CASE 5: Fx3x: Star Performance without a Star Attitude

Abstract

In late February 2013, Kristijan Danilovski, co-founder of Fx3x, a visual effects and animation company, was the guest of honor at the Macedonian National Television Studio One, which was covering the Oscar Awards ¹ ceremony currently underway across the globe in Hollywood. Three of the movies that Fx3x had worked on in the last year were nominated for Oscars and Life of Pi had just won an Oscar in the visual effects category. While the Fx3x artists celebrated the achievement, Kristijan was already thinking about the company’s next moves. Venture capital funding and potential mergers crossed his mind, among other considerations.

Macedonia. How far is it from Macedonia to the “Dream Factory”?

In this case, a young entrepreneur creates an EMMY-award-winning, Hollywood supplier of movie animation with a workforce of more than 120 employees.

In the process of attaining success — considering the fact that most mid-sized firms in that space died — the company faced a huge dilemma: whether they should (a) remain a smaller player with modest growth (which would also free them of trying to secure external capital); (b) try to raise significant VC money to push for rapid growth and become a large player; or (c) to try become a mid-sized player despite the fact that it seems to be a “death zone.”