17 Startup Failure Cases

Many times, we go to see a lot of successful people tell their own experience, rather than to understand a failure experience to useful. This article is to organize a representative of the 17 failure cases, for aspiring entrepreneurs to provide from the company's financial, positioning, team, market, capital, government supervision, user value and other aspects of experience and lessons. A warning for those who want to start a business or are already on the road to entrepreneurship.

1. Billion Tang net

Perhaps you still remember the 2000 Beijing Street appeared large and small billion tang billboard, sentence imitate Yahoo advertising words "Today you are billion tang" also let billion tang scenery for a while. Yi Tang wants to be a comprehensive Internet portal for young Chinese. They define Chinese youth as the "Yellow generation".

Lessons of failure: lack of positioning, too much financing

On the eve of the first dotcom bust in 1999, Tanghaisong, a Harvard Business School MBA, created the billion-Tang company, a "dream Team" consisting of 5 Harvard MBAs and two Chicago University MBAs.

With attractive entrepreneurial plan, billion tang from two well-known U.S. venture capital DFJ, Sevinrosen hands to two period of about 50 million U.S. dollars of financing.

Billion Tang claimed that he is not only an internet company, but also a "life fashion Group", dedicated to the creation and introduction of international advanced Life fashion products through network, retail and wireless services, and fully serve the young people who define the future of China's economy and culture between the 18~35岁 of the so-called "yellow e generation".

Billion Tang network overnight turned out, quickly in the major universities Gongchenglvede, in the country quickly "burn money": In addition to Beijing, Guangzhou, Shenzhen Three to establish branch offices, billion Tang also recruit staff, and in various places to carry out large-scale publicity campaign. At the end of 2000, the Internet's cold winter suddenly, billion tang money burned more than half, still unable to profit. Since then the transformation has not been successful, the 2008 billion Tang company only left empty shell, the former "Dream Team" in the company after burning money have also chosen to flee.

In my opinion, the biggest problem of the billion-tang failure is not positioning. This is also the problem of most internet entrepreneur companies. Pompous, unwilling to sink down to help users solve the actual problem, but the illusion of money can be smashed out of an internet group out. Billion Tang to China's Internet can be said to make no mention of any contribution, perhaps the only contribution is to provide a very failed investment case. It was born with a gold spoon in the nobility, tens of millions of dollars of money in exchange for only a sigh.

Follow-up development:

In May 2009, the etang.com domain name was publicly auctioned for no renewals, and the final bidder was given a 35,000 dollar price.

2. 酷6网

Video site of the year one of the three, Youku, potatoes and cool 6. Among them Youku Koo, and Shanyou are Sohu Department, Potato King is a literary youth. Once in a hurry.

The lesson of failure: The victim of a course battle

In the cool 6 hand bone time of the past year alone, 酷6网 left behind. Founder left, the loss of the year to become big, bloody big layoffs, and then transformed ... Chen Tianqiao resident cool 6 new CEO Shi Yu publicly said: "Cool 6 no longer buy long video copyright, including movies and TV dramas, will focus on the community, UGC (user generated content) and short video. ”

After Shanyou left, grand large-scale clean up the founding team, Chen and shanyou on 酷6网 development strategy arising from the differences surfaced. Chen hope that cool 6 development direction is "video information News", and Shanyou would like to insist on buying genuine copyright "large mode", the final huff.

Video industry has always been known as "burning Money", Shanda has invested nearly 200 million dollars in cool 6, but the grain has not been collected. This is perhaps the most direct reason for the transformation of cool 6. Burned 200 million dollars and ended up in an awkward transition. Management and founder, the idea is different, the enterprise will not have the right direction and end point.

Follow-up development:

Founder Shanyou went to Central Europe became a pioneering mentor, Micro bo name "Old Li Knife", retired from the lake. The fate of Cool 6 is the same as the grand fate of a frog in warm water.

3. Asian Interactive Media:

The Asian interactive Media was established in British Bermuda in July 2004. The Asian interactive media is claiming to be "China's leader in providing a solution for Cross-media TV programs," and its sales revenue is based on television advertising agency business, TVPG (TV Guide) and EPG (Electronic Program Guide) as a supplement.

