A highly optimistic funding stage where an enterprise consists of nothing more than an ambitious slide deck, a shared workspace subscription, and a mountain of personal debt.
What they actually mean
We have no product, no customers, and very little time before the rent is due.
Heard in the wild
We are currently raising our pre-seed round to help us build the minimum viable prototype.
A euphemism for being drastically understaffed and poorly funded, successfully rebranded as an admirable display of agile discipline.
"We're running lean ahead of our Series A, so everyone is pitching in on customer support."
Translation
"We can't afford to pay you overtime, but we do have a ping-pong table."
A precarious structural vulnerability wherein an entire business model relies entirely on a single employee who is the only one who knows how the legacy spreadsheet works.
We have a slight key-person dependency on Barnaby, who is currently on a three-week tech detox in the Andes.
Translation
If Barnaby gets hit by a bus, we will have to wind up the company.
A venture that generates just enough revenue to cover its basic operating costs, surviving in a permanent state of suspended animation where it can neither scale up nor comfortably die.
"We have completely run out of funding, but our minor consulting gigs keep us ticking along as a zombie company."
Translation
"We are too tired to innovate, but too polite to declare bankruptcy."