Find out if your startup is venture fundable, before the market tells you the hard way.
Shawna, the Institute's concierge, will interview you the way an investment committee would. You will receive one of three verdicts, and a straight answer either way.
Interviews are read by the Institute so that a person can follow up where it would help. Please share nothing you would not want read.
Welcome to the Institute. I am Shawna. Tell me what you are building, in a sentence or two, and I will begin asking the questions a venture partner would ask. I promise you a straight answer at the end.
The Verdict
Every plan interviewed receives exactly one of three findings, delivered warmly, early, and with reasons. We never encourage first and walk it back later.
Upon interview of the founder and review of the plan as reported, the Institute renders one finding:
The Ledger
An institute that tells everyone yes is selling something. We publish our count.
Meet the Venture Capitalists
Fifty firms, in one place. What each publicly says it is looking for, how it wants to be approached, and what that means for your pitch. Not an endorsement, just the field, laid out plainly.
States over 80 percent of its investments are the first check. Runs Edge for pre-idea founders, with no requirement to take Greylock capital.
Sequoia CapitalSeed through growthPublicly rejects the idea that you are too early. States 75 percent of its seed companies went on to raise a Series A.
Bessemer Venture PartnersSeed through growthStates 62 percent of its investments are pre-revenue. Publishes its actual investment memos and sector roadmaps.
Khosla VenturesSeed · Early · GrowthPublishes the clearest stage-by-stage criteria in venture: what changes between a seed pitch and a Series B pitch.
CRVSeed · Series AReturned capital and deliberately shrank its fund. Smaller funds need smaller exits, which changes what counts as a win.
BenchmarkSeries APublishes no criteria at all. Knowing that saves you a week of searching for a thesis that does not exist.
The Accelerators
Fifteen programs across six continents, with published terms, application routes, and the dilution math a founder should run before applying. This is the part of the funding world that takes applications from strangers.
Terms changed recently and most of the internet still quotes the old deal. Now $220,000 for 5 percent plus an uncapped SAFE.
The equity-free tierZero dilutionMassChallenge, Creative Destruction Lab, Plug and Play and Start-Up Chile take no equity at all. The most underrated option in the field.
Deep tech and scienceLabs and workshopsHAX and IndieBio offer engineering floors and certified wet labs. No generalist program can match the physical infrastructure.
Pre-idea and co-founder programsBefore the company existsEntrepreneur First and South Park Commons back individuals before teams form. One pays an equity-free grant while you look.
Terms change often and are widely misreported. Every entry says where the figure came from, and tells you to verify on the program's own page before you act.
The Library
The reference shelf venture capital has never had: one hundred twenty six works, cross-checked against the venture course syllabi at Harvard, Stanford, Chicago Booth, Wharton, and MIT.
Nine percent of VCs use no financial metrics at all, seventeen percent at early stage, and almost half admit to gut decisions.
Valuation Is a Term, Not a NumberTermsAll 135 unicorns studied were overvalued by their headline numbers, one by 171 percent, because preferences ride along.
One Firm in a ThousandThe Third VerdictVC financed firms are 0.11 percent of new US companies. Venture buys scale and speed, not profitability.
Grants Are the Road to VentureAlternativesAn SBIR award roughly doubles the odds of raising VC afterward. Non dilutive capital is a strategy, not a consolation.
Terms of Engagement
month to month
Every fee is flat. The Institute never takes a percentage of a raise and never charges contingent on a close. That is a compliance principle, not a pricing strategy.
Complete the interview first; the finding is where the work begins. Month to month, ended whenever the work is done. A director replies personally. Meet the Executive Director →