Lessons of failure: misappropriation of funds leads to delisting

October 2005, the company won the investment of Sequoia Capital.　　After Sequoia Capital, the Asian interactive media has absorbed Japan's famous financial and advertising companies, including Nomura Securities Company of Singapore, Merrill Lynch Japan Securities Company, Japan's largest advertising company, NTT Mobile Communication Company, Japan's largest satellite communications company Jsat, Itochu Itochu, etc. April 2007, Asian Media listed on the Tokyo Stock Exchange, according to its listed "prospectus", 2005 the company's net profit reached 465 million yen (about 30 million yuan), net assets of 1.897 billion yen (about 126 million yuan). But after only one year, it was a dumb way to retreat.

The fuse was due to the Asian interactive media's accounting firm's refusal to issue an audit opinion for its 2007 annual report and to expose the scandal that its CEO, Jianping, embezzled the company's assets. Asian Interactive Media Retreat, so that 11 financial investors at the same time Miss, exit the platform.

Follow-up development:

Company embarrassing retreat, Sequoia Capital founding partner Zhang Fan also resigned.

4. Country E

2000 E-commerce Star Enterprise, once the slogan for one hour distribution home.

The lesson of failure: The market is too advanced

E Country 1 hours to obtain the user praise at the same time also obtained the same many suspicion: "E country 1 hours" brought huge distribution cost, e country still can make money? The more you sell, the more you lose. How long can e-country sustain without the involvement of new funds? Some people simply think that e country 1 hours is only "successful market operation". Some people calculate an account, as long as the order of e-country 10 yuan per pen, you can kill it. The more you sell, the more you lose, and the greater the pressure on the country of E.

In fact, the tragedy of e-country lies in the premature entry into the market before the market matures; In 2000, China was extremely immature in terms of logistics, payment, distribution and even online shopping. Rely on a company to prop up the whole industry chain, Arabian Nights.

Follow-up development: Collapse

5. If the adjacent network

If the adjacent network was founded in 2004, soft silver investment. The goal is to replicate LinkedIn as China's largest business social networking site.

The lesson of failure: The imitation of national conditions

In the 2004-2006 wave of business SNS copy 2 China climax, if the neighbor is still alive. But experienced many twists and turns in the middle, founder Shing two into two out. The site was once laid off and almost closed.

If the neighborhood and other business SNS. Users never come up. At one point, people believed that the so-called six-degree interpersonal relationship theory, in practice, there is no hope of success. An average person could reach Obama by six degrees, but that doesn't mean he can get to know Obama and seek practical help. So the six-degree theory is similar to the Ponzi scheme.

The bigger difference is that the United States is a professional society that respects individual curricula vitae and professional competence. This is the sociological reason for the rise of LinkedIn. China is a social relationship and power determines the economy. If you know the party secretary, will you take the initiative to introduce people to others? What's more, most of the people in China who have wealth and power don't even go to such websites.

Follow-up development:

After the reorganization, the management gained control and now transformed into a headhunter. After the rise of the network.

6. DB Net:

In the June 2003, Zhengli and his friends created 163888 websites, meaning "hair hair on the way". Subsequently, they developed K8 software, 163888 gradually became China's leading network singer gathering place. Xiang Xiang, Yang Xen just wait for Web singers to launch successfully in the website, "Mouse Love Rice" and other network songs rage, so that 163888 of websites reputation, known as "Chinese first music community."

The lesson of failure: to go astray

In October 2004, IDG invested 2 million dollars (it is reported that the final investment is not fully in place), accounting for its 20% stake. 2006, the site registered users reached 12 million. The same year, 163888 won the Alcatel VC 6 million dollar investment, accounting for 12% equity.

June 2007, the site enabled a new name and new domain name: DB network, but the decibel net profit model has not fundamentally changed, relying on selling space and collecting membership fees of the profit model to unsustainable, advertising has become the main source of income.

2009, Zhengli suspected of operating pornographic video chat business arrested, January 2010, the case hearings, Zhengli pleaded guilty. The reasons for Zhengli's involvement in the sex business are unknown.

Follow-up development:

But the decibel net is weakening. The company has always been at a loss, and new investment has not been in place. The last dismal collapse.

7. Blog China

Blog China was the first person to be known as the Chinese Internet xingdong creation. is a banner of the Web2.0 era, and has brought together a group of people's top thinkers. Once claiming to bring Sina down.

