Continuing the topic of market valuations. We often hear that you shouldn't enter a market smaller than a billion. That it's too small for a startup and not worth looking at. This is usually said by venture investors, and they got this number from the internet, and the authors online pulled it out of thin air, where the authoritative Paul Graham wrote it just to have a viral headline. I can prove this by questioning every component of this number and showing that there is no truth in it. Shall we start?

Volume - the procurement specialists in our company taught me how to properly evaluate criteria for tenders by asking a simple question for each of my requirements: what if it's 1% less/more, then it doesn't work? How was that determined? Recently at an event, I asked the person who voiced this thesis: what if the market volume is not 1 billion, but 950 million? The investor agreed, I lowered it further, he agreed, and we got down to 800, then he stopped liking my game and said that's it, lower is not possible. But you'll agree we immediately reduced the requirement by 20%.

Profitability - it can range from 80% to 2-3% in different business areas. Let's try to compare this on a billion-dollar market - the figure comes out roughly from 20 to 800 million. Too wide a range for precise determination.

Risks - it's one thing to invest in an existing energy company, and another to invest in a memecoin by a young guy with no audience from the suburbs of Voronezh. In the first case, the risk is more about getting a small profit, while in the second, you could lose all your money and reputation, and maybe even your freedom.

Investment size - we can enter a billion-dollar market and write a check for 200 million, or we can enter a half-billion market and write a check for 50 million. This might even be the same market share and margin. In this case, I would choose the second option, because as an investor, I would split 200 million into 4 startups, and that would be a less risky strategy.

How much does the investor want to earn? - you can earn 20x by investing a million rubles in a startup, or you can invest 10 million rubles and take 200 million. These are still markets much, much smaller than 1 billion dollars. There are funds that indeed have a minimum check of 10-40 million dollars; for them, a billion-dollar market is the only chance to get 5x-10x on an investment. But there are also many investors who give 1-2 million rubles; for them, a million-dollar market already looks quite profitable.