11 Failed Startups that Depended on Others
Countless startups around the world are being launched every week.
Many fail because they did not learn from the success of other companies who've managed to rise above.
We just published this list of 11 startups that failed due to depending on others, along with analyses on why they shut down and interviews with their founders.
11 Failed Startups that Depended on Others
1) HitMeUp
HitMeUp was a web-based business commercial center. The founder had no tech background, and after launching 3 versions, they decided to shut down.
Details of the startup:
- Founders: Charlie Pool
- Country: United Kingdom
- Industry: e-Commerce
- Started in: 2011
- Closed in: 2015
- Nº of employees: 1-10
- Funding Amount: < $1M
You can read more about their failure here.
2) Lookery
Lookery gave statistics showcasing services that empowered organizations. It was based on Facebook platform, and after the redesign, they had to shut down.
Details of the startup:
- Founders: David Cancel, Rex Dixon, Todd Sawicki
- Country: United States
- Industry: Marketing
- Started in: 2007
- Closed in: 2009
- Nº of employees: 1-10
- Funding Amount: $1M-$10M
You can read more about their failure here.
3) PostRocket
PostRocket was a Facebook marketing platform co-founded in October 2010. Many technical issues and depending on FB affected the quality of their service.
Details of the startup:
- Founders: Murry Ivanoff, Tim Chae
- Country: United States
- Industry: Analytics
- Started in: 2010
- Closed in: 2013
- Nº of employees: 1-10
- Funding Amount: < $1M
You can read more about their failure here.
4) Totsy
Totsy was a flash sale company that offered high-end fashion brands online for a low-price. Flash sales lost their attractiveness and became obsolete.
Details of the startup:
- Founders: Christophe Garnier, Guillaume Gauthereau
- Country: United States
- Industry: e-Commerce
- Started in: 2009
- Closed in: 2013
- Nº of employees: 50-100
- Funding Amount: $10M-$50M
You can read more about their failure here.
5) BeehiveID
BeehiveID was a startup on the dating market, that identified online accounts created for fraudulent use. Techstars and RightSide Capital decided to invest $70K on their business. However, after some months BeehiveID closed their doors. Being too dependent on Facebook data killed their startup.
Details of the startup:
- Founder: Mary Haskett
- Country: United States
- Industry: Software & Hardware
- Started in: 2013
- Closed in: 2015
You can read more about their failure here.
6) Brisk
Brisk was a prescriptive intelligence company which suffered from lack of focus. Being dependant on Salesforce was a fatal mistake.
Details of the startup:
- Founder: Hampus Jakobsson
- Country: Sweden
- Industry: Software & Hardware
- Started in: 2012
- Closed in: 2016
You can read more about their failure here.
7) Creator Growth Lab
Andrew Kamphey has started several projects related to creators and influencer marketing. One of them was Creator Growth Lab, a tool to help Instagram creators grow by themselves. He invested $5,000, never made a penny, and realized there was no need for that product.
Details of the startup:
- Founder: Andrew Kamphey
- Country: Indonesia
- Industry: Analytics
- Started in: 2018
- Closed in: 2019
You can read more about their failure here.
8) Hashtag Pirate
Nicolas is an IT support engineer who built Hashtag Pirate, an Instagram hashtag search engine. He hired a freelance developer and, once launched, he put a big focus on SEO. Things were going pretty well. However, in 2015 Instagram announced changes to its API and so Hashtag Pirates stopped working.
Details of the startup:
- Founder: Nicolas Elec Attallah
- Country: Spain
- Industry: Social Media
- Started in: 2015
- Closed in: 2016
You can read more about their failure here.
9) Kopely
After a decade of training and coaching, Andrew realized that stress was one of their clients’ main issues. That’s how he thought about creating a stress relief app. He partnered up with a dev company to build his idea while he took care of marketing. In few months, he got a great list of interested people, but COVID-19 changed things… the devs were no longer interested in building the app.
Details of the startup:
- Founder: Andrew Laux
- Country: United States
- Industry: Health
- Started in: 2019
- Closed in: 2020
You can read more about their failure here.
10) Sharkius
Sharkius was a social games company. It grew too fast, too quickly. It reached $80k/month revenue within months and wasted it. Learn from their mistakes!
Details of the startup:
- Founder: David Kramaley
- Country: United Kingdom
- Industry: Entertainment
- Started in: 2007
- Closed in: 2012
You can read more about their failure here.
11) Taleship
Sergio Mattei is an 18-year-old entrepreneur who built Taleship, a social writing application. He developed it himself when he was 16 and participated in a startup competition. Unfortunately, he didn’t win, but was able to get a lot of experience and knowledge that allowed him to grow it to +600 users. Hurricane Maria demotivated Sergio, who finally decided to shut down Taleship.
Details of the startup:
- Founder: Sergio Mattei Diaz
- Country: Puerto Rico
- Industry: Social Media
- Started in: 2016
- Closed in: 2016
You can read more about their failure here.
