My role

I met the MoveNation team through the Antler VC programme. As Strategic Advisor I helped them with the product strategy, marketing and roadmap, while conducting market research and improving the UX around customer onboarding. In addition to the product-related objectives, I advised the CEO on the funding strategy.

Evolution (origin story)

I joined MoveNation because the Founder had a strong and compelling vision for the project: “To provide a partial solution to the $400 trillion pension problem in 2050.”

Simply put, a key challenge to solve around longevity is that governments won’t have the means to support your retirement in the future, which means that you need to find ways to finance this yourself. MoveNation’s solution to this is to help you retire better for less abroad - moving you to a place with a lower cost of living.

The societal problem I will likely face myself one day, but the problem for the user I have already experienced first hand, when moving abroad. Namely, that it is near impossible to find the best country from a leisure and financial point of view. Country moving in 2022 is like what visiting a new city was like back in the 90’s, when Tripadvisor did not exist - no overview, ratings or price insights.

With MoveNation we wanted to help the user get an overview and setup a new life in a transparent and seamless manner. You fill out 3-4 data points about yourself and in the blink of an eye, you can start exploring your desired retirement age and destination. When you have locked in your dream destination, we help you make it happen through a consultation to set up your visa, taxes and moving plan.

There are multiple business models to pursue in this space, on which I will not elaborate further, as the team is still exploring this.

Through our market research we identified that 750 million people worldwide dream of living abroad. However, in choosing our origin target market we also needed to take into consideration the freedom of movement, restricted by immigration laws, visa requirements and taxation. Our hypothesis was that certain nationalities have a higher degree of mobility and the financial means to make it happen, than others. In choosing our destination target market, one important aspect was the proximity to family and friends. Where most Americans desired a move to Canada or Mexico, most Europeans dreamed of a life in Switzerland or Spain.

If you dream of living or retiring abroad, I can really recommend you to check out the Movenation app.

Key takeaways

Finalling joining a complete team was extremely rewarding for me. You cannot underestimate the value of sparring and speed with which you can execute with more hands on deck - especially, if they have good complementarity with regards to skillset.

• Having a strong and compelling vision gives the team a clear sense of direction. Solving a problem not only for your users, but on much larger societal scale, provides you with a shining North Star that guides you, regardless of outcome from your customer discovery process. Adding to that, it gives you the ability to attract talent and investors, uniting them around a common purpose.

• One of the greatest challenges in startup is to know when you need to pivot vs persevere. You get bombarded with new input from early users and investors. And everyone will try to influence you based on their own frame of reference. Listen carefully to these valuable discussions, take a note, and when you hear the same feedback from multiple stakeholders around you, it is time to pivot.

• When speaking to investors, you cannot demonstrate ambiguity. Even in the exploratory phase of the project, you must show them that you have a clear goal in mind and that your day-to-day efforts supports you in building traction towards that goal.

• Remote work is here to stay. But in the early stage, spending face time with the team is key. It helps you build a stronger relationship, when discussing everything from individual roadblocks to social life face-to-face. I would always aim for at least a hybrid model in the beginning.