The Origin of QINVST

Introduction: A Vision Born from a Common Pain Point

Every startup founder knows the challenges of startup finance – wrestling with forecasting, budgeting, and financial modeling without the resources of a big company. Many early-stage teams face a stark choice: learn FP&A for startups on their own or pay hefty fees for experts. It's a classic pain point that two entrepreneurs, Winnicent Zuo and Nicolas Frendo, set out to solve. They believed there had to be a better way for founders to manage startup budgeting and financial planning, especially in the age of AI. In 2023, this belief gave rise to QINVST – an ambitious startup on a mission to revolutionize AI financial modeling for young companies. What follows is the inspirational founding story of QINVST, in the words of its co-founders, and how their journey is empowering others with smarter startup financial tools.

A Chance Meeting of Complementary Minds

The origin of QINVST begins with a chance encounter and a perfect mix of skills. Winnicent Zuo’s background blends finance with computer science, while Nicolas Frendo’s expertise lies in data analytics and asset pricing. They first met as graduate students at the University of Ottawa and connected over a shared passion for finance and technology. Winnicent recalls how discovering Nicolas’s work in data analytics and cryptocurrency immediately caught his interest. Likewise, Nicolas was deeply impressed by Winnicent’s financial savvy and drive:

It quickly became clear that their skills were highly complementary. Winnicent had industry experience in finance (even a prior AI startup in HR tech) and technical know-how in machine learning, whereas Nicolas brought strong data science chops and a personal drive to build something of his own. Coming from a family of entrepreneurs, Nicolas says “I wanted to continue the legacy of building new companies, especially ones that can help other startups”.

Their mutual respect and shared entrepreneurial spirit sparked an idea: why not team up to tackle one of the biggest gaps they observed in the startup world? As Winnicent puts it, “My background is in finance and machine learning... That’s why we noticed this gap in the market. Eventually we want to leverage our expertise to fill the gap.” QINVST was born from this very realization – that together, they could solve a problem that neither could address alone.

Spotting the Gap in Startup Finance

Both co-founders had witnessed a recurring issue: founders of early-stage startups struggle to access high-quality financial planning and modeling. Winnicent saw it repeatedly with fellow founders. “There’s definitely a big pain point in the market... early-stage startup founders don’t have enough resources to access high-quality financial modeling or any other financial services,” he explains. The options available were far from ideal:

• Do it yourself: Many founders try to handle forecasting and budgeting solo, which can be overwhelming if they lack finance experience.

• Hire expensive help: Others consider outsourcing to CFO consultants or big firms – an option so costly that it’s off the table for most small startups.
  

"The only choices for them are either they understand it themselves, or they have to spend a lot of money for outside services… Either one is very, very expensive," Winnicent notes. Nicolas saw the same problem from another angle. In the Canadian startup scene, he noticed that limited access to financial expertise was holding companies back. Unlike Silicon Valley, “there’s just not as much venture capital here... a lot of these startups are lacking finance help, they’re lacking forecasting help,” he says. Early QINVST beta users would tell them directly, “we just can’t afford to go to Deloitte for $50,000. We need something faster, more efficient… that you can just plug online.”  The market timing was perfect. It was the dawn of a new wave of startup financial tools, with artificial intelligence and cloud technology poised to make advanced financial modeling accessible. Winnicent and Nicolas realized that their combined backgrounds (finance + AI/data science) positioned them uniquely to build an “FP&A for startups” solution – essentially a virtual CFO powered by AI. “Communication with your team is extremely important... especially under this age of AI,” Winnicent emphasizes, highlighting how their technical and financial skills meshed in this era of unprecedented tech opportunity. They saw that leveraging AI could dramatically reduce the cost and time of financial planning for startups. This gap in startup finance – between what small startups needed and what they could afford – became the problem QINVST would aim to solve.

Taking the Leap with Conviction and Passion

Identifying a great idea is one thing; taking the leap to actually start a company is another. For Winnicent and Nicolas, conviction came from a blend of passion, personal sacrifice, and a long-term vision. In true startup fashion, they bootstrapped QINVST in its early days. Winnicent calls it the “credit card route” – the founders paid expenses out-of-pocket to get started, from conference fees to flights, rather than raise a tiny seed and give away equity too soon. This was a bold gamble for two young founders, but they felt it was necessary to maintain control and pursue their vision properly. “If we raised $50,000 [early on], we’d have to exchange a lot of equity… since we didn’t have a product or clients,” Winnicent explains. So they invested their own money and time, effectively betting on themselves.

