We’re called First Round for a reason.

Your first money in is one thing But so are your first hires, your first product and your first customers We’ve helped Notion, Roblox, Uber, Square, and 300 others tackle these firsts and more

Whether it’s pre-seed, seed or Series A, we’re building the world’s best product for founders who are just getting started

It’s never too early to reach out, but it can be too late We don’t see divisions between angel, seed and pre-seed — we’re interested across the board and find that founders’ needs are the same early on In fact, most of our 300+ companies came to us when they were a couple people and an idea, having raised no capital before they met us So, even if you don’t think you’re ready, we’d still like to get to know you Maybe we can even help in the meantime

Of course not While we’re usually the first money in, we’ve worked with a number of teams that raised a small friends and family round before coming to us That said, if you’ve already raised more than a few million dollars, we’re probably not a fit

Unfortunately, we’re named First Round for a reason If you’re raising your third or fourth round, consider one of the great VCs on this list of peer-ranked firms

No We don’t think VCs predict the future — founders do And we look to founders to teach us what’s next We were fortunate to invest in Uber before the rise of the on-demand economy We invested in Blue Apron before everyone jumped into food tech But all of our companies have one thing in common — we met the founders when they were just starting out

Yes, our investments tend to cluster around enterprise, consumer, hardware, fintech and healthcare That’s not where our curiosity ends If you’re building something different, we still want to hear from you and learn about the vision of the future you have in mind

The biggest factor in our decision-making is always the founding team How innovative, resourceful and resilient are you? What’s your superpower? Why are you going to be the ones to prevail where others won’t? What in your history shows that you thrive off the beaten path? Of course, we evaluate product and market too, but to be honest, we mostly look at that to evaluate the strength of founders too Looking at what you’ve done already for this company — and before in your career — gives us a record of hundreds if not thousands of decisions you’ve made to get you where you are today And that’s what success lives or dies on in this industry: the ability for founders to make really quick, good decisions We want to understand how you do it, and we give that a lot of weight

Above all, we look for compelling and contrarian insight into how the world works What do you understand about a market or a need that no one else does — that other companies in the space get wrong? And why is your company the most likely to win at addressing this gap? Second, if you have a product in market, a small group of passionate early customers is a strong indicator for us Several years ago, we heard a handful of our founders raving about a new business intelligence tool called Looker We reached out to the company and invested If there are people using your product or service who wouldn’t know what to do without you, we want to hear about it That’s one of the strongest data points you can offer As an extension of this, we want to see creative thinking around go-to-market strategy as well as product The best startups take both seriously

Third, we take a close look at the market you’re going after Let’s say you win the whole thing Is the prize worth winning? The game is long and hard, and some markets are more rewarding than others SaaS companies have a different range of opportunities than on-premise  software makers First-party retailers are valued very differently from third-party ecommerce sites To mix our metaphors, before a founder starts building their castle, they have to make sure they’ve picked the right piece of land

Building an enduring company is ridiculously hard You have to overcome inertia, have an unbelievable amount of conviction, and be willing to drive through brick walls You can’t wait for someone to hand you a roadmap You can’t even wait for a roadmap to come into focus You have to be able to draw it yourself and execute at the same time This is an exceedingly rare set of skills — and it’s what we seek to find in every founder conversation we have

That’s number one Then there’s all the typical stuff: integrity, credibility, market understanding, learning ability, etc But there are a few other things we haven’t seen written about or discussed to death that end up mattering a lot:

• Delayed gratification
• Being a founder is a constant, grueling exercise in deferring happiness and victory
• The most successful entrepreneurs are willing to sacrifice in the short term for long term impact
• When we consider working with you as a founder, we look for your willingness to make these tradeoffs earlier in your life and career
• Did you skip spring break to pursue a long-term project? Did you work while you were in school? Have you built anything that took months in heads-down crunch mode to make possible?
• Admit unknowns
• We’re always meeting the same two types of entrepreneurs
• The first thinks they’re expected to know the answer to every question
• So they’ll make sure they have a definitive response always, even if they shouldn’t
• They’ll tell us their pricing model
• Why they’ll be competitive with Google
• What will cause customer churn in three years
• Whenever we try to address potential risks, they tell us they don’t exist
• This is not our ideal type of founder
• The second type of entrepreneur will answer questions when they can, but when they don’t know, they say so
• When asked the same question about pricing, they might say, “Well, we’re considering a few different options depending on the outcome of some tests we’re running
• ” When asked about the cost of customer acquisition, their response could be, “We don’t know what our numbers will be, but here’s our model based on comparable companies
• ” When asked about the risks, they identify several — and engage us in discussion about how to handle them
• The founder who volunteers their ignorance has far more credibility
• No one expects a pre-launch company to have all the answers
• In fact, it’s a red flag if you think you do
• Don’t sell us on being 100% correct
• We’d much rather understand how you’re attacking the market, evaluating the risks, and taking on unknowns
• Good storytelling
• All successful founders can deliver a compelling narrative
• They have to be able to sell against the status quo
• They have to convince investors and employees that this incredibly unlikely thing they’re doing is about to take the world by storm
• They have to capture media attention, keep their board aligned and energized, and consistently bring new customers into the fold
• If a founder can’t tell an amazing story, it’ll be hard for them to do any of this
• If you’re interested in developing these skills, be sure to read The Seven Deadly Sins of Startup Storytelling, Transform the Way You Give Presentations and How to Tell a Story When Raising Capital
• Founder-market fit
• We’ve lost a ton of money betting on seasoned enterprise founders pursuing consumer ideas, and vice versa
• This doesn’t mean that our decision pivots on domain expertise — it means that a key part of our process will be determining whether a founder is capable of succeeding in the field they’re headed into
• We need to hear a good argument
• Rate of execution
• Great founders move very, very fast
• So if we meet with an entrepreneur over six weeks, we’re watching closely what they’re accomplishing at the same time
• If the company’s been around for 90 days or 6 months, we want to see how much they’ve gotten done in that period
• There are a ton of leading indicators there
• We want to work with companies and founders that make great speed a habit

