Runway is the simplest survival number there is: cash in the bank divided by what you burn each month. But revenue rarely stands still — grow it fast enough and you break even before the cash runs dry. That's the line between default alive and default deadPaul Graham's terms: a startup is default alive if its current growth carries it to profitability before the money runs out, and default dead if it doesn't — without raising more or changing course..
≈ €500 000 ÷ €80 000 net burn a month.
The balance slides toward zero — where it hits the line is the day the money's gone. Rising revenue bends the slope flatter, but here it doesn't bend in time.
| Revenue growth / mo | Runway |
|---|---|
| 0%now | 6.3 modead |
| 3% | 6.4 modead |
| 6% | 6.5 modead |
| 10% | 6.8 modead |
| 15% | 7.4 modead |
| 25% | ∞alive · profit in 7.2 mo |
Same cash, same spending — only the monthly revenue growth changes. Watch for the threshold where the runway flips from a finite countdown to ∞: that's the growth rate that turns default dead into default alive. Click a rate to load it above.