Fundraising guide
How to Raise Your First Check in Europe
Use this to understand what European fundraising rewards instead of importing a Silicon Valley script that doesn't fit.
A practical first-check fundraising guide for Europe: what to prove, who to meet, how to run the round, and how local instruments, grants, and cross-border investor maps change the raise.
Best for pre-seed and first-check conversations across European hubs
Europe is different, not worse
The thesis
Do not cosplay Silicon Valley. Europe is fragmented, relationship-heavy, and unevenly capitalized. That can be annoying. It can also be an advantage if you use local credibility, public money, and cross-border investor maps instead of pretending the continent is one giant Sand Hill Road.
At first-check stage, the investor is usually underwriting founder judgment, market pull, and speed of learning. The deck matters. The work behind the deck matters more. Your job is to make the case simple enough that a good investor can retell it without you in the room.
Not every good company is a venture case
Decide if VC is the right tool
A company can make you wealthy, useful, and proud without being a VC-backed company. Venture money is built for outlier outcomes because the investor's portfolio needs a few companies to carry many losses. If your company can be excellent without that pressure, keep the optionality.
If you do raise VC, raise because the money changes the slope: faster learning, faster distribution, harder technical risk reduction, or a real shot at a market big enough to repay the pressure.
- 01Use VC when speed, capital intensity, network effects, or category timing make delay expensive.
- 02Use angels, revenue, grants, or loans when ownership and flexibility matter more than racing.
- 03Do not stretch a solid local business into fake venture language just to access capital.
- 04If there is a venture case, make the big-if explicit: what becomes enormous if the first wedge works?
Credentials, innovation, execution
Know what investors are underwriting
Most first-check decisions sit on three vectors: credentials, innovation, and execution. Credentials are why this team gets unusual access or insight. Innovation is why the company is meaningfully different, not just nicer. Execution is proof that the market is starting to move toward you.
You usually want to be strong on two of the three. If one is weak, do not hope investors ignore it. Patch the gap with evidence, expert signal, or a tighter story about why this wedge works now.
- 01Credentials: why you, why now, and why serious people in the category should answer your call.
- 02Innovation: what changed in technology, regulation, behavior, supply, or distribution that makes this newly possible.
- 03Execution: revenue if it matters, but also pilots, usage intensity, design partners, technical milestones, retention, paid tests, or letters of intent.
- 04When someone says 'come back with more traction,' translate it into the weak vector. Often they are saying they do not yet believe the credentials or innovation story.
- 05Do not use vanity proof. Newsletter signups are rarely as useful as one painful customer workflow, one signed pilot, or one respected operator leaning in.
Pre-seed is an expectations market
Position for difference, not better
At first-check stage, investors are buying an expectation about where the company could go. 'We are better than X' is a hard sell. 'The world changed, so a different company can now exist' is easier to believe and easier to repeat.
Anchor the round around an insight, not a vague milestone. The insight can come from a prototype, customer discovery, a technical unlock, a regulatory shift, or a new usage pattern. The round should feel like fuel for something already starting to move.
- 01Show the updraft: new tech, new platform, new behavior, new regulation, new buyer pressure, or a niche that became large enough to matter.
- 02Separate the current wedge from the pitch. What you do this quarter creates credibility; what it can become creates the venture case.
- 03Add the dragon case, but keep it connected. The huge outcome should be an evolution of the wedge, not a random second company stapled on top.
- 04Use current evidence to earn questions about the bigger case. Do not spend the whole meeting defending the tiny version.
Capital has geography and taste
Map money by thesis, not ego
London still has depth. Paris has serious state-backed infrastructure and an AI/deep-tech center of gravity. Berlin remains useful for B2B, climate, infra, and operator angels. Stockholm and the Nordics have a strong record of building global companies from focused local scenes. Zurich and Munich can be strong for deep tech, robotics, and technical talent. But good investors increasingly look across borders, especially when the category is sharp.
Start with your category, then map the cities and funds that actually care. A generic list of 'top European VCs' is less useful than 40 investors who have already backed your wedge.
- Use Dealroom for market mapping, not as a substitute for judgment.
- Use State of European Tech for macro context and benchmark sanity.
- Use OpenVC or similar databases for discovery, then qualify every name manually.
- Ask founders one stage ahead who actually moved quickly, who waited for market consensus, and who was useful after the wire.
