From nothing to something, creativity or innovation creates values. There are intrinsic value in a creative work or innovative device itself, satisfying the author's or inventor's intellectual venture during the creative or innovative process. There is also extrinsic value that a creative work or innovative device can command in monetary terms, or the accumulation of creative works or innovative devices might be exceptionally recognized by certain authentic awarding bodies.
But how can a creator or an innovator transforms a creative or innovative process into a successful business? For startups, they often have to go through multiple series of financing as the value of their businesses increase when there is proof of concept, growth of customers and likelihood of success. For example, when I first began creating texts, writing songs and producing music videos aiming at transforming myself into a copyright content provider, I should have needed some seed or angel funding, but for my keeping the costs low and spending my savings.
Having got the early stage investment, startups generally need their first round of financing by exchanging values eg offering preferred shares to venture capitalists for their cash, to cover startups' cost structure in delivering eg innovative devices, to the market (Series A). When recurrent revenue streams have been generated, startups would need to scale up by challenging their competitors to get a larger market share, or by nurturing a new market, resulting in the need for another round of funding from venture capitalists that support them if they are competitive, have realistic revenue forecasts and intellectual property (Series B). When startups' business models succeed in the market, they would have to expand to capture or create an even bigger market share by getting the last round of funding before going public (Series C).
External funding support is crucial to startups during their innovative or creative processes, in launching key activities such as marketing and in growing their businesses throughout Series ABC. I have been experimenting my low-cost, low-risk and high-performance business model in providing copyright contents and believe that I do not need any Series A funding, But I would need Series B funding when my stuff is being sold in the market and getting profitable, and Series C funding before letting my successful business go public!