Tim Koschella: “You shouldn’t be intimated of investors. Don’t listen and follow their advice too much but rather follow your own agenda. Only founders know their product and market to the extent to lead the way.”
(Featured Image: Tim Koschella (middle) and the AppLift management team.)
From Business Graduate to Serial Entrepreneur
Tim Koschella is a true serial entrepreneur. He founded his first company (e-learning video platform Lecturio) in 2008 and has been involved in the startup world ever since. As a founding partner of Berlin-based HitFox Group and co-founder & CEO of AppLift, Tim is a true advertising and online marketing expert who has by now worked with 500+ app companies to acquire users for their apps. He is passionate about international mobile and online performance marketing (CPI, CPL, CPA, CPE) with a particular focus on the mobile and programmatic sector. It is his goal to enable more efficient and beautiful mobile ad experiences for publishers, users and advertisers alike through AdTech products in the mobile ecosystem.
The HitFox Group is a fast-growing platform for entrepreneurship. Its team builds digital companies together with exceptional entrepreneurs on a global scale. Its overall approach is to transform selected high-growth markets by building highly synergetic company clusters within them while each portfolio companies remains independently focused and fast. The company’s announced growth markets are Digital Advertising, Big Data and FinTech.
AppLift was one of the first HitFox ventures and by now is a leading mobile ad tech company that empowers mobile app advertisers to take control of every stage of the app marketing lifecycle. AppLift’s programmatic platform, DataLift 360, enables advertisers to launch their apps as well as grow and retain quality users from one interface.
Tim Koschella on Startup Notes
In this episode, Tim shares the the learnings of his path as an entrepreneur so far, talks about bad investor advice, emphasises on being patient when it comes to hiring the right people and also talks about his companies AppLift and HitFox Group in more detail.
In our conversation, Tim shares his view that mobile apps are still here to stay and will not be pushed out of the market by voice recognition or chatbots. Moreover, he emphasises that you should not save on travel costs when you have teams in multiple office locations as a strong internal communication is a key to success.
This is the complete list of topics that we cover in our episode with one of Germany’s most successful serial entrepreneurs and AdTech experts:
[01:36 – 02:13] On the distinction between work and private life when being an entrepreneur
[02:14 – 03:13] On the milestones of his career from graduating university until now
[03:14 – 05:45] The key learnings during the different milestones of his career so far
[05:46 – 08:07] On getting and following advice by investors
[08:08 – 09:36] The learnings from founding HitFox Group
[09:37 – 11:14] On AppLift’s business and its current challenges
[11:15 – 13:01] The ‘secret sauce’ of managing offices in 9 different locations
[13:02 – 14:53] On the goals for AppLift regarding growth and exit opportunities
[14:54 – 16:58] On the trends and future of mobile platforms
[16:59 – 17:54] What he would do differently when starting a new company again
[17:55 – 19:23] His best advice for first-time founders
[19:24 – 20:21] Open job positions at AppLift
[20:22 – 21:34] How applicants can ‘wow’ him during the hiring process
Podcast Host: Emil
If you want to get more insights from other Berlin-based incubators and serial entrepreneurs, make sure to also listen to our podcast interview with Uwe Horstmann (former Managing Director of Rocket Internet and one of the Founding Partners of Project A) and our episode with Benedikt Franke (former Head of HR of Rocket Internet, COO of Groupon UK and Founder of Helpling).
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