Detailed curriculum

A macro overview of venture capital at the time of your cohort. We read and analyse over 10 industry reports to build a summarised version that will help you understand the good, the bad and the ugly happening in venture currently (updated for every cohort, with the latest reports published in that quarter).

Where is the money coming from? Who is investing more – funds, angels, corporate venture? Which stage is getting more cheques and the average sizes of these rounds? Is is really a crisis? Are female founders still massively overlooked when it comes to fundraising? Who are the top investors in each market? Is Europe still leading ESG investments? We do the work so you don’t have to; you get a summarised, digestible and explained version of the current landscape.

We see it everyday: a lot of founders go out to raise capital without a basic understanding of Venture Capital. In this session we cover the most basic mistakes that lead to a scary number of founders failing to raise their rounds. We’ll also explain the fundraising process, how long it takes, the number of meetings you need (for Seed, Series A, Series B), what investors focus on on your deck and more. All backed by the latest market data.

Understanding the structure and the business model of a VC firm is key when fundraising. If you don’t know what motivates a VC, what sort of returns they expect, how they measure their success, the timeline of a fund, etc, you are more prone for falling into traps. Besides, how can you impress and convince your audience if you don’t understand their world and their priorities?

Venture Capital is not for everyone. It’s difficult, risky and full of complexity. Liquidation preferences, board seats, control rights, anti-dilution… what? Yes, we’ll make sure you fully understand what you’re getting into and have clear reasons to move forward. 

How do so many founders end up with ZERO percent of their company at exit? Dilution, or more precisely, structured dilution, aka dilutive terms designed by rogue investors. We’ll show you who, how, and especially how to avoid it

In case you decide Venture Capital is not really for you (right now or ever), we’ll also cover alternative forms of funding. There are at least seven other options when it comes to raising capital. Although we don’t focus on the more in depth details of each of them, the Bootcamp will give you a good idea of the options you have if VC is not right for your startup. 

Often enough founders see VCs as a walking cash machine, ready to give them money just because they asked for it, and failing to realise investors also run a business, have goals, targets, someone to report to and expectations. This session details the spoken and the unspoken in the complex dating game of raising investment.

You walk out of the Bootcamp with a full understanding of the differences in raising a round, depending on the stage you are in. Do investors’ expectations change from one round to the other? Do you need more meetings? Different documents? More traction? We’ll break the differences down for you. 

There’s more to a VC’s investment process than you’d imagine. And not all of it is disclosed in podcasts, LinkedIn posts and investors’ blogs.  

“We don’t have competition”. Strike: out! That one is pretty obvious and well discussed, but Investors have a long mental checklist of spoken (and unspoken) deal breakers, things that reduce your chances of raising investment. You get a detailed list of instant disqualifiers and rejections so you can map yourself against it and avoid any obvious red flags.

Sadly, not everything is friendly in the world of Venture Capital. Investors might be using you as we speak, disguising that in interest for your startup. Do you know to spot their fishing techniques and traps? 

An entire glossary of VC lingo and jargon. Everything you need to know to speak their language and level up with the best investors. Don’t get into a meeting without mastering this. 

Understanding the hierarchy of a VC fund is also key in navigating your fundraising process. Who is who, who does what and, most importantly, who can help you and who calls the shots. 

Often enough investors will pressure you to accept a term sheet that favours them and hurts you, your team and your business. Yup, it happens. We’ll explain the most common term sheet tricks and how to negotiate your way out of them. This session alone can save you money, time and pain. The stuff we learnt along the way (sadly by making our own mistakes) and that no Tech Crunch article can teach you.

There’s a bunch of mistakes and misconceptions that can harm your fundraising process. From not approaching enough investors to thinking investors are all the same. 

The most active funds are not those you think. Forget what the press says, we’ll drop the common misconceptions and point you in the right direction.

Most founders don’t fully understand the entire documentation pack they need to nail their round. What each document is made off, in which order to produce and distribute them. The Bootcamp covers this in detail, with examples, templates and guides on how to build them. If you think a pitch deck is all the documentation you need to fundraise successfully, uhh, you’re very wrong. You’ll come out of the programme knowing exactly how to build your Executive Summary, Pitch email, In-person pitch deck, Leave behind pitch deck, Investor Memorandum, financials, and printed Q&A list. We will also help you create your unique investor proposition, the investor hooks and building blocks upon which all of your documentation pack will be built on.

Our first look into your pitch and how you explain your business. We start to unpack the elements of your pitch, looking for potential hooks that could be use to capture an investor’s attention. 

You don’t have to be a native English speaker or actor to pitch well. You don’t have to overcomplicate your pitch just because your technology is über complex either. And we can prove it! We’ll show you examples of good live and online pitches, that challenge the usual conceptions about pitching.

We start this module translating all the financial metrics VCs expect to see and what’s behind the request. Don’t think that just screenshotting your financial model will do, on the contrary! 

