Tomás Penaguião judges founders less by how original their ideas are and more by whether they can turn those ideas into a real market use case, and he treats fundraising like a structured sales process, with organized outreach, tailored pitches, and follow-up rather than a one-time ask. He also argues that Portugal's small market size pushes its best startups to think internationally early, points to the region's solar, wind, and coastal advantages as a real opportunity for renewable energy, and sees the bigger challenge in Iberia as turning university research into actual companies rather than a lack of talent. Having joined Bynd as its second employee and handled everything from marketing to finance like a founder building his own business, he gives founders concrete advice, such as not giving up more than 20-25% of their company in a single funding round, and looks for early signs like complementary teams, deep market knowledge, resilience, and 6-9 months of real traction.