In the world of startup investing-where every pitch is dazzling, every market is a “trillion-dollar opportunity,” and every founder believes they’re leading a revolution-due diligence (DD) is what brings us back to earth. It’s a long, deep, and demanding process, but also the strongest tool we have as a VC fund to evaluate, clarify, and make critical decisions.
At our fund, like in many others, DD isn’t just a basic step before investing-it’s a core process meant to truly understand who we’re working with, what the potential is, and what the real risks are. It involves technical questions, business insights, a healthy dose of intuition-and above all, active listening and thorough investigation.
Over time, we’ve conducted DD for several early-stage companies. From those processes, we’ve gathered a few recurring insights. This is not a full checklist, nor a full manual. But these are the highlights we’ve found ourselves returning to again and again.