VCs Prefer Cofounders and the Data Shows It

Things VCs are thankful for: lower interest rates, any IPOs...and cofounders.

We looked yesterday into the change over time in startup founding team size and the clear pattern was towards solo founders.

A decade ago, only 17% of startups on Carta had 1 founder. In the last few years that percentage shot up to around 30%.

But VC investment hasn't followed the same pattern.

𝗧𝗮𝗸𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝘄𝗵𝗼𝗹𝗲 𝗱𝗲𝗰𝗮𝗱𝗲 𝗶𝗻𝘁𝗼 𝗮𝗰𝗰𝗼𝘂𝗻𝘁 (𝟮𝟬𝟭𝟱-𝟮𝟬𝟮𝟰), 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗱𝗮𝘁𝗮 𝘀𝗵𝗼𝘄𝘀:

• Solo founders make up 25% of all startups

• But only 18% of startups that raised 1 or more priced round

• and just 12% of unicorns

Interesting to see the share of 2-founder companies remain pretty steady across those three categories but larger founding teams of 3, 4, and 5 founders are more present in the latter two stages.

Seems like the common wisdom about VCs preferring cofounders remains true.

Now - will the AI boom change these stats? If you limit the analysis to just 2022 onward, there is a slight uptick in the solo founder category. But nothing major yet.

Maybe that elusive 1-person startup with $1B+ won't have taken VC cash 😁

#startups #founders #venturecapital #cofounders

If you're interested in founders and how they build generational companies, we've got a major data drop for you coming in January. For the first time ever, we'll track founder ownership from idea stage through IPO, giving you real benchmarks for every venture stage.

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