Extreme Entrepreneurs is back!

Last year, we launched Extreme Entrepreneurs, a program designed to inspire high potential founders through exposure to world-class people, ideas and practices. Buoyed by the response, EE2019 is back! In Delhi this year, running six weeks September—October, accepting startup applications at EE.lsvp.com until Aug 15th.

What is Extreme Entrepreneurs?

6 week, once a week ‘Testy Tuesdays’, no strings attached program designed to maximise learning while still running your startup:

Mornings: Masterclasses with startup top guns (we mean real top guns! 2018 saw John Thompson, Chairman Microsoft; Dheeraj Pandey, founder Nutanix; Alex Chung, founder Giphy; Anu Hariharan, partner Y Combinator; Jeremy Liew, seed investor Snapchat)

Afternoons: 1:1 coaching with a Lightspeed Partner. Those decades of Lightspeed global experience at work for you!

Evenings: fun, rock and roll cocktails, meet the community, be an insider

‘I left EE feeling more ambitious and confident’ – an outsider

Exposure is like dynamite for the curious mind. For a founder, it can shape ambitions, open minds to possibility and ignite new ideas in unimaginable ways.

On the last day of EE 2018, came the most powerful moment for me. One founder – an outsider to top engineering or business schools, having gone through pivots, 30+ years old – said ‘I feel more confident than before. And my ambitions are way bigger than few weeks ago’. This is why we do EE! To inspire, to bring the world’s best mentorship and ideas – what my Partner calls ‘levelling the playing field’ – for deserving founders that may have begun their journeys as outsiders.

Paying it forward

All Lightspeed Partners were founders or operators before. Many of us started our journeys as outsiders – heck I was just a doctor trying to fix broken bodies before starting my first business! – and had no reason to be successful. Many founders, investors and battle scarred operators helped open doors, showed us the right way, inspired us to dream bigger. EE is our way of paying it forward.

EE is a learning program that is zero-equity, geography agnostic and open to community

We commonly get asked “Why does EE not fund startups?”, “ I’m not from Delhi-Bangalore-Mumbai, can I still apply?”, “Why is there no demo-day?”

This brings us to the core design principles we believe in:

* The ONLY filter for EE is whether the participants will benefit from, and makethe most of the opportunity. No idea is too small, no founder is too early.The moment a program becomes about funding, selection criteria changes from ‘who will benefit most’ to ‘who meets our investment bar’. When that happens, the magic of running a program to empower and inspire outsiders evaporates.

* Zero equity: Remember all the people who helped Lightspeed Partners start companies? They all helped with no expectations of a return. That’s it! This is a love-project for us – we want to inspire talented founders, we love building companies – so we won’t take any equity.

* Learning (not a funding) program: EE is a place where founders can be open and vulnerable, ask the hard questions about their business, get pushed on needle moving issues. All without being judged through an investment lens. This transformation and growth is a non-linear process. Nothing wrong with fund-raising or demo days! But we don’t want that to come in the way of first principles learning.

* Open to community: We believe that it takes the whole village to raise an entrepreneur! In 2018, peers from Saif, Accel, YC, Matrix, Nexus, DST, Sequoia and many others raised a toast to the EE entrepreneurs, shared experiences and built new relationships. This year again, EE will welcome investors, media, advisors to join our community events and get to know the teams.

* Geography agnostic: 450+ teams from 45+ cities applied to EE 2018. We will continue to invite teams from all corners of India and SEA, and if location or logistics come in the way of participation, we will find a way to problem solve.

So go forth and apply! Sep 03-Oct 08. Applications live till 15th August.