Week eleven of running your own round

It's a Tuesday in the eleventh week. Twenty-two first calls, nine second meetings, one fund that asked for a cohort analysis three weeks ago and has not come back, two more that said you were too early for them. Your board meets on Thursday and will ask where the round stands. Somewhere between the second meeting and the third you stopped building the company. This is usually the week a founder starts looking for a fundraising advisor, and the week the question changes from whether to hire one into which one, on what terms, and doing what exactly.

We have written elsewhere about whether you need a fundraising advisor at all, and the answer there is that below a certain round size, with a strong network of your own, you often do not. This piece assumes you have crossed that line. What follows is the choice itself: which kind of firm, how the fee is built, who inside the firm does the work, and how to test a claimed network before you sign.

The four businesses that all call themselves fundraising advisory

Startup fundraising advisors are not one profession. The market for capital raising and fundraising advisory services in Europe holds at least four different businesses, priced and staffed differently, and a founder who treats them as interchangeable ends up paying boutique money for an introduction service. Work out which of the four you are shopping for before comparing names.

• A corporate finance boutique sells a run process: materials, a sequenced investor list, tension between funds, someone beside you in the negotiation, and it thins out when the firm carries too many live mandates.
• An independent advisor, often an ex-founder or ex-investor, sells one person's judgement and contact book applied intensively, and has no bench, so a second client stalls you and no legal or modelling capacity backs them.
• A law firm with a venture practice sells term sheet negotiation, documentation and protection of your downside, and does no investor outreach, so the round itself still has to be created by you.
• An introduction platform or broker sells volume of contacts and a fast sweep of the market, and nobody there owns the outcome, so the scattergun burns funds you wanted warm.

The role of advisors in startup fundraising is narrower than most pitches suggest. No firm can make a fund fall in love with your business. A good one makes sure the right funds look at it properly, at the same time, on the same information, so price and terms are set by a market and not by whoever answered first.

How a fundraising advisor gets paid, and what each part buys

Almost every mandate is assembled from the same components. The argument is only about their size and their triggers.

The retainer, monthly or paid at signature, buys the preparation phase, or part of it: the financial model, the equity story that has to create real interest, the data room, the investor mapping. It is usually non-refundable, because that work happens whether or not the round closes. A retainer credited against the success fee at closing is the fairer construction, and it is negotiable.

The success fee, a percentage of what you raise, is the bulk of the economics. Anyone quoting a market percentage before knowing your round size, stage and complexity is guessing, because it moves with all three and usually steps in tranches rather than sitting flat. What matters more is the definition underneath it. Is the fee charged on the whole round or only on money the advisor introduced. Does it apply when existing investors follow on, or to a convertible loan that converts eighteen months later, or to debt. Two firms quoting the same percentage can send bills that differ by a multiple, purely on those answers.

Then the alignment question. A pure success fee sounds founder friendly and pushes the advisor towards closing something rather than the right thing, while a heavy retainer removes the urgency. A modest retainer, a real success fee and a step-up above a target amount keeps both parties pointing the same way.

Testing a network instead of believing it

Every fundraising advisory firm in Europe that works with startups says it has a network. The claim costs nothing and is easy to check. Start with the pool. Invest Europe's activity data for 2025 records 316 venture funds raising capital across Europe and around EUR 20 billion invested into 4,827 companies. Hundreds of funds are live, and only a small share invest at your stage, in your sector, at your cheque size, with capital still to deploy this quarter.

So ask for that shortlist out loud, before any mandate is signed. A useful advisor names the funds in order, gives a reason for each, and tells you which names on your own list are wrong for you. Then test warmth rather than reach: the last three introductions the firm made to comparable funds, when they were made, whether the partner replied personally, and two founder references from mandates that did not close. A firm with a real network hands that over without hesitating. A firm with a database offers a logo slide.

The mandate letter, and the order to negotiate it

The mandate letter is the only document in this relationship you will rely on, and founders sign it in the week they are most tired. Read it for four things, in order.

• Start with scope, which fixes what is delivered and by when, and should treat a round paused for a quarter as normal rather than a breach.
• Move to the fee triggers, since whether a convertible loan, a follow-on from an existing shareholder or a debt facility counts as raised money decides the final invoice.
• Then read exclusivity and the tail, which need a defined end date and a written list of named investors rather than an open claim on the market after you part company.
• Read your own exit last: a right to terminate for non-performance on short notice, and what survives if you use it.

Negotiate in that order, because scope and triggers set the size of the bill while exclusivity and termination decide whether you can leave. Do not spend your leverage on the retainer. It is the smallest number on the page and the easiest concession for a firm to make, which is why it is offered first.

The dups approach

dups exists partly to take one of those four boxes off your list. The model, the equity story, the investor list and the term sheet negotiation are handled by one team, so none of it gets passed between two firms that each see half the round and neither of which owns the result. Under Full Deal Execution we take a mandate from preparation to closing, capped at ten companies a year and decided by an internal investment committee, for the reason set out above: a contact book only stays warm if the people using it aren't spread across thirty live processes.

Where a founder has the network and the appetite to run the round personally, Specialist Support covers the other half: valuation, financial modelling, investor materials, the equity incentive plan, and the negotiation and documentation once a term sheet lands. For a lot of seed rounds that is the honest answer and we give it rather than selling a full mandate.

Whichever of the four you end up hiring, get one opinion first from someone with no success fee riding on it, including on whether your timing is wrong and a quarter of waiting beats any advisor. Still in week eleven and unsure what you are shopping for? Describe the round to us and we will tell you which of the four it needs.

Questions founders ask before signing a mandate

What do fundraising advisors do for startups?

A fundraising advisor prepares the company for investors, builds and prioritises the target investor list, runs the outreach and the meeting sequence, holds competitive tension between funds, and negotiates the term sheet and the documentation. The best ones also tell a founder when not to raise. They do not guarantee capital, and no credible firm will promise you a closing.

When does it make sense to hire a capital advisor instead of raising directly?

It makes sense when you lack the investor network, the time or the process experience, and when the round is large or complex enough that a small improvement in price or terms is worth more than the fee. Founders with a warm, current network and a straightforward round usually raise faster alone, buying only the valuation and legal work.

How do I check whether a fundraising advisor's investor network is real?

Ask for a named shortlist of funds that fit your stage, sector and cheque size, with a reason attached to each name. Then ask for the last three introductions the firm made to comparable funds, when they were made, and whether the partner replied personally. Finally, ask for two founder references from mandates that did not close.

Jean-Baptiste Duchesne, Manager at dups