Learn more about the LvlUp process and unique offerings for our LPs.
We want to ensure we are attracting deals our partners may miss.
Our Venture Scout Program is an active visionary, entrepreneurial, investing, and operating community. Scouts work with Partners & fellow scouts to identify, educate and invest in the Startups in their network while building their personal investment portfolio & developing their venture track record.
Our scouts are tasked with finding high quality deal flow and sharing it with us. In exchange, we provide them with a piece of our carry if we end up investing.
Founding Partner Investments
Startup Failure Rate
VC Funds raised by Portfolio Teams
We love when LPs want to become active in our mentorship pool and pass along their knowledge.
We believe that there is often more power in opening the rolodex than in opening the checkbook. And pairing motivated teams with the right mentors helps make an immediate impact on the value of an investment.
Mentors are incentivized with additional "sweat" equity from our carry.
Even the most seasoned founders can struggle with fundraising and in the formative stages of a business, endless investor networking can be an unnecessary distraction.
We prefer to keep our founders focused on building momentum through product development and customer acquisition. We help our teams refine their pitch and make strategic intros to investors in our network to assist in closing their rounds faster to keep them focused.
Founders can immediately benefit by having access to our communities on Slack and Discord (750+ and growing). Our community members are investors, fellow entrepreneurs, and early-stage enthusiasts whose insights and backgrounds can be leveraged for beta testing, target customer connections, and more.
An exciting benefit of our mentorship matching, community-building and deal-flow network is that many partners are actively exploring acquisition & merger opportunities.
Mentors may even be connected with a potential acquisition target.
With so many experienced operators and former founders in our mentorship & LP network, we have vertical-specific individuals to tap into who have been through multiple exits to coach our founders through that process when the time is right.
All applications (whether general or through our partners & venture scouts) are centralized and sent to our digital deal warehouse.
Our digital review interface calculates a base score to help prioritize review. All applications are reviewed within 4-5 business days and first call invites are sent to stand-outs.
Introductory call with 1-2 LvlUp team members.
We reconvene as a team and share relevant information from first call and update internal scoring.
If there is additional interest, we request a second call.
Typically scheduled with 2-3 LvlUp team members, including a partner and/or subject matter expert.
We reconvene as a team to discuss the startup and share relevant information gathered from the 2nd call. At this point we have learned enough to either enter DD or reject.
Companies are invited to complete our Due Diligence Questionnaire and we request access to their data room.
We further validate company's customer pipeline.
Upon reviewing the Due Diligence Questionnaire and data room, we’ll discuss further with any subject matter experts and schedule a 3rd and/or 4th call to further discuss.
We’ll meet again as a team to discuss any outstanding questions or concerns. Send term sheets.
We look for companies who have validated product-market fit with scalable potential, ed by strong founding teams with the intangibles needed to take their ventures to the next level.
Under $1 million
> 10%
18 - 24 months
Up to $250,000
< $15 million
Many of our LPs are experienced operators with valuable insight they are willing to share.
Not only does this help our teams succeed, but it gives hands-on LPs a chance to earn additional non-cash equity.
Our level of involvement helps us negotiate better deal terms, including:
Pro Rata Rights
Ratchet Protection
First Right of Refusal
Liquidity Options
In future priced equity rounds, we build-in the option for early liquidity options for those who wish to exercise them.
We are exploring incentives for liquidity event options to roll disbursements into future funds.
Co-Founder of Quake Capital, highlighted by CrunchBase for making the second-most investments in female-led startups (2018).
250+ Startup Investments, with 84% still active, 9 previous exits. 10X+ return on portfolio of active investments within last 6 years.
Extensive network of over 1,000 investors.
Frequent collegiate guest lecturer & startup judge.
Technical managing partner bringing over a decade of frontier tech experience and 5+ years of investment experience prior to LvlUp.
Four-time venture-backed CTO with 3+ years leading startup consultant firm assisting in pitch deck creation, fundraising, coaching, and more.
10+ years of full-stack dev. experience in FinTech, SocialTech, MedTech, and more.
New York University, Masters
Product and strategy leader with experience building at massive organizations and scaling Startups across the Fintech, Healthtech, Collaboration, Insuretech, Wearables and AI industries.
Head of Partnerships at DealMaker.
Adam is a determined leader and expert problem solver, who takes a very hands-on approach with founders.
3 years of experience managing associates and working with a variety of startups across several industries.
Frequent Event & Pitch Competition Organizer, Host, and Participant
Co-Founder of a stealth mode cryptocurrency mining company.
B.S. Economics, Occidental College
Four-time startup founder, creating and leading industry-leading enterprises like DebateIsland.com and The American Post.
9+ years of operating experience across VC-and-non-VC-backed startups and a multi-billion-dollar technology and strategy company in the Media, AI, FinTech, and Government Consulting industries.
Strategically advised and invested in about 20 companies.
Frequent Conference and Podcast participant.
Former founder and operator with 10 years of experience in early and growth stage startups in a variety of industries from health tech to CPG.
2x venture backed executive (COO & COS).
3 years of experience allocating $30M per year of federal funding to advanced industry startups in bioscience, clean tech, aerospace, and advanced manufacturing.
Active startup mentor, coach, and strategic advisor with a passion for supporting high-impact and undercapitalized founders.
BA University of Denver - Business and International Economics