Radu Atanasiu, BiSM, on whether entrepreneurs are born or made

The documentary "Romanian Startups: Roaring Tigers of Europe", made by the start-up.ro team, spans across 33 years of history, from the first entrepreneurs in the transitional years to the initial technology company transactions that brought Romania into the international spotlight.

Romanian Startups: Roaring Tigers of Europe - The Extended Series will present the people who built the Romanian ecosystem and who discussed with the VideoCorp and start-up.ro team for this documentary. In this series you will find the extensive interviews and find out the stories of those who built entrepreneurship in Romania.

”I will start with an answer and like in jeopardy, I will ask the question at the end. I believe the answer is that we are on a path in Romania of mindset change towards entrepreneurship. This has to be encouraged. This really has to be encouraged and this should be encouraged through some formal education within middle school, middle school and perhaps high school.What should happen in a structured way in order to produce more unicorns in 10 years time? So that's the question. My answer would be to start toying with projects that could look like entrepreneurship in middle school and it's high school. And I'm not talking about pitches and incubators or stuff like this. Have people sell lemonade and have people imagine how to extract value for something and sell it, which is the hardest part, not extracting value, but selling it to a customer at some point and they will fall in love with it. And we will increase the chance to have more unicorns in 10 years time”. 

Radu Atanasiu is an Associate Dean at BiSM (Bucharest International School of Management), where he teaches critical thinking. He is a professional whose career journey spans for more than 30 years in dentistry, journalism, entrepreneurship, academia, and angel investing.

During our conversation for the Romanian Startups: Roaring Tigers of Europe, he reflected on his unplanned career trajectory that began in the 1990s, highlighting how many critical life and business decisions are often made with limited options or foresight.

“Most of us choose like this. You don’t imagine, you don’t plan, you don’t envision what’s going to happen. I was swimming in the dark, but it was nice.”

Starting as a dentist, he transitioned into business through family entrepreneurial ventures, eventually specializing in mergers and acquisitions (M&A), which provided him with deep insights into preparing companies for growth and exits.

Our discussion with Radu for the documentary also helps paint a vivid picture of the Romanian entrepreneurial ecosystem’s evolution, from its early “cowboy era” characterized by passionate but chaotic efforts to a more structured environment marked by M&A activity and shifting societal perceptions about businesspeople.

Despite progress, negative stereotypes about entrepreneurs persist in some areas. The guest emphasizes the importance of exits, scalability, and realistic market assessments for startups, noting common pitfalls such as addressing too broad or unrealistic markets and underestimating the effort required for marketing and sales.

“Selling the company is like betraying your family or dying. They don’t think about exit; it’s like death. Exit is a very, very good thing”, is his belief. 

The conversation dives into the psychology of entrepreneurship, addressing the fear of failure, cognitive biases like overconfidence and sunk cost fallacy, and the reluctance to “kill” underperforming companies due to emotional attachment.

“Failure is a good teacher. When you make peace with failure and understand that failure is a good teacher, then you learn the lesson and move forward”, says Radu.

He advocates for a scientific, hypothesis-driven approach to business experimentation, encouraging entrepreneurs to view failure as valuable learning rather than defeat.

Finally, Radu expresses his hope for a cultural shift toward embracing entrepreneurship from an earlier age, proposing structured education starting in middle school to foster entrepreneurial skills and eventually generate more successful startups and unicorns.

Radu Anastasiu sees a constant interplay between mindset, education, ecosystem maturity, and structural challenges. 

He advocates for embracing failure, fostering realistic market strategies, enhancing communication skills, and embedding entrepreneurship early in education.

His insights offer practical guidance for founders, investors, educators, and policymakers aiming to cultivate a vibrant, sustainable startup ecosystem that can produce more globally competitive ventures in the years ahead.

”There's this debate, is an entrepreneur made or born. I think the ones who are more born could not live without doing it, so they did it. The biggest part of value created in Romania in the last 20, 30 years has been created through entrepreneurial effort.” 

• Career shifts from dentistry to journalism, then entrepreneurship and academia, highlighting unplanned professional evolution.
• Romanian entrepreneurship evolved from a chaotic “cowboy era” to a more mature ecosystem with active M&A and changing perceptions.
• Importance of realistic market sizing, scalability, and strategic exits emphasized for startup success.
• Teaching entrepreneurship and critical thinking shapes a new generation of flexible, globally-minded founders.
• Personal connection and cultural fit with founders critical in angel investing decisions.
• Fear of failure and emotional attachment to startups hinder strategic pivots and exits.
• Need for early entrepreneurial education and fostering a scientific mindset to boost Romania’s startup ecosystem.

• Entrepreneurship in Romania has transformed from passion-driven chaos to systematic growth: Early entrepreneurial ventures in the 1990s and early 2000s were marked by high personal sacrifice and uncertainty, often driven by a survivalist mentality rather than long-term vision. The maturation of the ecosystem, marked by increased M&A activity and market consolidation, reflects a shift toward more strategic, transparent business operations and professionalization. This evolution parallels global trends but faces unique regional cultural and historical challenges.
• Exit strategies are often overlooked: Many Romanian entrepreneurs view their companies as “children,” making the concept of exit emotionally fraught and akin to betrayal or failure. This mindset limits growth potential and investor appeal. Radu stresses the critical role of exits in the entrepreneurial lifecycle, not as an end but as a strategic milestone enabling reinvestment and new ventures. Changing this perception is vital to building a dynamic startup ecosystem.
• “Born global” startups are defining the new era of entrepreneurship: Modern Romanian founders and startups exhibit a “born global” mentality—launching ventures designed to operate internationally from inception rather than scaling regionally first. This mindset is driven by technology-enabled services and visionary leadership and contrasts with past generations that focused on local or regional markets. Encouraging this approach requires fostering global awareness and market understanding early in founder education.

• Realistic market assessment and scalability are crucial, but underappreciated: Many startups present overly optimistic or inflated total addressable markets (TAM), often citing global figures without granular analysis of reachable customers or competitors. Radu Atanasiu advocates for a grounded approach: startups should identify realistic market segments they can effectively serve and demonstrate scalability beyond limited geographies. This pragmatic view reduces investor risk and enhances strategic clarity.
• Pitching and communication skills are a critical differentiator: Romanian founders often lag behind their American peers in pitching effectiveness, which affects fundraising and market traction. Radu notes that pitching is a learned skill involving verbal and non-verbal cues, narrative structure, and audience engagement. Improving these skills through training and exposure can significantly impact startup success.
• Serial entrepreneurship remains underdeveloped but is a key to long-term success: Unlike more mature ecosystems with multiple-round founders, Romania lacks a strong culture of serial entrepreneurship. Developing this will require systemic support and mindset shifts to encourage entrepreneurs to learn from failures and start new ventures multiple times, thereby increasing resilience and investment appeal. Serial entrepreneurs bring valuable experience that reduces failure rates and accelerates growth.

What’s next for the Romanian startup ecosystem? How will it evolve during the next few years? What will it look like? What's Romania's purpose in the startup ecosystem around the world? What will startups bring for the region? The question is still open, and so are the answers. Thank you all for watching our documentary!

Roaring Tigers of Europe is a production by start-up.ro and Videocorp, part of the Romanian publishing company InternetCorp, active for almost 20 years on the market. The documentary was made with the support of partners BCR, Orange, and 2Performant. Community partners included Guran Consulting Global, How to Web, Launch, Impact Hub Bucharest, Flaviu Simihaian, Rubik Hub, SoftServe, and the Romanian-American University.