Thunder.vc

"That is why you're going to fail." That’s exactly why Adam S., CEO of Chore and investor in 200+ startups, told a founder who was obsessing over back-office tasks instead of scaling his AI company. Straight up, most first-time founders don’t fail because of bad ideas, competition, or bad timing. They fail because they waste time on the wrong things. Fact is Elon Musk isn’t setting up payroll, Jeff Bezos isn’t negotiating HR software and Zuck isn’t filing company taxes. So why the hell are you? As Adam puts it: “The most successful founders are utterly obsessed with solving a problem, to the detriment of everything else.” Here’s what successful startup founders understand that most don’t: Before raising money, money is your scarcest resource. The moment you raise money, time becomes your scarcest resource. If you don’t make this mindset shift, your failure is guaranteed. Saving money won’t make you successful. Hitting your growth metrics will. VCs don’t care how frugal you are. They only care if you scale. So why are you focusing on the wrong thing? Wanna to know how to properly outsource the things not on your superpower list? Listen to the full episode now (link in comments).

You finally closed the round. The wire hit. You check the balance: millions in the bank. Feels good, right? Now here’s where most founders screw it up. I’ve seen it too many times: founders raise capital and immediately start burning through it: hiring too fast, overpaying for “brand” marketing, or locking in expenses they can’t sustain. Then, six months later, they’re scrambling because the runway disappeared. Raising money isn’t the finish line. It’s the starting gun. The best founders know how to stretch every dollar, invest in what really moves the business forward, and avoid the classic post-raise mistakes. If you don’t, you’re just fundraising for the sake of fundraising. This week’s Fundraising Demystified breaks it all down; how to deploy capital efficiently, avoid common traps, and make sure you’re not the next cautionary tale. --- Don’t burn your raise before you hit your numbers. Subscribe via the link in my bio to get the full breakdown.

Most founders build an investor pipeline like a bad sales funnel: too many leads, no real qualifiers, and zero strategy. They take the “more meetings = better” approach, then wonder why they keep getting ghosted. Fundraising isn’t just about talking to investors, it’s about closing them. And the best way to do that is to reverse engineer your pipeline from the term sheet backward. A strong pipeline isn’t just a list of names. It’s: 1. The right investors—ones who actually invest at your stage and sector 2. A clear path to conviction—so you’re not stuck in endless “let’s check in next quarter” loops 3. Real urgency—because investors move in herds, and no one wants to be first If your pipeline is full of “maybes,” you don’t have a pipeline—you have a time sink. This week’s Fundraising Demystified breaks down exactly how to build a pipeline that doesn’t just attract investors but actually gets them to write checks. Happy reading! --- If you want more insight on raising capital smarter, subscribe to the Fundraising Demystified newsletter via the link in my bio.