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New benchmarks for VC startup fundraising with real data from over 1,000 rounds.

Software companies only included, all rounds raised in the last 6 months, no bridges / extensions / weird stuff. All companies use Carta cap table.

𝗦𝗲𝗲𝗱

• Median valuation of $24.3M on $4.1M raised

• Median dilution fell to 18% and has been ticking down for months

𝗦𝗲𝗿𝗶𝗲𝘀 𝗔

• Median val of $80M on $14.4M raised

• 18% dilution is lower than at any point in the last few years

𝗦𝗲𝗿𝗶𝗲𝘀 𝗕

• $191M valuation on $25M raised (big money!)

• 12% of the company sold on median

𝗦𝗲𝗿𝗶𝗲𝘀 𝗖

• $391M post-money valuation on nearly $40M raised

• Selling, on median, less than 10% of the company in the round

𝗦𝗲𝗿𝗶𝗲𝘀 𝗗

• $789M valuation on $63M raised (medians)

• Median of 8% of the company sold

𝗧𝗵𝗶𝗻𝗴𝘀 𝘁𝗼 𝗿𝗲𝗺𝗲𝗺𝗯𝗲𝗿

• Medians are not some special number. They simply reflect the middle of a wide range of rounds. Guideline only, each deal is different.

• Valuations are often simply the output of the other two parts of the equation (cash raised and dilution). Most massive valuation rounds also come with massive funding amounts. How much cash do you really need?

• Startups raising in the top decile at Seed do not always raise in the top decile at A — and vice versa.

• Ya, there is a lot of AI here! Probably at least half of these companies would fall under the definition of AI-native.

Data on both deep tech benchmarks and AI-only benchmarks coming soon 🙏

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“Everyone is raising huge venture rounds at wild valuations, it’s all easy now.”

Eh…not quite.

• Median valuations in early-stage venture are rising quickly

• For seed and Series A, they've never been higher

• In prior booms, the number of rounds rose alongside the valuations

• But in this one, there are actually fewer rounds being completed

Higher valuations (and more $) into fewer companies = concentrated bets as an asset class.

Personally I'd like to see more odd, weird, off-the-radar founders getting a shot.

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Top seed valuations are rising faster than at any point in the last decade.

95th percentile seed vals in Q2 of each year:

• Q2 2017: $25.8M

• Q2 2018: $29.6M

• Q2 2019: $29.9M

• Q2 2020: $26.0M

• Q2 2021: $49.9M

• Q2 2022: $57.8M

• Q2 2023: $56.7M

• Q2 2024: $56.5M

• Q2 2025: $72.2M

• Q2 2026: $200.4M

In the frenzy from 2020 to 2021, these upper end seed valuations grew 92% in 12 months.

Over the last year, they're up 177%.

Some (a few?) of these companies will be worth the massive entry price increase.

Most will not.

No, these numbers don't adjust for inflation, but the main point is the comparison to the prior year rather than the absolute value (although in absolute terms, they're still pretty wild). And in case you're wondering, the rate of change over the past year is fastest for the 90th, 75th, and 50th percentile benchmarks as well.

Fewer companies getting funded at seemingly ridiculous valuations. What could go wrong?

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Power laws are everywhere, not just in venture.

As recently as 2015, the top 10 stocks in the American S&P500 made up ~17% of the total market cap. Today, they represent 36%.

But the US is actually one of the least power-law nations when you measure by the concentration of the top 10 stocks. In many countries, the top 10 companies take 75% or more of the total market cap weight (in some they take the whole index).

Viewed one way, this just reinforces the common refrain from mega-fund venture capitalists who say you need to be in the right 5 companies and nothing else matters.

Viewed another, this is a dangerous overconcentration and reliance on a handful of companies, a blow to any one of whom would have disastrous consequences to equity holders across the board.

Probably both :)

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"Turned down a founder with $1.5M ARR this year and $5M ARR next year. Today, brutal as it is, that isn't good enough to raise a Series A."

Always provocative from Harry and this one drew enough criticism that he actually deleted it. Honestly I'm not sure why he did.

In the simple graphic below, you're trying to find blue dots (the startups that will return your fund by themselves). You're competing with the other funds to do so. There are very few blue dot startups.

You run across red dots slightly more often (startups that are really exciting but then don't pan out). In fact, the red and blue dot startups may look identical when you meet them OR the blue dots actually look worse than the red ones in revenue, team, etc.

If all year you've been meeting dots, and going from $1.5M --> $5M is something you've seen already a number of times, it's not crazy to decline to invest in the next startup you see following the same path.

Now, maybe you object to the idea that just because Harry won't invest means that this startup isn't "good enough" to raise a Series A. Fair play, I get it.

But if I'm another fund who believes that fully, I'm celebrating Harry's approach - more companies for me that that headline investors ignore.

Sometimes blue dots are out in the wilderness with no one investing and sometimes they have 3 term sheets from the top funds already.

Venture is still all about finding the blue dots.