What gave them the courage? A deep belief that the sacrifice would pay off. “For the long-term vision, we think it’s worth the time and opportunity cost because we enjoy solving those hard problems that normal people will easily give up,” Winnicent says, encapsulating their mindset. Both founders actually relish the challenge: every setback is seen as a learning opportunity to become true experts in this niche. “We solve a lot of problems that we never thought about before... we learn so much that we would never if we worked in a bank for a year,” Winnicent adds. In other words, the journey itself provides immense value in skills and knowledge.

Nicolas agrees wholeheartedly. He decided from day one that if he was going to start this venture, he was “in it to the end.” “Once you take on this project... I'm not going to leave this. Especially as you start to put more and more time, more and more of your own money, you gotta get to the end,” he reflects. This all-in attitude carried them through nights of uncertainty and risk. And there were plenty of those moments – times when any rational person might feel fear or doubt about quitting a stable path for an unproven startup. In those moments, the pair drew inspiration from mentors and famous founders who had walked similar paths. Nicolas mentions looking up to someone like Jim Balsillie of Blackberry, who famously “sacrificed everything he had just for his startup”. The message was clear: true entrepreneurs have to be willing to risk it all.

Equally important was an internal well of motivation. As Winnicent puts it, a founder needs relentless drive from within: “If you need someone else to motivate you, then startup is not for you... you have to always be self-motivated”. That ethos shaped the culture of QINVST from the beginning. Both co-founders would wake up every day “eager to continue solving the problem… to achieve our vision as soon as possible”. Their passion for helping other founders wasn’t just a talking point; it became the fuel that powered them through the inevitable ups and downs.

Building QINVST: First Steps and Early Challenges

With conviction in place, Winnicent and Nicolas officially set out to build QINVST. One of the very first orders of business was assembling a team and establishing how they would work together. As a remote-friendly startup with a small founding team, they knew communication and alignment were paramount. “One of the first things we did was build our network and ensure total transparency in the team,” Nicolas recalls. They made sure every member was on the same page by setting up clear channels and regular check-ins. At the same time, the founders threw themselves into networking externally: “When you start as a brand new company… no one knows who you are. You have to earn people's trust by going to events, introducing yourself, explaining your business and why it’s helpful,” says Nicolas. This meant countless pitch events, accelerator programs, and coffee chats – hustle that eventually paid off as they won early supporters.

Winnicent adds that meticulous planning was another key first step. Before writing much code, the team charted out a roadmap and execution plan. “In the beginning we built a roadmap... planned everything out before moving forward to avoid wasting time and make sure the team moves toward the goal together efficiently,” he explains. This early emphasis on coordination helped QINVST stay lean and focused. Of course, the journey was far from smooth. The co-founders are candid about the early struggles. “In the very beginning, we were struggling with many things,” Winnicent admits. Three big challenges loomed large in QINVST’s first six months:

• Crafting the narrative: How to tell their story in a compelling way. Because QINVST’s solution was innovative, and startup finance can be a traditional space, they found they had to educate the market. “We have to explain what we’re doing, why it’s different, why now, why us,” Winnicent says of pitching an AI-driven financial tool to investors and customers. There were countless questions and sometimes skepticism. The team learned to describe their product in simple terms, focusing on the value it brings rather than the technical complexity behind it.

• Designing the product: How to build a user-friendly platform that truly solves the founders’ pain. Early on, Winnicent and Nicolas spent long hours iterating on the user experience and financial models. They knew a cookie-cutter approach wouldn’t work. “Every company is very different. We couldn't just use a template and try to create something one-size-fits-all,” Winnicent notes. Their solution was to leverage AI to tailor models to each startup’s reality. “That's exactly why QINVST brings a customized solution leveraging AI and machine learning to create a financial model that can fit each startup,” he explains. This breakthrough – applying deep learning and asset pricing concepts to adapt to any company’s metrics – became a core differentiator for QINVST.

