️How Top Founders Are Closing Rounds
️ How Top Founders Are Closing Rounds
In This Edition:
- Most Founders Fail Before Slide Two
- 15 Reports Every Founder Should Read
- The Investors Who Actually Go First
- ️ How Top Founders Are Closing Rounds
- ⚡ Stop Googling AI. Read This Instead
Busy Isn’t a Badge. It’s a Bottleneck..
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Most Founders Fail Before Slide Two
Your Pitch Deck Isn’t Magic — It’s a Test
Most founders think their pitch deck is a story.
In reality, it’s an exam — and investors are grading you, slide by slide.
The brutal truth?
Most founders fail before slide two.
The new eBook, The $0 Billion Pitch Deck Checklist, breaks down the six investor tests every deck must pass — and why most startups stumble where it matters most.
Here’s a preview of what you’ll discover
1️⃣ The Hook Test — Can investors “get it” in 3 seconds?
2️⃣ The Pain Test — Is your problem real, costly, and urgent?
3️⃣ The Clarity Test — Can a 12-year-old explain your solution?
4️⃣ The Math Test — Dream TAMs don’t count. Real numbers do.
5️⃣ The Evidence Test — Traction speaks louder than adjectives.
6️⃣ The Use of Funds Test — Be specific. “Runway” isn’t a strategy.
Every slide is a checkpoint — clarity, proof, and purpose win.
If you’re raising, revising, or just rethinking your deck — this checklist could save you months of rejections.
Remember: investors don’t read decks; they scan for reasons to say no.
This guide helps you eliminate them — one slide at a time.
Download the eBook — The $0 Billion Pitch Deck Checklist — and make sure your next deck passes every investor test ️
15 Reports Every Founder Should Read
15 Deep-Dive Reports That Will Redefine Your AI & Startups Strategy in 2025
Every week, hundreds of AI headlines flood your feed.
But only a handful actually move the needle for founders, investors, and operators.
So instead of doom-scrolling through hype, here’s a curated list of 15 must-read AI + VC reports worth your time this week.
Inside, you’ll find:
The real story behind the AI funding boom (FT)
Deep dives on valuations, growth rates, and VC trends
OpenAI’s leaked financials and public debate: IPO or stay private?
The Top 20 AI Agent Startups redefining the landscape
And new reports on State of AI 2025, Defence Tech, SaaS Survival, and more
From Meta’s latest AI research to VC reflections on courage and conviction — these insights paint a clearer picture of where the industry is heading next.
If you only read one AI roundup this week — make it this one.
Save yourself hours of digging. The gold is already filtered.
Explore every insight and download all 15 reports.
Stop post-purchase fraud before it drains your eCommerce business.
Running an eCommerce brand is hard enough, fraud shouldn't make it harder.
Post-purchase fraud, or "digital shoplifting," slips past checkout tools and costs DTC brands millions in disputes, wasted shipping, and lost revenue.
Chargeflow Prevent is the first AI-powered solution that stops fraud after payment but before fulfillment, cutting disputes by up to 90% with less than 0,1% false positives.
Stop Fraud in Its Tracks
The Investors Who Actually Go First
Looking for Pre-Seed Funding but Don’t Know Where to Start?
If you’re building your first product or still pre-revenue, you already know — finding the right investor is harder than building the MVP.
Most VCs talk about backing early-stage founders…
But only a few actually lead at pre-seed, when conviction matters more than traction.
That’s why this week’s roundup is a must-save:
50 Funds That Lead Pre-Seed Rounds — the investors who go first, not follow the crowd.
Here’s a glimpse
Operator-Led & Founder-First — Afore, Craft, Freestyle, Cowboy Ventures
Mission-Driven & Global — Better Tomorrow, Unshackled, MaC, TMV
AI & Deep Tech Focused — Gradient, Baukunst, Cantos, Bloomberg Beta
Fintech & SaaS Specialists — Deciens, Costanoa, Precursor Ventures
Hands-On & High Conviction — SignalFire, Unusual, Primary, Refactor
And that’s just the start. You’ll also find:
Fundraising playbooks, pitch deck templates, VC Q&A prep guides, and 2,500+ verified angel investors in AI & SaaS.
