Founder Collective

About The Fund

Founder Collective is a seed-stage venture capital firm that emphasizes alignment with the founders at the early stages of their company's growth. Established in 2009, this fund primarily concentrates on a wide array of industries including Advertising Technology, Business Products and Services, Consumer Products and Services, E-commerce, Embedded Devices, Healthcare, Mobile, Marketplaces, Information Technology, and Software sectors. They have offices in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and San Francisco, California. Founder Collective is unique in its anti-thematic investment approach, opting to back visionary founders with 'weird and wonderful' ideas rather than following market trends or themes. They advocate for 'efficient entrepreneurship' where startups should raise minimal amounts of capital to accelerate growth while maintaining larger ownership stakes. The firm cites the case of The Trade Desk, which raised only $22.5 million in venture capital before its billion-dollar IPO, as an instance of such efficiency. The partners of Founder Collective have personal experience in founding and selling technology companies, which shapes their founder-first mindset. They prefer organic venture capital and have structured their firm to align closely with the financial interests of the entrepreneurs they invest in, even at their own short-term expense. Founder Collective's investment range typically lies between $400,000 and $2,000,000, with a sweet spot of around $1,000,000 for investments. They are involved in Seed, Series A, and Pre-seed funding rounds. The firm's assets under management are valued at $75,000,000. This strategy has resonated within the entrepreneurial community, as evidenced by their inclusion in well-regarded lists like The Seed 100 for the best early-stage investors and the Forbes Midas List.