 On Thursday, February 24th, Russian military forces crossed the border into Ukraine and ended a peace that had existed in Europe since World War II. The war in Ukraine has, among many other tragedies, created a massive humanitarian crisis with the millions and millions of Ukrainian citizens that have fled the country in search of safety. For those that have stayed, daily life has been completely upended and their future thrown into uncertainty. But there are still plenty of Ukrainians trying to carve out a living and maintain a sense of normalcy amidst the invasion. Our guest today is Alyona Misko, founder of Fuel Finance, a cloud-based financial service based in Ukraine. Alyona has relocated her headquarters from Kyiv to Lviv in order to avoid the worst of the assault, but she still finds herself being woken up to the sounds of air raid sirens. So listen in to this special episode as we cover everything from what it's like to run a company in a country at war, the decision to stay in Ukraine versus fleeing, and her plans for both the short-term and long-term as the war drags on. Now on to the episode. All right, welcome to the podcast on today's show. We're talking to Alyona from Fuel Finance. Thanks for joining all the way from Ukraine. For people who don't know, what does your company do? Yeah, so we are like a cloud-based financial department for startups. So we do everything like financial planning, call reporting, union economics, and simply help all founders with their finance. And what made you want to start the company? What problem did you see or maybe a bunch of founders that you knew just kept messing this up? And so you were like, there's got to be a better way to do this. I have been like a C4 for more than eight years. So I always saw this problem of managing finance and I always saw how it's complicated for all founders and they simply don't want to do it. And even when you start like your business, you don't want to manage your finance. So you want to do everything but not finance. So that's why I always saw this problem and really problem of very old dates. I think even non-glamorous really finance. And that's why I think that this part should be changed a lot like during the next years. And for the beginning of your company, are you only targeting like who is your ideal customer? Is it SaaS companies that you're helping the most? Is it companies that have a product or somebody that just has like an API so that way you could just plug into their sales data? Yeah, we usually like our product is ideal for early stage startups like seed A-run startups and we now have product for e-commerce, SaaS and services. So only through business models. Okay. Can you give me something that you have found interesting throughout this problem? Maybe something that's easier, like it's easier to connect to the banks than you would have thought. Is it harder? What are some of the challenges that you thought were like impossible that you're realizing are super simple? I think first that I found like when we start our product. I see what like main value of this product is like not getting all these reports and do it manually and everything like that. So main value is that all founders, they simply get all insights already in the way they need it and exactly for their business model and for their stage of development. So that's why like I think our product is very cool for all founders because like you don't need to dive into all these details, how this financial reporting made and what figures I should now see here, what decisions I should make from this data. So you simply get everything already in the way like a ready product from finance and you simply like can use it for your decisions. Do they share this dashboard with their investors? I'm just thinking about it like there are some cases where a startup is what they call default dead, right? And yeah, I think your dashboard would show them that, but if I'm a little bit of a crazy founder, I'm going to go, no, no, no, we're choosing growth at the moment and this is a dumb concept when in reality they could literally be dead. So how does I don't like I think about it like while I understand your customer is a startup founder at the same time, it could probably also be the investor group as a way of managing their portfolio. Yeah, investors like our product is very is also cool because all companies like with which we work and their investors, they really receive all these dashboards and all information and they really like it. And I know that founders, they build more trust relationships with their investors using exactly our product. So yeah, and even like I also already have like experience of easier funding with all our data, which is provided to now a product. Interesting. And does it do anything like, does it automate? Can you input like a cap table? And then there's other features like that, like maybe automating K ones or like allocations. Yeah, cap table also and unit economics also. So and we also have like this plan fact analysis of unit economics and also like planning of your cash flow, like analysis of your plan fact of cash flow, burn rate control. So everything like you need in order to understand what you should do as your business based on data. It feels more like a VC tool to be on it. Like the more I think about it, the more I talk to you, the more I just think about it like as an investor, it would be good for me to have that so I can even guide the founder or make them aware of things that they they might not see. Yeah, it's exactly, exactly this way. All right. So when did you first start the company? Two years and a half. Two years and a half ago. And you've always 19 2019. Yeah. And you've always been in Ukraine before COVID. Since the Russian invasion of Ukraine, I saw somewhere on your your portfolio, your website, that your focus has been generating more U.S. leads and business. Where was your business primarily focused before this? And how has that shift been since then? First, the first like when we only started two years, two years and a half ago, we were focused on Ukrainian market. But already, I think after the one year, after the first