This week we interview French entrepreneur, Nathalie Gaveau in our 100 Interesting Roles a Woman Can Take in Tech. Currently, she is starting her second venture in e-commerce after a successful exit of Priceminister.com, which she co-founded in 2000 in a tiny kitchen in Paris and sold in June 2010 to Rakuten.

Nathalie talks about starting out quickly, finding and growing a team and advisers, getting funded, the steps to and after the exit and the -eternal question- what's next? And what Bruce Lee taught her....

Q. Co-founding and exiting: a dream for most entrepreneurs. How do you feel?

NG: I feel great. It’s a wonderful achievement, rewarding a massive collective effort from the whole PriceMinister team. Since day one, I’ve always been very proud of the company, knowing it had huge potential.Over the past 10 years, we’ve been approached to sell the business but it was more interesting to grow it further.

To me, it shows that there are still big business opportunities in e-commerce, for both entrepreneurs and investors. Just yesterday, I was reading the U.S. Comscore report saying retail e-commerce market enjoyed healthy double-digit growth rates. The dream just started…

Q. How did you start, how did you find the idea for the company?

NG: We started in a tiny kitchen in the centre of Paris, as a team of three co-founders. We became five very quickly as we brought on a CTO and CMO.

I knew one of the other co-founders (Pierre Kosciusko-Morizet) from business school. We both graduated from HEC Entrepreneurs in 1999 and were very good friends. He found the idea while he was in the U.S.

Our initial model was Half.com, a fixed price trading platform, which eBay bought in June 2000 for $350 million. It was a great business model: commission-based, no stocks or logistics, cash positive. We decided to adapt it in France.

3. How did you find your team? What was the USP of your success as a team? And your role?

NG: The co-founding team was through close connections and friends’ recommendations. The USP (unique selling point) is that we got along very well, being both complementary as well as totally aligned on the project deliverables.

My role was MD and I was looking after the commercial aspects of the site – including sourcing products, managing the offering and our network of sellers. We launched the site with 100,000 products available for sale. I was very involved in the seed funding and website development as well.

Q. Customer first of funding? What was your route? How many investor talks before you hit it?

NG: In September 2000, the dot-com bubble had burst so it was not easy. We met a few VCs but quickly realized that it would initially be faster to get angels. We first chose the route of bringing on board great individual investors. Not only did they fund us, but it also created a unique ecosystem around PriceMinister. We got VCs (3i) only a few years later.

Q. When did you start thinking about selling, and what did you do for it?

NG: We were always more thinking about growing than selling. We considered an IPO in 2008/9 but the economic environment wasn’t ideal. We focused on building the best business, which made us a good target in return.

Q. And now? What are you going to do with the $$$$ Investing in other people? if so, what type of companies?

NG: I’m going to diversify and invest aggressively to turn my $$$$ into $$$$$$$$$. I’m only 34 years old so it’s awesome to be able to have so much freedom. I’m interested in everything related to e-commerce, surely investing in people but probably my new venture staff in priority.

Q. Why start again a company? What are you doing different than before?

NG: I’ve got a new idea that answers today’s consumers’ needs. It’s both very useful and has a positive effect for the environment and local communities. The product is different but the execution is going to be quite similar to what I did before.

Q. Who was your mentor? Did you come across other entrepreneurs who helped out? Or was the team enough?

I had a few mentors indeed, especially as I was 25 when I co-founded the company and it was good to get some experienced points of views. Some entrepreneurs invested in PriceMinister, or became our marketing partners.

As long as it’s a win win relationship, it’s a no-brainer to share and collaborate. The team is always the starting point, but the more I was able to leverage beyond the team, the fastest I was. It seems that there is a right balance between talking and getting inspired and then doing and focusing on your actual objectives without being too distracted from your original vision.

Q. Any best advice you have?

Having spent the last 3 years in Hong Kong, I discovered different perspectives and I love Bruce Lee’s approach about perseverance. He developed his own philosophy of "practicality, flexibility, speed, and efficiency" because he thought that traditional martial arts were too rigid. He had “the style of no style”, which is so unique.

That’s one thing I’ve learnt along the years: always be yourself, express yourself and have faith in yourself. Hack way the unessential and then constantly learn and improve. “Be water my friend” as he said…