The Dutch student online platform HousingAnywhere begins to expand beyond its national borders. However, the investor is only willing to inject capital if HousingAnywhere changes its business model to a new one the CEO finds problematic.
Based on field research; 14 pages.
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From its inception, the focus of HousingAnywhere – a student housing online platform – had been on international expansion. Nonetheless, as HousingAnywhere began to grow and expand beyond national borders, an issue imperative to the startup’s success became apparent: Neither the company nor its clients (member universities) had been dedicating efforts to marketing HousingAnywhere.com’s services to students, which resulted in low room supply. With newly emerging competitors entering the market, CEO Niels van Deuren knew that to safeguard his company’s survival, HousingAnywhere would have to continue growing. To do so, additional capital was needed but the current problem faced by the company made it difficult in attracting new investors. One investor showed interest, but was willing to invest on the sole condition that HousingAnywhere would change its business model. Niels had doubts about it because the new business model proposed by the investor would bring in new problems. However, if he did not accept the investor’s proposal, how should he raise the capital internally to grow his company?