The lesson of failure: poor management and neglect of the giant's late-onset advantage.

In 2002, Xingdong created a blog in China, with the site maintaining more than 30% per month over the next 3 years, with the world ranking soaring to over 60. And in 2004 won the Grand founder of Chen and SoftBank rich partner sheep east of the 500,000 dollar angel investment. In September 2005, Xingdong financed $10 million from the famous venture capital company Graniteglobal Ventures, Mobius Venture, SoftBank and Bessemer Venture partner. And sparked a Web2.0 investment spree in China.

Subsequently, "blog China" renamed "Blog Network", and claimed to do blog portal, known as "the world's largest Chinese blog site", but also shouted "one year super Sina, two-year listing" goal. So in a short period of six months, the blog staff from more than 40 people to expand to more than 400 people, allegedly 60%~70% funds are used in personnel wages. And the tens of millions of dollars are quickly squandered in videos, games, shopping, socializing and many other projects. Since then, the blog network has been opened for 3 years, the personnel of the intense turbulence, the high level almost overall loss, and xingdong My CEO position is also replaced by a decision group. By the end of 2006, blog staff had scaled back to more than 40 people who had started to raise capital.

Follow-up development:

At the end of 2006, the blog Power of the portal website represented by Sina has completely surpassed the new vertical website such as blog Net. Then, the blog almost become the standard of any portal site configuration, the portal site easily replicated Xingdong hard to explore and open up the road. Finally Xingdong hometown Yiwu toss E-commerce, now in the industry almost disappeared.

8. Meal No

In the early stages of the meal, there are six or seven Chinese sites similar to Twitter in China, including whether Rice is one of the most fully functional and closest to Twitter. Compared with Twitter, Chinese micro-blogs offer a better choice for most Chinese users who are not accustomed to English.

The lesson of failure: Startups shouldn't touch government-sensitive areas

In the first half of 2009, the number of users of rice surged from around 300,000 in the year to millions.

The same year, June 2, HP became the first company to pay customers, began to get the first income. At the same time, Chen, Ai Weiwei, Liangwendao, Yue, such as a group of cultural celebrities to join, led to the rapid growth of rice.

During the second half of 2009, it was not properly closed by the department concerned, 2010 meal whether the founder Wang in an interview, recall a year ago whether Rice was suddenly shut down said: In order to respond to the Government concerned about the network of speech supervision, Rice was at that time to make a large number of delete stickers, restrictions on sensitive keywords, pause search and other measures. "We've done things that everyone can think of. ”

When the meal is closed, Sina Weibo has a strong rise. And with the strong relationship with the government to star and celebrity strategy to lay the status of the lake. Sina has enough financial and human resources to meet the government's regulatory standards.

Follow-up development:

Wang founder of the United States, and achieved great success, to become the biggest player in the field of group buying. With the support of the pine and the capital, whether the meal in 2011 low-key re-opened, but has been unable to attract attention.

9. Mysee

Mysee is the earliest Peer-to-peer video live research and development technology company, is a video live, on demand, interactive entertainment, wireless value-added services in one of the broadband video entertainment service platform. The company has combined major portals, telecommunications operators for more than 50 domestic and foreign large-scale activities of the webcast.

The lesson of failure: the defeat of vanity

February 2005, Mysee.com founded, Xipei (Weibo) invested 1 million yuan. At the beginning of 2006, a total of 2 million dollars of investments were received from such institutions as the Arctic Light and Cybernaut.

But Mysee burning money too fast, dozens of people, each month to burn more than 1 million yuan, office light decoration will spend more than 1 million yuan, but also spend a lot of money to buy video content. 8 months time, 2 million dollars of investment, exhausted. In addition, as the founder and president of the company, high burning always acquiesced in the media to exaggerate the fact that financing 2 million of dollars into financing 10 million dollars. According to investors, he is most concerned about their own visibility and image, he gave speeches everywhere, to promote the achievement of wealth, but only for their own market, not for the company to do the market. In the eyes of investors, high fuel investors to packaging their own money, and even other uses, but is not used to do business for the company.