Whether you’re crafting your first pitch or prepping your next raise — this resource pack will save you weeks of searching.
Start thinking like the founders who never have to touch their runway.
Explore the full list + resources here.
How Canva, Perplexity and Notion turn feedback chaos into actionable customer intelligence
You’re sitting on a goldmine of feedback: tickets, surveys, reviews, but can’t mine it.
Manual tagging doesn’t scale, and insights fall through the cracks.
Enterpret’s AI unifies all feedback, auto‑tags themes, and ties them to revenue/CSAT, surfacing what matters to customers.
The result: faster decisions, clearer priorities, and stronger retention.
See how top teams do it
⚡ Stop Googling AI. Read This Instead
⚡The Fundraising Playbook Top Founders Use
Most founders don’t fail because investors say no.
They fail because they never learn how fundraising actually works behind the scenes.
Fundraising isn’t just storytelling — it’s strategy.
And the smartest founders know it’s about:
✔ Understanding investor psychology
✔ Structuring equity like a pro
✔ Benchmarking compensation realistically
✔ Valuing your startup with real data, not guesses
That’s exactly what Fundraising Resources 2.0 delivers — a curated playbook of insights, benchmarks, and frameworks trusted by top founders and VCs.
Inside, you’ll find
VC Mindset Decoded — from *Secrets of *Sand Hill Road& and Sam Altman’s Playbook
Equity & Compensation Tools — including 2025 calculators and real-world benchmarks
Valuation Resources — from Carta, AngelList & SAFE modeling tools
Founder Wisdom — timeless lessons from Naval, Paul Graham & Elad Gil
Because great fundraising isn’t just about the pitch.
It’s about structuring smarter — equity, valuation, momentum, and conviction.
If you’re raising in 2025, this isn’t a “nice to read.” It’s a must-download.
Download How Top Founders Are Closing Rounds — and unlock the full Fundraising Resources 2.0 guide here ️
How Top Founders Are Closing Rounds
Stop Asking for More AI Guides — Start Reading Smarter
Everyone’s talking about learning AI.
But most founders, creators, and engineers waste months bouncing between random blog posts and half-finished YouTube tutorials.
So let’s cut through the noise.
Here’s the only AI reading list you actually need — 9 books that’ll take you from beginner curiosity to production-level mastery.
AI Engineering — Chip Huyen
Build AI products, not just models.
Prompt Engineering for Generative AI — James Phoenix & Mike Taylor
Understand the art and science of talking to machines.
LLM Engineer’s Handbook — Paul Iusztin & Maxime Labonne
Practical frameworks for building and deploying LLMs.
⚙️ Designing Machine Learning Systems — Chip Huyen
The go-to guide for scalable ML pipelines.
Build a Large Language Model — Sebastian Raschka
A deep dive into architecture and optimization.
️ Building LLMs for Production
Turn prototypes into reliable, scalable products.
Hands-On Large Language Models — Jay Alammar & Maarten Grootendorst
Hands-on practice from two of the best explainers in AI.
Prompt Engineering for LLMs — John Berryman & Albert Ziegler
Master effective prompting strategies for real-world applications.
The AI Engineering Bible — Thomas D. Caldwell
A full-stack approach to AI systems and deployment.
Whether you’re a builder, researcher, or founder — this list isn’t theory. It’s your AI roadmap for 2025 and beyond.
WEB PICKS
⚛️ Google’s Quantum Chip Just Left Supercomputers in the Dust
Willow’s breakthrough proves a verifiable quantum advantage — running 13,000× faster than the best classical systems. The quantum era isn’t coming; it’s here.
AI Coding Tools Are Evolving Faster Than You Think
A new study maps the entire “design space” of AI dev tools — revealing how chat and agent-based systems are reshaping the future of programming.
Generative AI Is Already Paying Off — Literally
The 2025 State of Generative Media Report shows 65% of companies see ROI within a year. The hype? Finally backed by numbers.
We’re So Busy Chasing AI… We’re Forgetting Ourselves
Michael Buckley warns that our rush to adopt AI may cost us more than jobs — it might cost us our humanity.
