Originally published on 02/01/2026
Dear reader,
Happy New Year! May it bring health, prosperity, and geopolitical appeasement.
We cashed in another €10K investment right before 2025 ended, bringing total raised to a little over €110K. The RO’s seed round is now closed (for real this time). In a couple of weeks, I’ll be meeting with Bpifrance, France’s public investment bank, about their various debt offerings.
While not judicious to raise debt before MRR (ie: predictable revenue) ramps up, it’s never too early to foster a relationship with a bank that extends concessional loans. In the RO’s context, a subscription-based (ie: recurring) business model lends itself well to debt financing.
I’m satisfied with how much equity I gave up during the seed round (<10%). The founder maintaining majority equity ownership is crucial for a publication. Losing majority ownership would rob me of the RO’s editorial independence. Intelligently leveraging debt could be a way to meet our capital needs while retaining that prized equity.
Our need for debt isn’t immediate, so I have the luxury of intently understanding the space, appraising different options, and thinking them through. Doing so in the comfort of a long runway will yield clearer reflections than if I were to do so when we were out of cash.
Before diving into the RO’s 2026 strategy, there are two outstanding updates I’d like to share.
The RO’s first, full-time team member
I’m buzzing to announce that Aakash Athawasya will soon become the RO’s first full-time employee. Aakash cold DM’d me a couple of months ago, inquiring about the RO. A fruitful few months later, we both wanted to cement this relationship. Aakash and I share similar interests: writing first, combined with the broader business challenge of building a publication. Aakash started his own crypto publication, Doodhwalla, a few years ago. His founder spirit is immensely valuable to the embryonic enterprise that the RO is.
As a one-man band, I’ve dabbled in all aspects of the RO (writing, growth, marketing, sales, operations…). Aakash will hold a similar mandate. Common startup lore would balk at this: early team members should be complementary, not similar. But the most valuable business lesson I’ve learned is that the best recipe is your recipe. The RO has gone from 0 to 0.5 thanks to me doing a bit of everything. Onboarding someone with uncanny similarities to me will hopefully get us from 0.5 to 1. We’ll be doing the “same things”, but those “same things” have been working and I wish to multiply them.
Now that our media conglomerate has grown headcount to a grand total of two, I felt compelled to write down our company culture. The centrality of company culture is something I was initially skeptical of at first, but have since become radically convinced of. There is nothing more important for a company (ie: a group of humans) to push in the same direction. Culture is the glue that allows companies to do so. Even if it’s just two of us, lacking that glue would be catastrophic.
Below are the salient RO culture points:
Leniency is the highest form of condescension. Therefore, we are respectfully demanding.
Private and professional lives are two distinct entities. They are treated as such.
We operate on trust, which yields personal autonomy. Anything that erodes trust erodes personal autonomy.
We have a strong vision but remain imperfect human beings. Leadership expects to be challenged.
We build diligently, cautiously, mindfully. We think in decades, not quarters.
I would add that the RO believes in long, uninterrupted work. I abhor the culture of urgency and consistent notifications that is so prevalent in startups. We are writers and long-term builders. We operate on a different OS: meticulous work, unfailing consistency, and patience. Our product is the result of original thought and refined writing. This necessitates deep, focused work and adequate rest.
In the tritest way I can put it, we are marathon runners, not sprinters.
Selling our first university subscription
In December, we received confirmation that a respected MBA program was buying 50 annual RO subscriptions for their MBA students.
This vindicates three things.
First, the quality of our writing. Having an academic institution pay for the RO’s writing is an undeniable vote of confidence in its quality.
Second, the uniqueness of our writing. We went through a long trial period before sealing the deal. During that time, I spoke to the MBA students that were reading us. A consistent comment recurred: the RO is unique. We cover topics and regions with a sense of detail no other publication offers. For these readers, the RO wrote about something they were passionate about (non-US startups) for which they previously lacked any quality reading resources.
This delta between non-US startup interest versus availability of resources covering non-US startups likely exists in MBA programs around the world. Attending to that demand and commercially capitalizing on it will be a key priority.
Third, the broad appeal of our writing. Our paid subscribers now include (amongst others) an MBA program, a UK-based VC, an African VC network, and a Series C founder in the Philippines. As I’ve always preached, the RO’s editorial thesis (an analytical publication covering the global startup scene) appeals to a humongous, growing, silent TAM which we’re just starting to serve.
2026 strategy
The RO’s success hinges on us doing two things very well: writing articles and selling subscriptions. Our 2026 strategy is to get better at both.
Here’s how we shall proceed.
Writing better articles
Aakash and I will continue writing the long-form interviews that the RO is known for. We will extend beyond founder interviews to include other relevant actors (VCs, regulators, operators, academics…). This should give readers more vantage points, painting a more holistic view of the sector they pay us to cover.