Follow-up development:

I personally saw a high burn last time at a mobile internet gathering in 2010. No one knew him at the meeting. North Aurora Harper is said to call on VC industry people not to reinvest and high burning any related businesses. The media always like packaging hero, it is obvious that he has failed in the industry.

10.24 Coupons

24 coupons are from Harvard's Du Yinan. Du Yinan founded 24 coupons before is the famous PE company KKR investment Manager, good at financing. The 24-coupon investor includes the Malaysian Success group, Singapore Vickers Venture Partner and other institutions, with a capital injection of more than 100 million dollars.

Failure Lesson: Management and CEO infighting

After the group buying bubble burst, 24 coupons owe the supplier more than billion. The investor stationed on behalf of KK as COO into the company. After downsizing, profits are already available in some cities. But when the investor intends to continue to inject capital, 24 coupons internal decorum, CEO Du Yinan and the investor represents KK two faction contradictory eruption, each sends the internal mail to denounce. The latter accused the CEO of "stealing" 2 million yuan of corporate property and "Running away" to the United States. The real cause of the outbreak is that the management, under the new injection conditions, asked the CEO to dilute the shares to single-digit numbers, causing the founder dissatisfaction.

Since I know the capital of 24 coupons, I have some knowledge of the situation after the management has intervened. Aside from moral and ethical perspectives, founder Du Yinan, a KKR investment manager, graduated from Harvard and could be fooled into money in the capital circle, but not in terms of management skills and experience. The management is in fact a group of Singaporean investment, and the Singaporean administration is too meticulous, calculated too shrewd, not suitable for the Chinese style of the robin, and finally stimulate and management interests of the distribution of contradictions is not surprising. This can only prove to be at the wrong time a wrong marriage, to divorce and shifty.

Follow-up development:

On October 20, the Group purchase website 24 Coupons announced that the company cannot operate normally, will suspend the group buying business on 20th, the staff all paid long vacation, now enters 24 coupons the website before the dazzling range buys the activity to be replaced by a statement. It is said that the Group F is interested in the acquisition, and the management and Du Yinan are also interested in renegotiating the negotiations.

PPG: died of man-made disasters

PPG,2005 was established in October, and the business model is to sell shirts through the Internet. The concept of light assets and the reduction of circulation links, coupled with the explosion of television, outdoor advertising, quickly let PPG establish market leader status, the "yes! PPG's slogan and Wu confident smile.

The lesson of failure: Founder Money Laundering

$46 million trillion of rounds of financing was shifted in disguise. One of the purposes of entrepreneurship is to make money, but not just to make money, PPG's failure once again proves that in business, people are how important factors.

In the third quarter of 2006, PPG won the first round of 6 million dollar joint investment in TDF and the rich Asia. In April 2007, PPG won a second round of tens of millions of dollars in investment, in addition to the first round of TDF and the collection of rich Asian investment, but also the introduction of the Kaiser China Surplus, it is the largest venture capital fund in the United States.

At the end of 2007, San Shan Investment company beat other competitors and injected more than 30 million dollars into PPG. 2008, PPG Mode appeared where the customer-prudential products, excellent shirt nets, carris, such as dozens of imitators, PPG not only lost the status of the industry boss, lawsuit ridden, senior management diaspora, more outgoing founder Liang Volume fled a said.

PPG failure of the real reason: the founder of the Liang surface is to do e-commerce, but supporting the logistics, warehousing are their own company, or indirectly related to him, he kept to these companies dozen money, investors money disguised as a fee into his own name. The money shifted away, and Liang. From the beginning he was premeditated, prepared to circle the money, he is very smart, diligent, executive power is enough, but the starting point is not pure.

Follow-up development:

PPG closes, Liang in America. Investors finally gave up. Every guest rises, from this ppg disappears in the populace eyeball.

12. Cotton

Cotton Network in November 2010 officially online, its positioning targeting high-end market. Dimensional cotton net products from socks, gradually expanded to underwear, scarves and so on, and then joined the Electric business marketing war, put a lot of money to play advertising.

The lesson of failure: the wrong industry

December 2010, Xiaoping on micro-blog on the cotton, and then on Sina Weibo to the Lin CEO letters, about him to meet and chat.

Only communicated for 20 minutes, Xiaoping decided to give Lin 10 million Yuan Angel investment, become the second largest shareholder of cotton net. The case was legendary in the industry.

