About me and my company

1
Overview

• About me and my company
• Entrepreneurial skills character
• Education for business
• How to push young businesses forward
• Problems I encountered at start-up
• for CEDEFOP Nov. 2010

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1. About me and my company

• Cosmin Malureanu age 29
• Second business 100 owned
• First business at age of 22, 25 owned
  initiator sold
• 2 years stocks market trader living passion
• Economy IT studies
• Like seawater diving

• Ascendia Design started in 2007
• Outsourcing eLearning materials simulations,
  applications, educational games, interactive 3d
• 17 employees, 500k approx. turnover for 2010
• First own branded product to be launched
  EduTeca The Seasons - 8CD eLearning series for
  kindergarten pupils

www.ascendia.ro cosmin.malureanu_at_ascendia.ro
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2. Entrepreneurial skills character

• Self-confidence, self-control
• Leadership ready to take action
• Communicative socialy connected
• Solution oriented as opposed to problem oriented
• Free thinker think out of the box be creative
• Risk-taker
• Visionary
• Long life learner and especially able to learn
  from mistakes
• Not all people will become entrepreneurs, but all
  can learn to be more entrepreneurial in the way
  they work, regardless of what they do.

www.ascendia.ro cosmin.malureanu_at_ascendia.ro
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3. Education for business

• General economic studies able to understand any
  business model and how economy works in general
• Economic applied studies hands-on approach
  see and understand that theory is good to know
  but practice is good to do
• Management studies must manage time, money,
  team and material resources
• Cross-disciplinary studies focus on math,
  statistics, informatics
• Communication studies - the most important
  bridge in any aspect of life, though in business
  too
• The most important aspect when teaching business
  related subjects is to bring reality into the
  classroom!

www.ascendia.ro cosmin.malureanu_at_ascendia.ro
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4. How to push young businesses forward

• Guides for young people
• Get exposed to new culturesways of life. Learn
  to think outside the box.
• Learn other languages, travell and live in
  another country for a period if possible
  (studies?)
• Take your life into your own hands
• Listen to other's oppinions and advice (family,
  friends), but take your own decisions!
• Get a job first and learn to work, not to
  simulate working
• Get involved in competitions, whatever the field
  of activity. For a business should be rather
  economy related (stock market, management,
  virtual companies, etc.)
• Search the programs of NGOs like Junior
  Achievement

www.ascendia.ro cosmin.malureanu_at_ascendia.ro
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4. How to push young businesses forward

• Policy Makers
• Easy capital access business angels/loans
• University incentives or prices for young
  achievers
• EU/National incentives for promising businesses
  owned by young people tax reduction
• Easy access to consultancy

www.ascendia.ro cosmin.malureanu_at_ascendia.ro
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5. Problems I encountered at start-up

• First thing - you need an accountant from day 1
• You got a project, you need a lawyer when making
  papers
• What I need from my programmers is not learned in
  any school
• Software is expensive lack of leasing/rates
  option
• Money flux must always be prepared to sustain
  the business, even if is profitable (salarys,
  VAT). Never know for sure when money will come.
• Being young is often wrongly seen as equivalent
  to unprofessional

www.ascendia.ro cosmin.malureanu_at_ascendia.ro
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Be inspired!
www.ascendia.ro cosmin.malureanu_at_ascendia.ro