How to Raise Venture Capital: How…

1. Key Themes

Three (and only three) real paths to closing a round

The article frames fundraising as a small set of distinct dynamics rather than an undifferentiated grind.

"Securing money for a startup happens in one of two ways: a founder asks for capital and gets it, or an investor offers capital and the founder takes it. In practice, there are three primary paths to a closed round."

Hyperbolic growth is rare — don't expect to be OpenAI or Anthropic

Most founders should not benchmark their fundraise against the frenzy dynamics of frontier AI labs.

"You can tell if you're in this category if multiple investors are chasing you with term sheets without concern for valuation and without being prompted. If that's not you, don't worry. Vanishingly few companies are in this category."

Pre-emption is the gold-standard outcome — but it's engineered, not lucky

The article's central operating thesis: what looks like investor-initiated magic is actually founder-orchestrated groundwork.

"Pre-emptive offers can often seem magical to outsiders but they are almost always the result of strong groundwork... For all intents and purposes, most pre-emption is the result of a process, but it's a warm process vs. a cold one."

A pre-emptive offer must be a written term sheet — verbal enthusiasm is a negotiating tactic, not a commitment

A sharp, practical distinction founders can use to avoid being strung along.

"a real pre-emptive offer is a written term sheet. Full stop. Anything less, however enthusiastic, is simply an expression of interest... these non-committal offers are usually attempts to start a one-on-one fundraising process on the investor's timeline rather than yours."

Cold pitching is the worst path and increasingly punished in the AI era

Starting a raise without pre-built relationships is framed as a last resort driven by desperation.

"Starting a pitch process without first laying the groundwork and relationship building is the hardest, and honestly worst, way to fundraise... especially in the AI era it often leads to poor terms, or no terms at all."

2. Contrarian Perspectives

Pre-emption looks like investor initiative, but is really founder-engineered. Conventional wisdom credits the investor's sharp instincts or FOMO for a pre-empt; the author argues the founder is actually the author of that outcome through deliberate relationship and information management.

"Investors do this to win deals by being first and usually think it is their idea. But the truth of the best fundraises I've seen is that great founders orchestrate these offers."

Even "hot" AI companies get rejected constantly — hype narratives obscure the real process. Anthropic's founding story is used to puncture the myth that great companies get funded easily or obviously.

"Anthropic famously was rejected by dozens of top VC firms across multiple early rounds."

3. Companies Identified

OpenAI — AI research/product company. Mentioned as an example of the "externally obvious hyperbolic growth" fundraising dynamic.

"This is the dynamic that played out for OpenAI and Anthropic in their growth rounds as investors pummeled them with cash at increasingly astronomical valuations."

Anthropic — AI research/product company. Cited both as a hyperbolic-growth example and as a contrarian case showing that even top AI companies were repeatedly rejected early on.

"Anthropic famously was rejected by dozens of top VC firms across multiple early rounds."

4. People Identified

Aaron Harris — Author of the newsletter/guide, writing a book-length series on venture fundraising. Mentioned as the source of the framework and firsthand observations of founder behavior.

"But the truth of the best fundraises I've seen is that great founders orchestrate these offers."

5. Operating Insights

Do relationship-building and information management before you need to raise. The pre-empt strategy requires investing in investor relationships well ahead of a formal process: "That work requires a founder to cultivate investor relationships and strategically manage information well before fundraising becomes required."
Treat any non-written offer as merely an expression of interest, not a real deal. Don't let verbal enthusiasm from an investor delay building other options: "a real pre-emptive offer is a written term sheet. Full stop."
Avoid fundraising from a position of urgency/scarcity. Cold-start pitching should be reserved for true emergencies, not a default approach: "You might have to do it if you're suddenly running out of money or facing a different existential thread."

6. Overlooked Insights

The pre-empt trend itself is a recent market shift. The increasing frequency of pre-emptive offers is framed as a structural change in the market since 2020, not a timeless constant — worth noting for investors trying to understand how deal dynamics have evolved.

"This investor behavior seemed rare before 2020, but has become increasingly common across a wide range of rounds for attractive AI and deeptech companies."

A pre-emptive term sheet isn't necessarily meant to be signed immediately — it can be a lever. The article hints at an entire strategic decision tree (accepting vs. using it to accelerate a broader process) that most founders likely don't consider.

"Once you have a pre-emptive term sheet, we have an entire chapter dedicated to the framework for taking one versus using it to run an accelerated process."