From the beginning of this year, the cotton network many times into a crisis, "owe millions of yuan advertising", "cotton-cutting decisive layoffs" and other news often see newspapers. In July this year, the supplier had to collect the debt, but in the period of one months, the cotton still failed to solve the problem, and eventually the warehouse was seized by law enforcement agencies.

Although the socks are consumable goods, but the customer unit price is low, is not suitable for e-commerce. Plus China's high flow costs. This is the wrong industry. Xiaoping Teacher also has the time to make dizzy.

Follow-up development:

The website has been unable to open;

13. Product gathers the net

The product gathers the net on November 10, 2011 The official on-line trial operation, by the original Grand Gold cool CEO Gebin and so on the joint investment creation. Gebin once external said that, including Shanda and other investors 200 million yuan investment support, the goal is one year with Amoy Baoping divided into the world, to achieve the second place in the country, three years after the listing.

Lessons of failure: disrespect for industry rules

January 7, 2012, the news said, Shanda's website of the Electronic Business Network closed. Product Network founder Gebin confirmed that the main reason for the closure of the site is financing is not in place, they do not want to leave a mess, the closure of the site is also no way to

Grand Group January 8 issued a statement pointed out that the grand Gebin to founder of the product of the network has never been invested. The product gathers the net all enterprise behavior to be the product gathers the net and the investor own behavior.

In the age of capital bubbles, anyone can make a big talk, to drive the United States. In fact, it is most important to respect the laws of industry. In addition, Shanda as a family business, not the management of other people's money venture capital, and Shanda such a consortium with the wolf dances, no real progress, is impossible to get the support of the bridge brother.

It is said that the style of the bridge is that I have to enter every field. Just find the right person and give you a sum of money and a period of time. If not, the project is removed. This has caused Shanda to invest in the enterprise generally poor performance. and VCs are not willing to follow the company to invest in the Royal department.

The case of the collection is only a case of the grand system.

Follow-up development:

Grand and Gebin began to separate from each other ght, once to go to court, and finally came to an end.

14. Five minutes

Because of the development of the famous "Happy Farm" "small War" game is well-known.

The lesson of failure: Transformation failure

May 2012, "five minutes" admitted to the failure of the B-round financing, and immediately from the current office of the Yangpu District, the creation of wisdom world to retire.

"Five minutes" of the collapse mainly from internal and external two reasons. Internal cause is the failure of transformation, external causes is inadequate financing.

This April, "five minutes" launched the first HTML5 game, "neighbour War", and its debut mobile phone game "Turtle and Rabbit Run" users show that has exceeded 200,000. On the surface, "five minutes" seems to be in the direction of mobile gaming, but also did not give up the web game. But the limited power of it has committed a long line of mistakes, without concentrating resources on the way. In the past two years, with the development of Weibo and other social networks, the Web-type social networking site has no absolute advantage at home.

In addition, in the Mobile gaming field, competition is more intense than the web game, as long as the Apple store and the Android Market rankings will find that the phone game you sang my debut, each lead only a few days.

Money, "five minutes" to burn a round of funds, hoping to use some kind of business model to attract new VCs. Unfortunately, by happy net with the downhill, transformation seems to see the dawn and still groping in the dark "five minutes" in the face of grim capital, almost no convincing. Compared to a round of financing can talk about ideas, B-round financing is much more realistic. Public data show that "five minutes" has received at least two investments, December 2009 DFJ Investment of 3.5 million U.S. dollars, July 2010 cyberagent United Jaic China Investment, the amount of between 500,000 to 1 million U.S. dollars.

In addition, the five-minute transition failed more because the founders were poorly managed. Founders are college students, no work experience, and financing success, once carried away. Finally, the loss of excellent team members, the transformation of the company can be imagined.

Follow-up development:

It is said to have been dismantled into two companies. Xucheng still lead Kibaki operating Sina Micro game platform, Gao Shao Fei has no development.

15. Push Chart

Push Map Founding team in the Blue Harbor online CEO Wang Feng Investment, the team from 2011 New Year's Day began research and development, one months after the landing of the application store.