Within these interviews, we’d like to improve the quality of our writing (an evergreen effort) and refine our graphic design (producing clean, proprietary RO infographics to supplement our writing).
These interviews are the RO’s spinal cord. On top of them, we’ve started commissioning longer-form, investigative type articles from freelance writers. The two topics we’ve commissioned for January are a deep-dive into the European VC space (and why they should stop trying to be American) as well as a deep-dive into the African EV startup space. Aakash and I might also try our hand at our own investigative pieces. This should make us better editors for the articles we commission.
We’re aiming to publish two articles a week, mixing interviews with longer-form.
Selling more subscriptions
First, we will be introducing a subscription plan in January. Our previous, annual-only plan, locked out too many potential readers and that was a shame. We will also allow readers to subscribe to a free version, through which they will receive summaries of new articles. If you’d like to join the waitlist for our €9/month subscription, you can do so here.
This will open up tons of new construction sites: analyzing website traffic, improving conversion from free to paid, ambassador and referral programs… We’ve started work with a freelancer on these topics, which I’m hoping I can introduce you to soon.
Second, we will be pursuing more university subscriptions. Our modus operandi will be similar to how we sold our first university subscription: open a free trial, circulate the resource within the student body, gather testimonials, and negotiate a university-wide annual subscription. We’ll focus on MBA programs.
Aakash will sell to MBA programs in the proverbial East and I will sell to MBA programs in the proverbial West. There’s a bunch of stuff we’d love to test during the trial period (case study competitions, private events…). If you work or attend an academic institution that would like to purchase an RO subscription, DM me on LinkedIn.
Concluding thoughts
I’ve been writing the Realistic Optimist for over four years. I’ve always been quite steadfast in my vision. I did almost quit though, once. At around the two year mark. I was quite despaired that the publication still wasn’t taking off despite me spending over 24 months working on it and recently becoming full-time. I was getting (at first glance) similar results from being full-time as when I was part-time. That was dispiriting.
Now that I’ve dug myself out of that hole, maybe I can offer a few thoughts of solace to anyone in a similar situation.
Your vision will always vastly exceed your current situation. This will create internal frustration, compounded by your entourage quizzically wondering what the hell you’re doing. Some will believe in you blindly. The most damaging type are entourage members steering you back to safety, to the well-trodden path. This is often done with good intentions, which makes it all the more dangerous because it “sounds right”. But if you believe in what you’re building, that advice is unequivocally wrong. Other entourage members will believe in you early but will start to worry once the initial excitement wears off, you’re in the mud, and your project hasn’t taken off.
This, dear reader, is the most crucial point of your journey. This “valley of death” is a well-known concept in company building. I almost quit in the dead middle of it. Two things helped me hang on.
Early, non-family supporters: Having people you don’t know be enthusiastic about what you’re building is a superpower. These people don’t care about you as a person. That’s great. They have no other reason to praise your work other than the work being objectively good. If you have that, in whatever quantity, you can expect there to be more. You’ve got to hang on until those supporters multiply.
Early, commercial validation: People that I didn’t know were paying to read The Realistic Optimist. I was making a ridiculously low amount, probably around €300 per month. To the outside observer, well-intentioned or not, that often looks like a failing business. As a founder, you have to operate a mental 180. I knew that the tiny pool of paid subscribers was the petri dish of what the RO’s real potential was. If 30 people I didn’t know bought subscriptions, there was a very, very high statistical probability that 3,000 more could. All I had to do was find them. In a world of 8 billion people, the likelihood that I’d created something that only 30, specific people in the world find value was infinitesimally low.
To founders, here’s how I’d resume my advice: use the project’s early excitement to garner validation (preferably commercial) from people you don’t know. Hang on to that precious validation during the valley of death and keep pushing. Stubbornly. It’s counter-productive to over-rationalize during this period, because the most “logical” thing to do is quit.
Think: “I provide value for 10 people. That means ~10,000 people will also find value. I have to keep pushing until I find them.” If you can build a financial cushion during that period (part-time consulting is a good one), that will extend your endurance and likelihood of emerging from the valley of death. This a tired truism, but simply not quitting exponentially increases your chances of success. Regardless of how bleak your current situation is.
The Realistic Optimist is out of the valley of death. Nowhere near self-sustaining growth yet, but my propensity to quit has dropped below 0. You’d have to pay me to stop.
I want to thank my own entourage, who are the overwhelming reason I’m able to do any of this. Most offered nothing but wholehearted support. Rarely did anyone steer me back to safety. I don’t know if this is because they knew it would work, or because they knew how damaging such advice could be during tough times. Whatever the reason: thank you.
Until next time,
Tim