---
title: "SaaS funding, Vainu and Round2 | Christian Czernich | Negotiator 44"
titleOriginal: "SaaS funding Vainu with Round2 | Christian Czernich | Negotiator 44"
episodeNumber: "44"
guest: "Christian Czernich"
datePublished: 2020-11-06
duration: "25:34"
youtube: "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oxv4AydGKmk"
captionsVtt: https://www.neuvottelija.com/podcast/episodes/ep44-saas-funding-vainu-round2-christian-czernich/captions.en.vtt
captionsSrt: https://www.neuvottelija.com/podcast/episodes/ep44-saas-funding-vainu-round2-christian-czernich/captions.en.srt
originalLanguage: "en"
topics: ["saas_software","investing_markets"]
subtitleMethod: "none"
provenance: "Owner page assembled from the MacWhisper SRT transcript of this English-language episode, together with YouTube metadata and the neuvottelija.fi episode record. Chapter timecodes are taken from the transcript; no caption files are published with this page."
fiCanonical: "https://www.neuvottelija.fi/fi/episodes/50-saas-funding-vainu-with-round2-christian-czernich-negotiator"
canonical: https://www.neuvottelija.com/podcast/episodes/ep44-saas-funding-vainu-round2-christian-czernich/
---
# SaaS funding, Vainu and Round2 | Christian Czernich | Negotiator 44

## Chapters

- [00:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oxv4AydGKmk&t=0s) From academia to investment banking to Round2
- [02:30](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oxv4AydGKmk&t=150s) Vainu, and what bootstrapped actually means
- [05:01](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oxv4AydGKmk&t=301s) What makes a SaaS company different
- [07:32](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oxv4AydGKmk&t=452s) B2B versus B2C: the misunderstanding about speed
- [10:02](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oxv4AydGKmk&t=602s) ARR, and the ratio of lifetime value to acquisition cost
- [12:33](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oxv4AydGKmk&t=753s) Churn, net churn and the economics of upselling
- [15:03](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oxv4AydGKmk&t=903s) The fourth metric nobody looks at: engagement
- [17:35](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oxv4AydGKmk&t=1055s) From licences to SaaS, and implementation partners
- [20:06](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oxv4AydGKmk&t=1206s) Revenue-based funding as capital as a service
- [22:38](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oxv4AydGKmk&t=1358s) How Round2 protects the downside
- [25:08](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oxv4AydGKmk&t=1508s) Austrian and Nordic negotiating cultures

## Summary

Round2 Capital founder Christian Czernich explains revenue-based funding: capital advanced against a two-to-six per cent share of revenue, fully non-dilutive, with no conversion right and no argument over valuation. He walks through the metrics he underwrites on — ARR growth, the ratio of lifetime value to customer acquisition cost, net churn against upselling, and a fourth that is routinely ignored: engagement. The episode also covers what bootstrapping meant for Vainu, why B2B SaaS scales far slower than people assume, and why a company transforming from licences to subscriptions looks worse in the numbers precisely while it is getting better.

## What is discussed

- **Czernich's route.** A PhD at the Stockholm School of Economics and Stanford researching Swedish technology spin-offs and Silicon Valley venture capital, then investment banking including work with Translink, then Round2 in 2017 — now on a second fund of €30 million.
- **Vainu.** One of the largest bootstrapped technology companies in the Nordics, built entirely on internally generated revenue, with Round2 as its first and only external investor.
- **What SaaS is.** Recurring revenue on the newspaper subscription model, cloud delivery instead of a licence, contracts of at least twelve months, predictability, scalability and high gross margin.
- **The speed misunderstanding.** SaaS is mainly B2B, and a successful B2C business scales much faster. Building a strong base of recurring revenue takes a long time.
- **ARR, with a caveat.** It is a myth that SaaS firms earn only recurring revenue — setup and consulting fees are normal, and their share matters for reading the business.
- **LTV to CAC.** Funding growth means funding customer acquisition. The failure modes are not knowing your acquisition cost at all, or excluding real costs from the number.
- **Net churn.** Churn netted against upselling, because expanding an existing customer is far cheaper than winning a new one — and demonstrated upselling signals a genuinely useful product.
- **Engagement.** Customers who pay but never use the service. Round2 always asks for engagement data, and its absence is itself the signal — a predictor of sudden churn and of features nobody touches.
- **Licence-to-SaaS.** Consistently underestimated because revenue and cash flow fall sharply in the short term. M-Files is the Finnish example: turnover dropped while quality rose, invisible from outside unless you know the switch happened.
- **The instrument.** 2–6 per cent of revenue, no conversion, fully non-dilutive — capital as a service, mirroring the customer's own business model. Protected by investing only above €1M turnover and requiring the funds go to sales and marketing.

## Watch

The recording lives on the Neuvottelija channel: [SaaS funding Vainu with Round2 | Christian Czernich | Negotiator 44](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oxv4AydGKmk).
A Finnish edition of this episode is published at [www.neuvottelija.fi](https://www.neuvottelija.fi/fi/episodes/50-saas-funding-vainu-with-round2-christian-czernich-negotiator).

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Cite as: Sami Miettinen, Neuvottelija — SaaS funding, Vainu and Round2 | Christian Czernich | Negotiator 44, https://www.neuvottelija.com/podcast/episodes/ep44-saas-funding-vainu-round2-christian-czernich/, 2020-11-06. For quotes include episode 44 and timestamp.