38-year-old gets $660k pre-seed funding after two exits: "Starting a business is the only way to become rich from scratch."

Snow Lee exited two businesses when he lived in South Korea. Last month, he moved his family to California to work on his latest project, Plugbear.

The business has $470k left in the bank after receiving a cash injection from angel investors. And it's currently at $7.2k MRR.

Let's take a peek at his finances.

Getting rich from scratch

It wasn’t until the moment that he started his first company, right after graduating university, that Snow thought about money for the first time.

Growing up, his family wasn’t struggling. They weren’t rich, but there was food on the table so he didn't need to think about it.

But now, he wants to be rich. He began to dream about future, and he realized that he needed money to even focus on that dream

"Although I don’t think money is the most important thing in the world, I believe it is a mandatory element of getting to the next level of Maslow's hierarchy of needs."

He says that individuals are too restricted when it comes to their resources. You need money in order to make that money work for you.

And, according to Snow, the most efficient way to uplevel your resources is building a business.

"I believe that running a business is the only way to become rich from scratch."

Exiting two companies

Since that first startup 15 years ago, Snow and his cofounder, Liam, have worked on many projects — anonymous forums for university students, a gamified weight loss app, a mobile lock screen service, and the list goes on.

And two of their startups grew to the point of getting acquired for undisclosed amounts.

Now they’re doing it again, but this time, they’ve decided to do it in the US — San Francisco. It’s pricey, but that’s where it’s all happening, right? So, last month, they moved their families and settled down in the Bay Area.

Charging customers money

PlugBear is a SaaS product that helps customers integrate their custom GPTs into daily tools like Slack, HubSpot, Teams, and more in ten minutes without coding. And while it's not his first startup, it is the first time he’s ever charged customers.

Until now, all of his products have been monetized via ads. But this time, he's using a subscription model. And they charged as soon as possible.

When he saw his first-ever paid customer earlier this year, he was through the roof. But he was also extremely anxious.

With it being his first time charging, he wasn’t sure if they were providing enough value. He didn’t know if the customer would be satisfied a month later.

But it worked. And, ultimately, he thinks his fear was a good thing. It resulted in him reaching out to customers to better support them. And plus, it showed him how much he cares.

PlugBear's revenue and funding

Here’s what Snow's bringing in:

• PlugBear revenue: $7.3k

• Funding: $660k pre-seed funding

• Founder pay: $100k/yr (up from $50k/yr when he lived in South Korea)

• Business bank account: $470k

• Personal bank account: 5 figures

"Funding doesn’t mean that we found the product-market fit. It also doesn’t guarantee our success. Although I was really happy to see the number in the bank account, I understood that it was just the beginning and got back to work."

Finding angel investors

PlugBear has received $660k in funding. He says this route isn’t for everyone — it just depends on your strategy and business.

While building his previous businesses, Snow built a network. And it was that network — people who believed in him — that connected him with his current angel investors. And they knew about what he was up to because he was building in public.

If you're looking for an investor, those are key elements in the process — building and leveraging your network, and building in public.

He was even able to get this investment prior to having a clearly defined product — they invested in him and his team, not necessarily the product itself.

"I believe that money is credit. It’s trust. If I have enough credit to make people trust in the value I provide, I can earn money from it."

Spending pre-seed investment money

So far, they’ve spent $190k of the $660k. They used it to speed up their validation process and get to market faster.

"As startup founders, we need resources to validate hypotheses. Funding is one of the most critical resources."

They launched 5+ products and tested them by delivering landing page prototypes to audiences via paid marketing. They spent between $1k and $2k advertising each product.

And once PlugBear was validated, they expanded their team to build their product — and value for their customers — faster

They’ll eventually raise more money, but not yet. They want to wait on further fundraising until their business is more predictable and they have a better understanding of their customer acquisition costs.

PlugBear's expenses

Here are his monthly business expenses:

• Salaries for team of 7: $25k

• Rent (Wework): $600

• Hosting: $700

• Software: $300

• Advertising and marketing: $500-$1k

Snow's expense

He says his personal expenses aren't clear yet, as they just moved, but it's clear that they're going up and up. The Bay Area is not a cheap place to live, even though they're trying to be as lean as possible.

Here are his monthly expenses so far:

• Rent: $3k

• Daycare: $2.5k

• Groceries and eating out: $1k-$2k

Paying off $250k debt

Snow doesn’t think he's been strict enough in his budgeting over the years.

He built up about $300k in debt while living in South Korea. But before moving to the US, he liquidated some of his family's investments in order to pay most of it off. Now he only owes about $50k.

And he's committed to focusing on budgeting, keeping expenses down, and keeping his financial models up to date in Google Sheets.

That said, he loves to travel the world with his son. When they were in South Korea, they traveled overseas twice every year, spending maybe $15k/yr on travel. They hope to continue that now, even after moving to a more expensive place. It's a non-negotiable for him..

"I travel with my family a lot. That time spent with family cannot be purchased after my son grows up."

Invest in asset; not liabilities

Snow’s wife manages their investments. While he'd like to have a hand in it, he says he cannot fully invest his time into both the business and their personal finances, so he focuses on the former.

"Time is the most expensive resource."

His wife invests 60% in the stock market and 5% in miscellaneous investments. The rest goes into her "safe haven" fund, which is a savings account for rainy days and emergencies.

He did recently make one investment on his own, though. He splurged on a Tesla.

It was $45k and he paid it in cash. He says it wasn’t really necessary, but he loves the car and enjoys driving it. He doesn’t usually like driving, so perhaps it was an investment in enjoying his time on the road.

But cars don’t make good assets, and he knows it.

"Invest in assets; not liabilities. I already regret that I purchased a Tesla."

You can follow Snow on X. And check out PlugBear.

Please note that the above are opinions. This is meant for informational purposes only. It is not intended to be financial advice.

And if you'd like to be featured as a guest in a future interview for this series, let me know in the comments!