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Naval Ravikant Started 7 Companies Before One Worked

By Naval Ravikant · Mindset & Career · 2 min read

Naval launched 50 projects and failed at almost all of them. Then AngelList hit.

Key Points

Most ventures fail. Naval started seven companies and launched 50 projects before finding product-market fit.
You only need to be right once. One win erases every loss.
Stay on a theme. Hammering the same problem makes you better over time.
Every startup teaches you something. First you learn what not to do. Then who not to do it with. Then when not to do it.

You only have to be right once. It's like your relationships. You only get married to one person.

50 Projects. One Win.

Naval Ravikant built seven companies. Almost all of them failed.

He launched 40 to 50 projects over his career. AngelList was the first one he'd call true product-market-entrepreneur fit.

"Entrepreneurial ventures fail all the time. Most of my companies fail. I've launched about 40 or 50 projects over my career. AngelList is the first one that I would truly say is product-market-entrepreneur fit for me."

The One-Win Rule

Naval's point is dead simple. You don't need a streak. You need one hit.

Think about it like marriage. You don't need to date a hundred people successfully. You need one to work. Same with your career. One set of skills stuck with you. One thing became your life's work. Startups are the same game.

"It's a low hit rate over your career. But you only have to be right once. It's like your relationships. You only get married to one person."

Stay on the Same Problem

Naval says the founders who win don't hop between random ideas. They hammer the same nail for years.

He points to Evan Williams. Blogger. Twitter. Medium. All the same obsession: easy publishing on the web. Williams didn't get lucky. He got better at the same problem. Each attempt made the next one sharper.

"People like Evan Williams are always hammering on the same problem. Micro publishing or easy publishing on the web. He just keeps hammering the same problem so he just gets better and better at it."

The Painful Lesson Ladder

Naval: A lot of it is market timing, and you learn painful lessons.

Your first startup, you do everything wrong. Your second, you do things right but with the wrong people. Your third, you pick the right people and the right approach but the wrong time. Every failure removes one variable from the equation.

"First you do everything wrong. You make a whole set of mistakes your first startup. The second one maybe you do things right but with the wrong people. The third one you might do with the right people in the right way but at the wrong time."

13 Years of Pounding

Naval started his first company at 23. He launched AngelList at 36. That gap is 13 years of grinding with no breakout hit.

Naval: I would do my startup during the day, have my day job, run home at night and brainstorm more startups. I was just in love with it.

"I started my first startup when I was 23. I started AngelList when I was 36. Thirteen years just pounding at startups nonstop. I would do my startup during the day. I would run home at night and brainstorm more startups."