Etsy

Fashion companies are looking to invest in "enabling" startups that help them implement new business models or technologies. Venture capitalists and incubator executives like founders who don't gloss over the challenges they face. Founders should have concrete data on the competition and potential consumers, as well as preliminary results of having tested their idea.

And interestingly, technical expertise is not one of them. If writing code were a science, all developers would pretty much be the same. But it is not. And just like in art, no two developers have the same thinking or perception while working towards the same outcome.

The people who built Etsy dreamed of remaking commerce with their bare hands. Fifteen years later, its sellers are being asked to compete with Amazon.