It's becoming insane again in venture capital: A tiny AI startup wants investors to pay $100 to book a meeting with its founder.
- Dan Siroker, a founder of the startup Rewind AI, is telling investors to pay if they want to meet.
- He's charging $100 for bookings to conserve his most precious resource: time.
The venture-capital industry has mostly been a tale of woe in the past year, with thousands of startups struggling to raise money and many shutting down.
For some lucky founders, though, the market is as frothy as ever and edging into the realm of insanity again.
A couple of days ago, Dan Siroker, a cofounder and the CEO of Rewind AI, set his sights on meeting new investors. He anticipated so many VCs clamoring to meet that the entrepreneur decided to whittle down the field and make some money for charity while doing it.
"We can't meet with everyone so to make sure you are serious and it's a good use of our time, we are requiring a $100 payment to meet. First come, first served," he posted to X on Friday.
Over a thousand investors
Not all founders can do this. Based on how his previous fundraise went, Siroker was already bracing for a deluge of Zoom calls.
Rewind's digital assistant records everything a person does on their computer, makes it searchable, and stores the recordings locally on users' computers to mitigate privacy concerns. The service has a free tier and a $19 monthly subscription that unlocks more robust features.
Rewind AI came out of stealth in late 2022 with millions from Andreessen Horowitz, First Round Capital, and others. Siroker said his startup now has 22 employees.
The hottest companies are getting funded while the rest fight for scraps
VCs falling over themselves to meet startup founders — and paying for the privilege — is a sign that at least some parts of the startup-funding environment are back to boom times.
But charging investors may be at odds with building healthy, long-lasting partnerships with them.Siroker said that while he's asking for cash as "an efficient way to know who was serious and who wasn't," the experiment has a domino effect of weeding out self-important investors."I also want investors who don't have such a big ego and believe in our company so much that they'd be willing to swallow a bit of their ego and would be happy to pay to meet," he said. "Most investors think entrepreneurs should kiss their ring. This selects for the ones without ego."This is just one example of Silicon Valley's extreme divide between haves and have-nots.A large number of startups staved off death during the past two years by cutting costs and head counts. But as pools of cheap money these startups raised early in the pandemic run dry, many will have to go to market for capital this year.They won't all succeed. The same scarcity of capital for startups is hurting funds. Last year, the industry notched 474 funds closed, the lowest count since the tech-bull run began in 2013, PitchBook data shows. The cash raised fell to about $70 billion from $173 billion in 2022.
Investors have told BI they're seeing more binary outcomes as they spread much less capital to fewer companies.
Though one person replying to Siroker's tweet suggested he mark the proceeds from meetings as revenue for his business, Siroker told BI he plans to donate the money to the Boys & Girls Clubs and Build, a nonprofit that teaches students how to be entrepreneurs.