Pre-seed is not one thing
Know which round you are really raising
A first check can mean friends and angels, an accelerator cheque, a grant-backed technical build, an operator syndicate, a small expert round, or a proper pre-seed led by a fund. These are different games with different evidence bars.
- 01If you have only founder-market fit, sell why you are unusually qualified and what you can learn fastest.
- 02If you have early users, show retention, intensity, workflow pain, or willingness to pay.
- 03If you are deep tech, show technical risk reduction and why public funding or university leverage matters.
- 04If you are cross-border, explain the incorporation and hiring story before investors ask.
- 05If angels matter, make tax incentives legible where they apply, especially SEIS/EIS in the UK.
Make diligence boring
Build the evidence pack before the deck
A deck is a compression artifact. The investor should feel that there is real evidence behind every slide, not a beautiful story with nothing underneath. Build the evidence pack first, then let the deck point to it.
You do not need to know the perfect round size on day one. You do need a thoughtful range. Saying 'we are thinking about EUR 500k to EUR 1.5m depending on lead, dilution, and speed' is stronger than sounding like the market is in charge of your company.
- 01One-page memo: what changed in the market, why now, why you, and what proof you already have.
- 02Customer evidence: calls, pilots, usage, retention, workflow pain, letters of intent, or paid tests.
- 03Product evidence: demo, architecture sketch, data model, technical risk, and what you will build next.
- 04Money evidence: current burn, use of funds, target range, expected dilution, runway after the round, and what the money buys.
- 05Company evidence: cap table, incorporation, IP assignment, founder vesting, and the instrument you expect to use.
Make the company easy to repeat
Do not pitch the whole meeting
Send the deck before the call. Assume some people skimmed it, some did not, and someone junior may be carrying the first read. Your job in the meeting is not to recite every slide. It is to create a crisp mental model and then have a real conversation.
The elevator pitch that matters is often investor to investor: an associate to a partner, an angel to another angel, a partner to the Monday meeting. If they cannot repeat what you do in a way that sounds exciting, the meeting did not work yet.
- 01Open with the simplest framing: what changed, what you are building, who urgently cares, and why this team can win.
- 02Stop before you answer every possible objection. Good investors need room to think and ask.
- 03Use the meeting to learn whether they understand the category, the stage, the check size, and the risk you are taking.
- 04After the call, ask yourself whether they could describe the company at drinks without mangling it.
Experts beat generic startup heat
Get credible people around the company
If investors do not yet believe the credentials or innovation case, do not just grind more calls. Go to the people they would call for diligence. A respected operator, researcher, buyer, regulator, technical advisor, or former founder in the adjacent space can change the room faster than another generic VC meeting.
- 01Deconstruct the company into the four or five parts that make or break it: buyer access, technical risk, regulation, supply, distribution, city rollout, or category credibility.
- 02For each part, list the people who would make an investor say: if that person is leaning in, I should pay attention.
- 03Ask for specific introductions, not vague help. People remember names better than archetypes.
- 04Send a fresh forwardable email for each introduction so the connector can press forward and add one trusted line.
- 05Treat expert feedback as product input even when they do not invest. The network can be more valuable than the cheque.
Rounds are cold until they are hot
Run a compact pipeline
European fundraising often feels slow because founders start the relationship graph too late. Build lightweight familiarity before the round is open, then run the actual raise in a tight window. A company that has been vaguely fundraising for months starts to look like the market already passed.
The underrated opener is: 'We are not fundraising yet, but we are pressure-testing the round and would value your view.' It lets you test appetite without officially sitting on the market. If someone is genuinely bullish, they will often try to move anyway.
- 01Start investor mapping 3-6 months before you need the money.
- 02Talk to founders in a fund's portfolio before you pitch the fund.
- 03Open the round around a new insight: a prototype worked, customers converged on the same pain, a technical risk fell, or a respected expert joined.
- 04Batch calls, track next steps, and mark conviction honestly. If it is not a clear yes, treat it as no until behavior changes.
- 05Do not disappear into fundraising. Keep shipping so the company has momentum even when investor calendars slip.
Do not make people invent the next step
Use the templates, then make them yours
Templates are useful because fundraising breaks when every ask is vague. Rewrite these in your own voice, keep them short, and make the next action painfully easy.
- 01Pre-round advice note: 'We are not fundraising yet, but we are pressure-testing the round. We think [market change] makes [customer] need [product] now. You have seen this category from [angle]. Would you be open to 25 minutes next week to pressure-test the wedge?'