year, we already started to focus on other countries, on European countries. And already, like last year, we mostly focused focused on U.S. countries. So, like when the worst started, like we were not focused on Russian market at all. So it was obvious question for us, like after 2014. So Ukrainian and mostly U.S. last year. Prior to all of this, what was like the Ukrainian entrepreneurship scene like? Was it booming? Was it healthy? Were there a lot of entrepreneurs or would you say, you know, not really like you're kind of a crazy person there? I think that all entrepreneurs now in Ukraine are crazy, especially like startup founders. So I even don't imagine, but all my like friends, all my friends, founders, startup founders, they really even grow now. So they volunteer, they help others. They donate to military forces. They relocate their teams. And at the same time, they somehow making their business grow. So it's something very crazy now. I think not only me, but all founders. That is crazy. I mean, are you, are you worried? Like, do you, do you sleep at night? Is there a sense of panic or is it just you're good? Like you're just focused, so focused on the task ahead of you. Last night, I, I hadn't a good sleep because we have many serans here. Like last several nights, you asked about sleeping. And I should say, you know, last night, we, uh, badly because we have much seran, many serans now. And especially during last, uh, today's at night. So that's why it's a little bit crazy when you work like till night. And, uh, after that early in the morning and like at five a.m. or something like that, they start serans. So yeah, it's a little bit complicated last days. What happens when the sirens go off? Do you guys have to go somewhere? Or is it just like, watch out? There might be some, some, yeah. Yeah. So we, uh, like at night, we simply like wake up and try to go simply in more safe place in the flat. So not, not near windows. Are they targeting Western Ukraine right now? Cause I know that the war has shifted to largely Eastern Ukraine with the offensive in Donbass. And I know that for the most part they've pulled out of Kiev and, and everything, uh, west of there, but like, have there been strikes near you? Yeah. So they started to focus also on Western Ukraine. So, uh, it's like, uh, maybe you already heard, but yesterday five bombs were already in Lviv and even like eight people died. So, uh, we understand that like Russians, uh, they have a very crazy idea, uh, now to win this war till nine May. And nine May, it's like the day of victory in the second world war. And the second situation that, uh, we have like also holiday on, uh, Sunday, it's like Easter holiday. Yes. And, uh, they also like have, uh, now all Russians have another goal to make everything before this day. I, we don't know why, but that's why this week. And, uh, we're seeing that several next weeks, they will be harder than previous. Now, as far as like the workforce in Ukraine goes right now, I know that men 18 to 60 years old are not allowed to leave the country. Are they being drafted into the military? Like all of the, the men who work for fuel finance, are they being charged to take up the fight and join the military, or are people still able to kind of conduct business as best they can? Now, like, uh, joining military forces, it's usually depends, uh, of your willingness to do it. So we have one team member who decided to join military forces, but we don't have like the situation when everyone like should join military forces. No, they, first of all, they take people with experience. And, uh, only after that, uh, so we have this several, several stages of globalization. And that's why now it's not the situation. So all people who can work, they simply work now. And we also have like IT army in Ukraine. And, uh, that's why all like IT people, they simply join this army and they do like their best was, uh, in this part. You know, have you ever considered fleeing the country for now? Cause I'd have to imagine that, you know, running a business is, is its own challenge. And then you add in a war on top of that. It makes it damn near impossible. And, you know, if you were to go to another country in Europe or wherever, I would think it would be a little bit easier. Has that ever crossed your mind? Oh, yeah. So I, I had the thoughts and I also like all time analyze all risks. And I also understand that Western Ukraine. So now it's like safe, a little bit safe place, but maybe it will not, like in the nearest time. So we don't know what to expect. And that's why I analyze the situation. But now I have now the strategy so I can work here and I still stay productive. So I work like, I don't know, 14, 17 hours now per day and everything like is okay. And I can work. So I have here like a working and we have here also community of other entrepreneurs like from Keith. So till the time I can like stay here and work and be productive, I will stay here. If I start to understand that it's impossible. So I will relocate because I believe I will be like more efficient with laptop. And how about as far as like your business? I'm sure that internet connection is of a vital importance. And I had heard in, you know, weeks prior that Elon Musk's Starlink was very beneficial in being sent over there and helping people to stay connected. Have you had any kind of interaction with that? Or like, how is your internet and how are you able to like, are there outages like when, when bomb strike? You know, you're simple now ask this question and I saw the message on my, on my laptop, your internet connection is not okay. That's exactly why. Yeah. It's very funny. Yeah. But you know, like that connection is okay. And yeah, in Western Ukraine, we don't have like Starlink, but no, but some of my friends who are in AT Army and in Western Ukraine, they have Starlink. So, but mostly Starlink now is used for military forces or for AT Army, but yes, in all other regions, everything is okay. So with internet connections, we have now problems in Western Ukraine and in somehow in also in central Ukraine. But I also know that Starlink really helps because my friend who is now at military