The lesson of failure: excessive competition and Matthew effect

The application of photo sharing is the representative of the application of tool class. Instagram and color in the United States, after the birth of the Chinese market in 2011, such as push map, Pushpin, Pat, hand-shot, with the beat, micro-map, friends, Lemancu, Leshing Mody, such as 10 of the balance photo sharing applications. After a year of observation, their status is not ideal.

The push-map team was born earlier in these photo-sharing apps, but Chen Zhongjun founder Frank user growth is not ideal, and picture-sharing applications encounter difficulties from two aspects. The first is that Sina Weibo and micro-mail are now adding photo sharing, the user is a large part of the two streaming, and the second is that China's WiFi hotspots are too small and the flow fee is very high, which creates a big bottleneck for the application of image sharing.

In addition, the promotion cost of mobile applications is increasing. This creates a disadvantage for users, not to mention business models.

Follow-up development:

The push-map team has a strong technical capability and is currently developing new products in order to transform.

16. Street Side

The Foursquare inspired Liu Davei and his friend Yang Yuanhui. When Liu Davei's first start-up in Taiwan failed, he accepted investors ' advice to come to Beijing and Yang Yuanhui to start a new venture to replicate Foursquare in China, the street-side network. Street investors from HTC founder Wang, the background is strong.

The lesson of failure: No unique value for users and merchants

Once the independent blog site in the blog as a portal standard quickly after the decline, the street to represent the independent lbs site will be the same ending, is not in a hurry to make judgments, but the rapid transformation of similar sites, such as muttering the reorganization of the net after the restructuring to imitate the website Pinterest, The royal background of the cutting network at the end of 2011 into the lbs+ E-commerce model, it seems that the simple replication Foursquare in China is not so bright prospects.

Liu Davei had assumed that the main revenue side of the street was brand cooperation. In the early stages of rapid development, the street did win the favor of Starbucks, Starwood, Nike and other partners. But people close to the situation said that even at their peak, the partnership was free and the maximum amount of cooperation was only 5 to 100,000. And even as a new-media adopter, most companies are very ambiguous and conservative in their approach to independent lbs sites, and are often more willing to collaborate with multiple sites to cover a wider audience, which has frustrated the street's desire to sign an exclusive agreement with customers.

The value of virtual check-in is also gradually being questioned. Single badge mode is difficult to maintain the user stickiness, many users of the network registration information once and the Micro-blog Association, it is easy to become "spam information." The real strength of the Cuikulaxiu is Sina, QQ and other industries, such as the fierce attack, when micro-bo, micro-letter will lbs as a free product "standard", which let the street as a representative of the simple attendance of the category of lbs company more worthless.

Follow-up development:

All sorts of realities force the street to rethink positioning. Soon after the streets were founded, they set up another mobile internet company, the fruit of the joint. Although the street still exists, but users have been very rarely used.

17. My friend net

My friend Net December 2010 High-profile On-line, hundreds of artists red congratulations, known as China's largest community E-commerce giant company, known as China's largest internet innovation.

The lesson of failure: the Magic of Chinese style

This is a very magical company in the Shanghai industry. Only China can have such a magical business.

The founder is a rich second generation, the family is said to be XI ' an richest man. The family owns a number of listed companies and has a 5% stake in one of China's best-known private banks. Group assets exceed 120 billion.

When the founder returned from overseas study, he wanted to do the internet. Although his father thought the child was fooling around, he still gave him a lot of money to start his business in Shanghai. First do video website, after unsuccessful. The father thought the child could retrieving back, but the child refused. So the father sent his effective vice-president to Shanghai to persuade him and take over the company matters. Unexpectedly, the assistant to Shanghai, was persuaded by the children, determined to stay in Shanghai, engaged in the great cause of Internet change. The Vice-President persuaded the Group chief to continue to inject capital and mobilize all its resources and relationships throughout the country.

For example, internet companies should have a variety of licences, including video, including payment, are granted from above. All the executive departments in Shanghai are going through a formality. For example, the Jiading government immediately granted a piece of land.

My friend immediately in the whole industry to dig people. From Shanda, Ali has dug thousands of people in double, three times-fold wages, and aims to make the largest community e-commerce, and community gaming companies. In short, all the internet to make money, have to do.

The result is self-evident; after burning a few billion, the final layoffs are transformed.

Follow-up development:

is said to be transformed to do paid