Yes! While we have large concentrations of investments in those metro areas and Los Angeles, we’re interested in companies nationwide We are proud to fund companies like Crossbeam in Philadelphia, Verto Education in Portland, as well as fully distributed companies like RenoFi and Pequity

Originally published 4/22/16; Last updated 4/28/21 These answers vary from company to company, but there are some basic steps everyone goes through While we often try to move at the pace of the founder, an important rule applies: the less time we have to make a decision, the more conviction we have to feel about a company Sometimes we spend months developing a relationship (which, honestly, we prefer) Sometimes we move from intro to close in under a week Generally speaking, here’s what you can expect:

• Initial meeting: In advance of an initial meeting, we’ll look at any materials sent by the founder, determine whether the business fits our basic investment criteria, and try to ensure it’s not directly competitive with any of our existing investments
• Your first meeting (or phone call) with a member of the investment team will typically be between 45 minutes and an hour
• We let the founder do most of the talking, and hope they use the opportunity to dig into the specifics of their team and business
• Second meeting: Most of our “passes” occur after the initial meeting
• If you’ve made it past that meeting, you’ll spend more time with your First Round point partner as we both continue to learn more about each other
• This is our chance to focus in on particular areas of the business where we have questions — and for founders to ask us more about First Round, what working with us is like, and what they could expect as a member of our community
• Follow-up: Our partnership makes all decisions as a team
• So, we often introduce promising founders to another First Round partner for an additional conversation
• We often like to introduce the founder to the partner who has the “most skepticism” about the company at this point – as it ensures that all questions are addressed and gives us the ability to probe more deeply into the core assumptions of the business for an hour
• Partner meeting: If these conversations go well for both of us, we’ll typically make some reference/diligence calls and invite you to meet with the rest of the partners at our twice-weekly investment meeting
• Here, you’ll have about an hour to tell your story to the entire partnership and answer questions
• Typically, we fund about half of the companies that make it to our partner meeting
• Final Decision: After your presentation, our partnership will discuss your company in great detail with the goal to give you a final answer usually within 24 hours of the meeting

You can see more about our terms and how deal specifics usually work below

Ideas are easy to describe on paper People are not That’s why we’ve historically valued referrals from people we know and trust This includes people leading and employed by First Round companies, angel investors, other entrepreneurs, etc It gives us more data to work with

A direct referral will get a quicker response, but don’t be afraid to email us yourself We know good ideas can come from anywhere, so our partners review every single investment opportunity we receive, whether it’s through a warm intro or cold outreach

Originally published 4/22/16; Last updated 11/16/21 We tend to focus exclusively on companies based in the U S because that is where we have the most experience and can be the most valuable partners We’ve made a few exceptions for companies headquartered in Canada (like Buddybuild in Vancouver) and companies whose management is located in the US but has overseas development teams, but in general if you’re located outside of North America, we’re probably not the right investors for you

Typically, our initial investment in a startup ranges from $750k to $4 million, but we’ve gone higher and lower in some cases Currently, our average initial investment is right around $2 million As the largest seed-stage venture fund in the country, we’re very serious about supporting our companies with follow-on investing In fact, we reserve equal amounts of capital for our follow-on investment as our initial investment

Originally published 4/22/16 Last updated on 10/10/19 No Unlike some traditional venture funds who need 20 to 25% ownership requirements, we don’t We like to own enough of the company to make sure that we can dedicate meaningful time and resources to helping you build Our ideal ownership is roughly 15% after your seed round

Originally published 4/22/16 Last updated on 11/14/18