SAFEs have become the most common way for early-stage startup founders to raise money. Early-stage founders prefer SAFEs—short for Simple Agreement for Future Equity—for their relative simplicity.
But while raising a SAFE is typically faster and cheaper than raising money through a priced round, it was an arduous process that required a lot of offline back-and-forth between you and your investors—until now.
With Carta’s updated SAFE financings workflow, you’ll never have to leave the platform to generate and issue SAFEs, track down signatures, and receive funds from investors.
Issuing a SAFE without leaving Carta provides four core benefits:
A single platform for fundraising: Raising funds with a SAFE used to require you to share wire instructions with each investor, who then had to log into their bank portal to send the funds. After that, it was up to you to record the SAFE transaction accurately on Carta. Now, you and your investors can complete the entire process on the Carta platform.
Streamlined SAFE workflow: After you answer a few basic questions about your SAFE, we auto-populate a SAFE template that you can then send to your investor with just a few clicks. Once your investor signs off, they can add a bank account and fund your startup with a one-click Automated Clearing House (ACH) transaction. The streamlined workflow makes raising a SAFE on Carta faster than raising one offline.
Automatic updates: If your investor already uses Carta, we’ll update their portfolio automatically to reflect the new investment. For founders, we also automatically update your cap table to reflect the change in ownership structure. You can still opt to transfer funds via wires, but you would have to manually confirm the receipt of funds in order to update your cap table.
Reduced risk of fraud: Exchanging information outside Carta can increase the risk of email spoofing and wire fraud. By staying on the platform, investors and founders can securely fund your startup, helping to keep your banking information safe and minimizing risks involved with manual methods.
Ready to raise a SAFE? Get started today.
