Christian Reber experienced an unprecedented rollercoaster ride with his start-up pitch. In the end he was burnt out and ended up in the clinic. Here he speaks for the first time about his illness, mercilessly and honestly – and about how he is fighting his way back.
By Niklas Wirminghaus
The place where Christian Reber fled from exhaustion seems like a small paradise. On the edge of an otherwise desolate industrial area southwest of Palma de Mallorca lies “The Circle”, a stylish co-working building that a German real estate developer built in the style of a Silicon Valley office; with planted interior walls, hipster cafeteria and a courtyard with olive trees. Reber has rented a tiny office for two directly behind the reception, which he shares with his wife. This is where he now spends his working days. Reber welcomes you in a hoodie and one of those simple black chinos that only turn out to be sweatpants upon closer inspection.
Christian Reber moved to the island with his family last year, like many other German entrepreneurs. He says he needed a change of scenery after 16 years in Berlin. That’s the one big change. The other is that he starts his working days at the “Circle” at 9 a.m. and ends at 4 p.m. Then he takes the children out of school and devotes himself to family life and his hobbies, hiking or, more recently, padel tennis.
Sounds like a pretty normal working day? Not for a serial founder like Christian Reber. The man in his mid-thirties with the Brandenburg accent, who can laugh so loudly and contagiously, was until recently CEO of one of the most important German start-up hopes, the Powerpoint attacker Pitch. With a valuation of $600 million, the company was one of the next unicorn candidates. At its peak, Reber had 200 employees – and often 14-hour working days, from 8 a.m. to 10 p.m.
But a few weeks ago he announced his retirement. An unusual step that caused a stir – also because Pitch simultaneously laid off 80 employees and paid out a large portion of its investors in order to grow carefully in the future without risk capital and on its own. But without Reber. He wrote on Linkedin: “I need a break.”
An immoral Offer
What had happened behind the scenes could only be guessed at. Reber is now clearing the air with Capital, reporting on how the last few years have been for Pitch and him as a founder – and why he ultimately had to decide to withdraw. It’s a story about the unprecedented tech boom of the early 2020s, when money cost nothing and demand seemed endless, about the downturn that followed due to war, inflation and high interest rates – and about the price that founders personally pay on such roller coaster rides , with their psyche, with their health.
2023, the year in which Reber will flee to Mallorca with his family, begins with his collapse. He tells:
I just told my team that I can’t even sit at the dinner table with my children anymore. I’m completely exhausted, I’m having panic attacks, I can’t sleep anymore, I’m completely exhausted. I need a break. I then decided to go to a clinic to have my burnout treated.
To understand how this came about, you have to go back even further, to spring 2021. Pitch had only been on the market for six months when Reber received an almost immorally good offer. The tech boom was almost at its peak at the time, investor money was flowing in unprecedented amounts, and the founder was able to raise the insane sum of $85 million for his start-up without much effort. He had originally even considered setting up Pitch without any investors, financed only from his own assets. It would have been a modest, lean venture, not one of those start-up ventures that, pumped up with millions of investors, conquer the world at high speed.
But the temptation is too great. Led by Tiger Global, the most active venture capitalist in the world at the time, the financiers pushed Reber to value the company at $500 million. And Reber does as he’s told: he accelerates growth, hires people, turns the big wheel. “Let’s go big or go home” is his slogan.
The world is different
A year and a half later, in the fall of 2022, the world is different. War is raging in Ukraine, energy costs have skyrocketed, and the economy is threatened with recession. Pitch’s growth plans are a waste of time. And the flood of venture capital has completely dried up. Reber has to react, it is important to extend the so-called runway – the period for which the money lasts. There is the first round of layoffs for Pitch: 60 employees are laid off. “Brutal” is the word that comes to mind when Reber looks back. “I cried like a castle dog.”
It was then said: ‘Okay, Christian, you have decided to reduce the size of the company by a third. Now please tell us how we proceed.’ I should have replied: ‘Shit, honestly, I don’t know, it’s too much for me.’ But I didn’t say it out loud. Instead, I called a product strategy meeting for next week. And then I sat at home, already completely exhausted, and tried to rethink the strategy. And then I realized: I can’t do it anymore. When you’re used to being in a leadership position and you realize that it’s no longer possible, then everything suddenly collapses. Like a house of cards.
Source: Stern