If you’re pitching for investment, you need to show VCs what is in it for them – and by that, we mean, how big a return on the investment you can get them. Most founders don’t even know they need a financial storyline, let alone how to build that narrative. This session is focused on the reasons to build one, how to do it and successful examples.

Simple methodologies on setting up your valuation. It’s simpler than you think.

Confess: you are guilty of screenshoting your P&L, pasting it to your deck and praying investors don’t ask. There’s a point to VCs questions around your financials: we’ll translate what they request and what it actually means.

Which KPIs and metrics are important for your documentation, what truly matters if you’re a SAAS business vs. an e-commerce or app. How to present these KPIs in the simplest and most impactful way.

If you’re pitching investors you need to know how much money you are asking for and how far you can get with that money. Should you optimise for runway or valuation? We’ll explain all this, in detail. 

It happens, sometimes your traction is not exactly where you hoped for, and, yet, you still need to present that to investors in the best possible way. Fear not, we know the way! 

Yeah. There are thousands of new startups in the market every day. Your competition is fierce and investors are tired of seeing the same old same. How do you differentiate in a sea of startups? We have the answer.

What’s unique and special about your startup, your product, your team? Investors are looking for the next big thing, the next innovation that will disrupt an entire industry. You don’t want to look like just another “uber for something”. 

Or if you don’t have anything that actually makes you different or special, we’ll show you how to work around that by distorting the reality field.

What are the most common hooks you can use to capture the attention of an investor? 

Investors back people. Final stop. You need to make sure you present yourself and your team in the best light possible. And by that, we don’t mean with giant pictures of your face.

What actually matters to investors in your team configuration. And why. 

To build your investor documentation you will need to be a an astute data researcher. We’ll share all tricks and data tools we use so that you can find the reports, articles and information that backs your vision. The powerful stuff investment bankers have and mere mortals don’t, until now.

We’ll explain our 4,500 investor list (UK, EU, USA and APAC), with verified emails, which you get for free as part of the programme. How to navigate it, and how to use it intelligently.

Not all VCs are the same and you shouldn’t treat them as so. We’ll explain what you need to consider when assessing investors and how to put a target list together.

POP: our own Bootcamp methodology on how to prioritise investors and how to approach them in an order that makes sense – which we’ll bet, is the opposite of what you think!

Gain access to our own investor tracker, so you can manage your outreach process in a simple and consolidated place.

There are a number of things you need to consider when deciding who are the best investors for your startup. We’ll explain them in detail and our tricks to obtain that information.

The key differences (pros and cons) of raising in Europe vs. the US and the different expectations VCs have in each region.

During Bootcamp each company gets three one-on-one sessions focused on their documentation pack, their specific fundraising goals and challenges (not sure how to present your financials? We can help!). We usually use these sessions to give feedback on your pitch deck and to discuss the iterations you work on. We do this in a group setup so that you can also learn from other founders and their challenges. If you could have an investor building your pitch deck for you, this would be it!

Investors are not all the same. You must approach the ones who are highly targeted to you and you must know how to rank them by order of priority. 

Introductions are the way to go around when it comes to meeting VCs. We’ll teach you the steps and tools you need to do that effectively.

Yeah, you read it right. It happens, we’ll show you how to recognise and avoid the trap.

Mastering your first approach email is key for first impressions and getting the best response rate you possibly can. We’ll show you our tested and proven templates.

If you can’t get introduced, cold emails work too! As long as you do them the right way. We’ll dissect a good cold email and explain how you can build yours. Plus, fail-proof templates.

Like any good email campaign, you’ll have to follow up and chase investors. There’s a right and a wrong way to do it. We’ll explain both.

Fundraising is a process and it’s critical that you understand the stages and timings of that process and how to prioritise accordingly.

If everything goes well, you’ll be dealing with multiple investors at the same time. We’ll share our secrets on how to handle and play the dynamics so that you create FOMO and close the round in your timeline, not the investors’. Tricks you can only know if you’ve fundraised multiple times.

Learn the ins and outs of pitching face to face and over video. Exercises and techniques for the perfect delivery.

During Bootcamp each company gets three one-on-one sessions focused on their documentation pack, their specific fundraising goals and challenges (not sure how to present your financials? We can help!). We usually use these sessions to give feedback on your pitch deck and to discuss the iterations you work on. We do this in a group setup so that you can also learn from other founders and their challenges. If you could have an investor building your pitch deck for you, this would be it!

During Bootcamp each company gets three one-on-one sessions focused on their documentation pack, their specific fundraising goals and challenges (not sure how to present your financials? We can help!). We usually use these sessions to give feedback on your pitch deck and to discuss the iterations you work on. We do this in a group setup so that you can also learn from other founders and their challenges. If you could have an investor building your pitch deck for you, this would be it!