forces, he like wrote me and like several days ago and we chat with him. And he said that yes, it's like started to be possible because they already have Starlink. But before that, like it wasn't connection with him like during the week. And how do you go about planning for the future with so much uncertainty? I mean, I know that you can probably have a business plan for yourself, but how do you bake in the sort of flexibility that's required for your business going forward? And are you thinking like one month, two months, a year down the line, or is it just day by day? Yeah. So we have like short time planning, short time planning. First of all, we are really very data driven business. So we use our product also for to manage our business. So we are really addicted guys according to planning. So we have like weekly plans, monthly plans, quarter different plans about everything. So about cash flow, revenue, lead generation, expenses. But also like in this situation, I think like first month we had very short time planning. So we really planned for weeks, maybe four months, one month. But we like didn't have this planning for the next like several months even. But now we already like during this last, I think three weeks, we started to think more in strategic ways. So we understand that, yeah, where is going on? And we don't know how long it will be. And maybe it will be like to the end of the year. And we still need to like have all our strategic goals because like one week before the war, we had strategic session for the next year. And we already had all our ideas and plans for this year. And now we try to think also in like more strategic way because without it, we simply can't create a good product and make everything for it. Are you raising capital at the moment? Also, like are you taking investor meetings? Yeah, we are like we are preparing to start it like in nearest weeks. And is it mostly Silicon Valley, San Francisco investors? Or mostly a state side? I can't imagine. I just can't imagine having this conversation with you where it's like, oh, OK, we're going to talk about raising capital while you're in the middle of a war and hopefully everything works out. I mean, I would imagine like an investor would just say, just move, like come to America or like go to, I don't know, go to your closest European ally and seek refuge. Does the party you feel crazy? Yeah, I think I think we're really crazy. And man. But, you know, like life is going on and business also should grow. And our market really, our market is growing and it's starting to be trending from previous years. So it's like high time to do like what we planned. And it's like better situation for us because we are break even. So it's not like the situation as usual startups have about so we need fundraise or we will die. Yeah, so we are like break even and even we have reserves from our profits like from previous years. So we have another situation, but we simply want to grow faster now. And that's why we want to try to make it real. But we also understand craziness of this situation. So we'll see how it will be. It's very admirable. It's almost in some way like you're able to focus. Maybe it's your refuge. Maybe it's the only thing in your life you can control. It's your business. Yeah. And so in some way that's therapeutic because everything else around you is so unknown. Yeah, for sure. I think I feel exactly like that. So that's why it's like best therapy now to work. Well, tell us about what's where do you see your business in a year's time? Like what what new products are you working on? What are other things you guys are adding to your dashboard? What is that? What does the roadmap look like? First of all, like we want to scale on the US market and grow faster with our clients. So we're still up to make. So we have like our strategy about our product. So we want to like we now combine software with financial managers. And we also like have a strategy how we want this product should look like in the nearest month. So it's like MVP now. Yeah, it's working. It's used by clients, but we have much work to be improved there. And so we still working on design on parts like product parts, engineers. So automations, also connections with different search parties. So we do it now, everything to improve our product and make it better and faster for our clients. So yeah, we have like many plans according to that. But we also believe that our like huge idea we want to transform this very old financial sphere with like some art of big books, XLS docs and hired financial managers. And that's why we believe we can simply replace huge parts of many of work of all financial managers of founders with our product. How much do you guys sell your product for today? We now have like 20 clients which paying with subscription basis, but our price is starting from one thousand dollars per month. So like we have not basics of subscription, like quick books with forty dollars per month. We have another subscription. It would be great if you guys get rid of quick books. I never liked it. It's pretty antiquated, very annoying. The invoicing sucks. Yeah. Yeah. I think many, many founders also think the same, especially when you need to set up this quick books. Yeah, you got to hire a firm and then you just have to hope that they do it right. But it's really annoying. And you desire to make a better quick books. Now we simply like take information from quick books, but we also can take information from banking accounts, not only quick books. So that's why we now analyze the situation because to many companies, they use simply quick books. And now we simply connected with quick books, but we also have like to analyze if we can replace or maybe I think our main part and our main value. I think not in reports that make usually quick books. So mainly in planning, dashboards, you need economics insights. So that's why we maybe will simply like use quick books as we do it now. You know, with the entire world's eyes on Ukraine, probably for the first time in recent memory, you know, there's a lot of support being given to refugee aid and the Red Cross and other nonprofit organizations. And I