yeah. Um, so I think a few things. So I had worked in, uh, finance before and had gone through a lot of deals and structures and, you know, know what a data room needs to look like. What are the typical asks of, um, potential buyers, uh, granting them access to things? So a lot of it was, um, making sure that we had sort of our books in order, also making sure that we had, um, simple analyses, uh, that were customary for a mobile app or a consumer mobile app like ours, handy and ready, so we weren't scrambling for, um, you know, when they would ask for these types of things. Um, that was mostly it, um, prepping, like, a few teaser docs, um, General docs, financials, uh, you know, sort of charts and a deeper look into retention, cohort retention. All those things, um, were sort of generally prepped before, uh, we went on the platform since we knew a lot of buyers would, would ask for these types of, uh, materials.

AI assessment note: “prepping, like, a few teaser docs, um, General docs, financials”

Q Um, I guess, you know, um, if you had just a few tips for people, other founders that might be looking to sell their startup on Acquire, what, what maybe tips would you give them if you had maybe one or two or three?

A Um, I think if you're looking to sell your business, um, one of the business, or one, one of the most important things I think is to create, uh, Sort of an era of competition, um, that your product is sort of sought after, and there's multiple people interested, um, because I think once that happens, it, um, encourages potential buyers to be a little more serious, to be a little more, um, fast in their response, to be a little more thorough, um, when they know potentially there's, uh, someone else who's also interested in your product, and I mean, that I think inherently is as much as building a good product that people want to buy. Um, but also playing the game a little bit, um, and, uh, sort of making sure potential buyers are aware that, you know, you're not here to just sort of mess around. Um, you're serious about selling the business. There's other parties interested. Um, and you know, if you're interested, you're in, if you're not, you're out because you don't want to waste their time and you don't want them to waste your time. Um, so I think that's probably pretty important to increase the speed of timeline of acquisition and actually get things done. Um, and then I guess the second thing is also really know that you want to sell. Cause I think there were some points when we were like, man, should we keep Pushing on this, um, uh, or going down this angle as we're nearin…

AI assessment note: “one of the most important things I think is to create, uh, Sort of an era of competition”

Q Nice. So you, you, Solved a problem that, you know, you personally experienced, you got customers, it sounded like you had a, a good go to market engine. Um, what made you, um, decide to, to sell the business?

A Yeah. So for Moxa and what we were doing around active pressure, I think there were a few lessons that we learned, um, uh, throughout building the company. And I think one of them is that, um, educating consumers, um, And, uh, sort of hand holding them through the process and teaching them is, uh, not only very time consuming, but also very expensive. So we had gone through an accelerator and had a little bit of pre-seed funding. Um, but what we realized was it was really tough to, um, have a positive LTV to CAC on peer paid advertising. Um, and while we had, I think pretty, a pretty great, um, organic growth engine, uh, It was sort of tough to, um, you know, solely rely on the organic portion, especially since we had taken on some funding, uh, we had to make other channels work. Um, and it was kind of tough for us to make sort of the paycheck work, and I think what we also realized was, uh, at least in the U.S., um, people are used to their habits, and they are a little bit more resistant to change than we had initially thought of, so even though in my mind, um, you know, everyone should be doing natural therapies or should be changing their lifestyle or behavior before they're taking pills, um, that's often not the case because pills Are really effective, um, that they work really fast, and, uh, you feel it almost instantly, um, whereas the side effects may come a little bit …

AI assessment note: “what we realized was it was really tough to, um, have a positive LTV to CAC”

Q Nice. I love these startups. So you, you previously were doing acupuncture, COVID hits, and then I assume you were kind of a light bulb moment. Hey, why don't we shut that? Bring this online.

A Yeah. Yeah. And it was interesting because, um, it was sort of towards the tail end of my last semester, and I was looking for what to do next. Um, so I had been in this mode of thinking of startup ideas, working on different projects, and, uh, this was something a little bit more personal to me. Um, my sister is, uh, or she has a, a PhD in traditional Chinese medicine, so, um, you know, I've sort of grown up in a family of, uh, more natural wellness, and I would say Um, drugs or, you know, over-the-counter drugs or pharmaceutical drugs are sort of a last resort for us, and we tend to use things like natural therapies like acupressure or also even just food and diet to improve outcomes versus, um, you know, popping a, popping a pill, and, uh, you know, I'm always, I think it's always shocking when I tell people this, but I can, I can count on one hand the amount of times I've taken Tylenol or Advil, and people are just like, whoa, um, because I have friends that, you know, take it almost, On a weekly basis, or whenever they drink, or whenever they have any sort of. Sort of ailment. So that sort of philosophy, um, had been something that I had grown up with, and I realized it wasn't really prevalent, at least in the U.S. Um, so this was something to sort of push that mission a bit, um, hopefully get people a little bit healthier, uh, through more natural alternatives.

AI assessment note: “Yeah. Yeah. And it was interesting because, um, it was sort of towards the tail end”