Business Model & Revenue Analysis
How to prepare your business model submission
This stage evaluates how your company generates revenue, how that revenue behaves over time, and whether the model is commercially viable.
You are not describing your idea.
You are describing how your business actually makes money, how it scales, and where it breaks.
Access to this submission is only provided after your Lions Den outcome.
How the submission works
You will:
define your pricing and revenue structure
break down your cost base
describe how you sell and close customers
explain retention, churn, and expansion
disclose any dependency risks
Your answers must reflect how your business actually operates today.
If your answers are inconsistent with your pitch deck, financials, or data room, the diagnostic cannot produce a reliable output and your submission may be rejected.
What you must prepare
This submission is structured exactly around the sections below.
1. Revenue Structure
You must clearly define:
your primary pricing model
any secondary pricing models
your average price per customer
your pricing tiers
Your model must be understandable in simple terms.
If someone cannot explain how you make money in one sentence, this section fails.
2. Cost Structure
You must identify:
your main cost drivers (payroll, marketing, infrastructure, support, etc.)
which cost category scales most with growth
This is used to understand:
margin potential
capital efficiency
operational pressure points
If you do not understand your cost structure, your model is incomplete.
3. Sales Model
You must describe how revenue is actually generated:
your sales motion (product-led, sales-led, hybrid, channel)
who closes deals (founder, sales team, self-serve)
your typical sales cycle length
This determines:
how quickly revenue can grow
how scalable your acquisition model is
A long or unclear sales process increases risk.
4. Revenue Durability
You must explain:
what drives customer retention
what causes customers to churn
how easy it is for customers to switch
This is one of the most important sections.
Revenue is not valuable if it disappears easily.
5. Expansion Mechanics
You must show how revenue grows over time from existing customers:
whether customers increase spend
how expansion occurs:
more seats
more usage
upsells
cross-sell
If your model does not expand, growth depends entirely on new customer acquisition.
6. Dependency Risk
You must disclose:
whether your business depends on external platforms
whether revenue or delivery relies on third-party systems
the nature of that dependency
High dependency introduces structural risk.
A scalable business that depends entirely on another platform is not fully controlled.
What this stage is actually testing
Investors are assessing:
whether your business model is clear and understandable
whether revenue is repeatable or one-off
whether margins can improve over time
whether growth is scalable or constrained
whether customers stay and expand
whether external dependencies limit control
If the model does not hold together, the opportunity does not progress.
What typically goes wrong
Most companies fail this stage because:
pricing is unclear or inconsistent
revenue model is not fully defined
cost structure is not understood
sales process is too long or undefined
retention is weak or unmeasured
expansion does not exist
dependency on platforms is hidden or underestimated
This stage exposes whether the business actually works as a system.
What to do before accessing the form
Before starting this submission:
define your pricing clearly
understand your unit economics at a basic level
map your sales process from first contact to close
identify why customers stay or leave
be honest about dependencies
You are not explaining your business.
You are proving that it functions.
Where this fits in your journey
You will access this submission after:
completing Lions Den
receiving your outcome
receiving your submission links
At that point, your business model is analysed and fed into valuation and investor readiness outputs.
Next step
Return to your onboarding flow and proceed once your Lions Den outcome has been received.