know that you set up a help page for Ukrainian businesses. Have you seen from your end an outpouring of support for those businesses? Has that translated into actual dollars? Yeah, it's translated in actual dollars. And we even already know, like I have here different ratings who donate more and from countries and from organizations and to whom would transfer these donations. So yeah, we understand it. But I should say that it's even not enough. So we already talk about money that's were donated to Ukraine from different countries and from different people and from different organization, I think already in billions dollars. But it's not enough because like war, I think is very expensive. And Ukrainian economy is also not in a good fit. So we have like drop in GDP. And that's why I think recovery will be very long. So when it comes to like you're in finance to some extent, I think you're probably seeing it in real time that the future of finance is moving more to like a digital asset like crypto. How do you view your platform playing a role in that as you know, this new wave of financial technology both from your side, but also literally from, I mean, people are seeing it in real time where if you're in Russia, you cannot give money to your friend. Like it is impossible to send money. And so how do you view like crypto's role in the future of your country, but also in the future of your company? First of all, crypto's role is really huge because from start of this work, we have crypto accounts and money that were donated to like crypto. I think they now completely, we talk about the amount which are like 30% from all donations. So it's really huge amount. And that's why we also understand and now it's something unusual what is going on in Ukraine according to cryptocurrency because we already have not only like one organization, we have several types of organizations where you can donate in crypto even through ministry of digital transformation. So even our ministry already have cryptocurrency accounts for donations. So and we also see this transformations in our country according to legal parts for cryptocurrency, it's already changes. And so now I see that we have many, many changes according payments and crypto in Ukraine. And I think it's also can be a boost to this industry in the nearest years because if we have such changes during the war and they think they are very fast, I think that other countries they also like will take such experience. Yeah, and when it comes to different cryptocurrencies, we know like Ethereum for example, can have gas fees up to $200, $300 which makes it not very viable when it comes to scaling because your average person is gonna think that's too high, Bitcoin is slow also. In my head, it seems like you guys probably are feeling this or you're seeing it more than most people where people here in America right now are seeing it when they buy an NFT, you're seeing it in real time when you're trying to trade assets. And so have you found a cryptocurrency that is working better than the others or is it just based on what's popular in the moment? I think that it's based mostly on what is popular now, but when I think about this market, I simply think like about it like, usually like when we talk about usual money is like the source of exchange, but the source like usual money, the source of exchange is controlled yet by national banks in different countries. And now when I think about this cryptocurrency markets, I more believe in cryptocurrency not like in way of investments. I mostly believe it's like the new way of changes between people. So because it's not controlled by some national banks and that's why I think it's only the start of this new way of how all currencies can be changed in the nearest future. So that's why I think more in that way than like in type of investments. Totally agree. Well, anything else you wanna share with us about your company or about your current situation? I think, yeah, I want to share like also our main ideas that we tried to share with our friends who created platform which is named spendwithukrain.com. It's a platform about all Ukrainian cool businesses who still work and they make cool worlds known products. And they have like all information and stories about these companies. And I should say that also everyone can support Ukraine not only donating like to our organizations, which is also important, but also know more about these companies and really like spend with Ukrainian companies. We'll make sure to put a lot of information out about that. I wanna thank you. Thank you for sharing your story and for telling, you know, I know it's late where you are. I can't imagine, honestly, a part of me thinks it's crazy but I do understand the tunnel focus of it. And I think that's, it's healthy, right? It's like it could be way worse. And so, you know, it's, I'm glad you have something to focus on, something that keeps your energy. Absolutely. And we're certainly rooting for you. Channeling it towards something positive. Yeah. Yeah. It's like very important now, yes, simply to have usual life sometimes. Yeah, absolutely. More than ever. Well, thank you. Thank you so much. Thank you so much for making the time. I appreciate it. Thank you, guys. That was our conversation with Algiona of Fuel Finance. I also want to give a shout out to our listeners in Ukraine. We've been charting in Ukraine for over a month now and we want you to know that we stand in solidarity with you. For everyone interested in how you can show your support, check out the website, spendwithukraine.com. It has a list of companies in just about every sector who are operating out of Ukraine. And while I still have your attention, if you're not subscribed already, you should seriously consider doing so. And if you are, then go ahead and leave a review. It's a great way to help out the podcast. We are at Startup Storefront on every social media platform except for Twitter where you can find us at STS Podcast LA. Our team consists of Diego Torres Palma, Natalia Capolini, Lexie Jameson, Owen Capolini and me, Nick Conrad. Our music is by DoubleTouch. Thank you for listening. We'll see you next time.