• Securing funding and customers: How to extend their runway and prove the product’s value. Like most new ventures, QINVST worried about funding in the early days and juggled a tight runway. The founders were constantly pitching, not only to investors but also to potential customers. Nicolas shares one vivid early lesson: interest from prospects doesn’t equal money in the bank. “In the very beginning, we had four or five interested companies in one crazy month, but only one or two actually closed. I learned the hard way that nothing is closed until the check deposits,” he recalls. The disappointment of deals falling through was tough, but it taught them persistence and realism in sales. Then came the highs – like signing their very first paying client. “Landing our first client, becoming revenue positive... there was a lot of excitement in the team because it showed some validation that we can get it done if we work hard enough,” says Nicolas, reflecting on that milestone. Early wins like that provided proof that QINVST was on the right track.
  

Through each challenge, the team at QINVST adapted and persevered. They refined their pitch to resonate with both tech-savvy founders and traditional investors. They continuously improved the platform’s algorithms to ensure accuracy and ease of use, positioning it as a cutting-edge AI financial modeling tool that even a non-CFO can navigate. And importantly, they built relationships – turning early skeptics into believers one conversation at a time. Every struggle, from explaining the product to closing the first deal, ended up strengthening the company’s foundation and the founders’ resolve.

A Vision to Empower Founders and Investors

What began as a simple idea – help startups with their finances – has evolved into a broader mission for QINVST. At its core, the vision of QINVST is to level the playing field in startup finance. That means empowering founders with insights previously only available to large corporations or those who could pay top-dollar for consultants, while also benefiting the investors who back those startups. Winnicent articulates this dual-sided vision clearly:

He points out a huge issue in the market: information asymmetry. Many promising startups struggle to present their business in a language investors understand, and investors miss opportunities because they lack visibility into those startups. QINVST aims to bridge that gap. By providing CFO-level insights at a startup budget, the platform makes startups’ financial health and potential more transparent. “We see there’s a huge information asymmetry in the market, and we want to fill that gap – make more startups visible to investors, and help investors make faster decisions,” Winnicent says of their long-term ambition.

Nicolas adds that while their mission has remained constant, the strategy has sharpened over time. “The vision is still to help early-stage companies, especially scaling it with machine learning and AI,” he notes, “but how we do it... has changed a bit.” Initially, QINVST explored various avenues in financial analytics. Eventually, they zeroed in on the area of greatest need: FP&A (Financial Planning & Analysis) for startups – basically budgeting, forecasting, and fundraising prep. “Now we’re more heavily focused on FP&A, more focused on forecasting, on getting these companies fundraising,” Nicolas explains. By honing in on this focus, QINVST can deliver tangible results: helping a startup know how much it’s really worth, plan its cash flow, decide when to raise money, or even evaluate an acquisition offer. “It’s about helping small businesses compete with large businesses on the financial playing field... making it a lot cheaper for small businesses through AI,” says Nicolas. In short, QINVST’s vision is to democratize sophisticated financial modeling and planning, so that being “small” or early-stage is no longer a disadvantage when it comes to strategic finance.

That vision is already bearing fruit. As QINVST’s platform gains traction, early users – both founders and investors – are finding value. Startups get clarity and confidence in their numbers, while investors get better data to inform their decisions. And the co-founders see this as just the beginning. They imagine a future where raising capital and planning growth is far less daunting for founders worldwide, thanks to tools like QINVST. In this future, the next great entrepreneur might not fall through the cracks simply due to lack of financial projections or polish – QINVST will have their back.

Conclusion: Join the QINVST Journey

The story of QINVST’s origin is a testament to what’s possible when passionate entrepreneurs tackle a real problem with innovative technology. Winnicent Zuo and Nicolas Frendo saw founders like themselves struggling with finance and knew it didn’t have to be that way. By combining their expertise in finance and AI, they built a solution that brings “AI financial modeling” to those who need it most. Their journey – from meeting over a shared idea, to bootstrapping on credit cards, to closing that first deal – is filled with lessons about resilience, focus, and staying true to a vision. It’s an inspiring reminder that even the toughest industry gaps can be bridged with the right mix of talent, timing, and tenacity.

QINVST today stands as more than just a product; it’s a mission to uplift an entire ecosystem of startups and investors. And the mission is just getting started. If you’re a startup founder wrestling with spreadsheets and projections, or an investor looking to empower your portfolio companies, QINVST invites you to be part of this journey. Reach out to the team, learn more about their platform, and see how they can help transform your startup’s financial future. In the age of AI, tools like QINVST are turning the once daunting world of startup finance into a more accessible, level playing field for all – and there’s no better time to join the movement. Learn more about QINVST and connect with us to supercharge your startup’s finance – together, let’s shape the future of startup success.