- 02Forwardable intro: 'Quick context you can forward: we are building [one-line]. The first wedge is [specific buyer/problem]. Proof so far: [pilot, usage, LOI, technical milestone]. We are looking for [specific expert/investor/customer] because [reason]. Deck/memo: [link].'
- 03Investor update: 'Since last note: [one proof point]. Learned: [one insight]. Next: [one milestone]. Useful ask: one intro to [specific person or buyer type].'
- 04Post-call follow-up: 'Good to compare notes on [topic]. The two risks you pushed on were [risk] and [risk]. We are testing [action] this week. Useful next step from here would be [specific call, intro, data room review, or pass].'
- 05Commitment clean-up: 'We are pulling together the first close around [instrument/range]. You said [their stated interest]. Should I reserve room for you in this close, or keep you on updates for the next one?'
Velocity beats over-optimization
Stage the close without losing control
The cleanest round closes around a real lead. A term sheet derisks the rest of the round because everyone can see the company will have enough capital to move. But leads are binary and slow, especially at pre-seed. Have a second path.
If a lead is not ready, stage credible commitments: expert angels, operator advisors, small checks on local convertible instruments, or specific soft commits that become real when the round has a lead. The goal is motion without pretending the round is done.
- 01Know who can lead, who can follow, who can advise, and who is mainly useful as signal.
- 02Do not over-optimize valuation while the company loses speed. A slightly imperfect round that closes fast can beat a perfect round that never closes.
- 03Use ranges for amount and dilution until the lead conversation sharpens; benchmark them with current founders, counsel, and investors in your category.
- 04Show momentum to genuinely interested investors: new pilots, expert commitments, customer pull, hiring progress, or technical progress.
- 05Never manufacture scarcity. Real urgency comes from speed, insight, and credible commitments.
SAFE is not the whole continent
Instruments and jurisdiction
Fundraising paper still varies by jurisdiction. The UK often uses Advanced Subscription Agreements. Germany commonly uses convertible loans. France often uses BSA AIR. The Netherlands is comfortable with convertible notes. The important point is not to memorize every legal form; it is to stop assuming every investor conversation ends in the same document.
Decide your company home early enough that the paperwork story does not become a confidence problem mid-raise. If you are unsure, talk to founders and counsel who have raised from the investors you want before you send terms.
- Ask local investors what instrument they expect before you send terms.
- Do not optimize for the cheapest incorporation if it makes the round harder to close.
- Keep clean IP assignment and founder equity docs before external money enters.
Non-dilutive money is leverage, not a lifestyle
Use public money without becoming grant theatre
Europe has real grant and public-finance leverage, especially for deep tech, climate, research-heavy products, hardware, and industrial innovation. Use it when it accelerates the company. Avoid it when it turns the company into a proposal-writing machine.
- 01Good use: technical milestones, prototype funding, pilots, lab work, or runway extension that increases investor confidence.
- 02Bad use: chasing every call because non-dilutive money sounds emotionally safer than selling.
- 03Know the EIC Accelerator and national grant bodies if your product is genuinely innovation-heavy.
- 04Keep grant applications aligned with your actual roadmap, not a parallel universe invented for evaluators.
The partner matters after the wire
Choose investors you can live with
The wrong investor can create more drag than the money solves. When a fund is trying to win the deal, everyone is on their best behavior. Check what happens after the wire: who shows up, who understands the company, who makes useful introductions, and who vanishes when the company is not the hottest thing in the portfolio.
- Look for investors with their own conviction, not only people who move when the round is already hot.
- Reference the actual partner, not just the fund brand. Associates can be great, but they may not be your long-term relationship.
- Ask portfolio founders what the investor did during a hard month, not only during the announcement week.
- Prefer credibility that compounds: category knowledge, customer access, hiring signal, media leverage, technical judgment, or follow-on capital access.
- If the first meetings feel weird, do not assume the board relationship will magically improve.
Ambition without theatre
What not to import from SF Twitter
Europe is not anti-ambition. It is anti-empty performance. You can be bold here, but the boldness has to connect to evidence. Investors respond to speed, customer pull, technical depth, founder edge, and a sharp category read. They respond less well to pretending every slide is already a category-defining inevitability.
- Do not confuse a warm meeting with investor momentum.
- Do not over-polish the deck while under-talking to customers.
- Do not ignore regulation, hiring, grants, and country fragmentation if they affect your market.
- Do not treat lukewarm investor homework as progress.
- Do not raise on pure vibes if the market is asking for proof.