4 weeks have passed at BE9, which means we have reached half-time of the team building phase and one third of the form period is over. Time is running. We have to become real. Again I am reflecting by thinking back to my time as a rower.

Every sport has a pre-season time at some point during the year. In rowing the cold winter months when ice is covering our beloved water is pre-season. During these months we spend endless hours on the rowing machine and in the weight lifting room. Athletes see their own progress, how they get faster, stronger and more enduring. This preparation time is crucial for success during the season as it builds the physical fundament. However there is one big unknown during that time, no matter how fast or strong they become, they don’t know how that compares to all the other rowers until the season starts. 

In the first weeks at EF, my co-founder Amine and I did research around application performance monitoring and observability in web3, started customer exploration and gathered data points to test our initial hypotheses. We were able to build up a first fundament of what the market needs are and our startup idea might look like. However, it was hard to get more insights from a wider audience without becoming more tangible. We somehow had to get out of our training room and out on the water where we could face the overall market.

Have you ever wondered how rowing teams move around a country or even continent to compete at regattas? The whole team has to get the boats ready for transportation, an action called rigging, then mount the boat hulls and store the equipment safely on a trailer. Once the team arrives at the regatta venue this process happens in reverse order to get the boats ready for rowing again. It is always super time consuming and I don’t know anyone who enjoys it, but it is a necessity. Once the transportation preparation is done, usually there is an atmosphere of excitement as it signals that we are ready to hit the road. This excitement is especially noticeable for the very first regatta of the season where nobody knows what to expect. The earlier the athletes are in their rowing career the more this holds true. 

4 weeks have passed at BE9, which means we have reached half-time of the team building phase and one third of the form period is over. Time is running. We have to become real. Again I am reflecting by thinking back to my time as a rower.

Every sport has a pre-season time at some point during the year. In rowing the cold winter months when ice is covering our beloved water is pre-season. During these months we spend endless hours on the rowing machine and in the weight lifting room. Athletes see their own progress, how they get faster, stronger and more enduring. This preparation time is crucial for success during the season as it builds the physical fundament. However there is one big unknown during that time, no matter how fast or strong they become, they don’t know how that compares to all the other rowers until the season starts. 

In the first weeks at EF, my co-founder Amine and I did research around application performance monitoring and observability in web3, started customer exploration and gathered data points to test our initial hypotheses. We were able to build up a first fundament of what the market needs are and our startup idea might look like. However, it was hard to get more insights from a wider audience without becoming more tangible. We somehow had to get out of our training room and out on the water where we could face the overall market.

Have you ever wondered how rowing teams move around a country or even continent to compete at regattas? The whole team has to get the boats ready for transportation, an action called rigging, then mount the boat hulls and store the equipment safely on a trailer. Once the team arrives at the regatta venue this process happens in reverse order to get the boats ready for rowing again. It is always super time consuming and I don’t know anyone who enjoys it, but it is a necessity. Once the transportation preparation is done, usually there is an atmosphere of excitement as it signals that we are ready to hit the road. This excitement is especially noticeable for the very first regatta of the season where nobody knows what to expect. The earlier the athletes are in their rowing career the more this holds true.