Stoyan Kenderov: What the Bulgarian Diaspora Needs to Support Bulgaria's Growth

Stoyan Kenderov is a Bulgarian born entrepreneur living the dream in Silicon Valley. Today founder of Wisdom, a dental payment solution looking to change the way the dental industry operates, his previous success was the product-led transformation he achieved at Plastiq, quadrupling the company's GTV in less than 4 years.

Before his tenure at Plastiq, Stoyan held executive leadership roles at leading global technology companies, including Intuit, LendingClub, Quicken, Amdocs, and KPN Qwest. His entrepreneurial journey began with co-founding one of Germany’s pioneering Internet portals, further amplified by key roles in establishing the initial wave of Internet service providers across Austria, the Netherlands, and Germany.

How has the Bulgarian start-up ecosystem evolved in the past 2-3 years?

My point of view from having met well over 50 founders and entrepreneurs from Bulgaria in this timeframe is that every year I see things sharpen, with founders having a broader and clearer vision of how they’re going to transform their industries and how they’re going to succeed in doing it.

It’s clear to me that the level of coaching they receive through BIH and other similar organizations is getting more and more impactful, and you can see it across their performance - the pitches are better, the ideas are better, the environment in which they start, the resources available to them are improving. 

I see a notable increment in the intensity, focus, and quality every year, and it’s delightful. They come to San Francisco, they speak like any entrepreneur here in the Valley, they have easier access to financing, they have more coaching available to prepare for a funding round, they have better market research. The one thing that still needs to improve is access to talent outside of technology - marketing, product, customer management. It’s not impossible, but it’s challenging. In 10 years from now this problem will no longer exist. 

I like this expansion of the focus of the Bulgaria Innovation Hub into Central and Eastern Europe to include more talent from across the region, and to drive connections so that startups can start with a broader pool of resources and contacts. 

What’s currently missing to improve the way the Bulgarian diaspora gives back to the community?

There are at least 10,000 people that could be of some help that are not waking up thinking, ”I know something relevant that somebody else doesn't know.” but “How do I survive today, competing through what I know with others around me?”.

The Bulgarian diaspora is organized in very organic ways, and people like Pavlina, who are incredibly connected, know people in many of these groups, but definitely not all. We have Bulgarians working at Apple who are not involved in anything right now that's happening in the Bulgaria Innovation Hub. They don't even know that they could be of any help. There needs to be more popularization, and targeted outreach to people who are doing interesting things in the Valley, who have a valuable point of view because of their experience or because of their current job or because of their contacts. A more targeted popularization of the ecosystem and everybody who's supporting the ecosystem is necessary. 

The Bulgarians that are currently starting companies here are not thinking about immediately setting up shop in Bulgaria. The first order of business is to find customers in the US. But when it comes to resources, I think it's a second or third thought to maybe do something in Bulgaria, since it's so far away. 

Imagine if there was a blueprint of how you can start your R&D organization in Bulgaria covering costs, infrastructure needs in terms of finding the people who can help with quality recruitment. The chances that somebody would proceed and give it a try would increase significantly. 

I, for one, am constantly trying to connect with people who know their way around the Bulgarian talent market. It’s important to know which local recruiters can be trusted to find the kernel of your organization, to recruit the core of your operation, and that’s just step one. And yes, it can be done if you put your mind to it, but it would be much easier if there was a blueprint.

This could include anything from key contacts in the local market, quality recruiters, examples of companies that created R&D teams in this market, places where you could go to network with local talent. With that mapped out, a lot of entrepreneurs who are coming out of Google, Apple, or Open AI would dare to set up shop much earlier. This would significantly accelerate things, because nothing's going to stop Bulgaria’s accession to any of these new industries and developments, but we could speed it up by designing an easier process. 

The possibility for Bulgaria Innovation Hub to achieve these milestones is achieved with the support of America for Bulgaria Foundation (ABF) - an independent, nonpartisan, and nonpolitical American grant-making foundation working in partnership with Bulgarians to strengthen the country’s private sector and related democratic institutions. For more information, please visit: https://us4bg.org/.