About us
Startup Founder 101 brings together aspiring and experienced tech entrepreneurs to discuss, meet, and collaborate to build great new startups, and to push the local startup ecosystem forward.\
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This group hosts numerous free events throughout the year where you can learn the best practices of starting a company from people who have been there and done that. You’ll have the opportunity to meet local founders and investors, exchange ideas with experts, get feedback on your idea, participate in startup workshops, and more.\
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Typical startup event topics include:\
• Coming up with a strong startup idea\
• Startup legal basics\
• How to pitch your startup\
• Starting a company without quitting your day job\
• How to raise funding for your startup\
• And much more!\
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Join the group to be invited to our next event!
Upcoming events
4
From Founder to Funded: Interactive Q&A with Brian Bell
·OnlineOnlineNo filters. No pitch decks. Just real talk about fundraising. Join us for a candid, live Q&A where you can ask a top startup investor anything about raising capital. What do investors look for, especially in AI startups? What kills a deal? How do you get a meeting? Get the answers you've always wanted in a friendly, open environment, and walk away with the knowledge and connections to take your fundraising to the next level.
❯ Guest Speakers include:
- Brian Bell (Founder and Managing Partner, Team Ignite Ventures)
- Jonathan Greechan (Co-Founder & CIO, Founder Institute, GP Founder Capital)
❯❯ RSVP now at https://fi.co/e/405860/meetup to get your link and join us live!
❯ What You’ll Learn:
- What investors look for when evaluating early-stage startups
- How investors are evaluating AI startups right now
- The signals that make founders stand out to investors
- Different sources of startup funding and when to pursue them
- How to prepare your startup before approaching investors
- Common mistakes that cause founders to lose investor interest
❯ Who Should Attend:
- Idea-stage founders exploring future fundraising
- Startup teams preparing for their first funding round
- Founders building AI-powered startups who want to know what investors expect
- Professionals considering starting a venture-backed startup
- Entrepreneurs curious about how investors make decisions
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❯❯ Don’t miss this live, interactive online event packed with valuable insights! RSVP now at https://fi.co/e/405860/meetup to get your link and join us live!
2 attendees
The Product-Market Fit Journey: Market Signals, Analytics & Tech Decisions
·OnlineOnlineBuilding a product is easier than ever, but knowing what to change as you grow is still one of the hardest parts of finding product-market fit. In this session, we'll walk through three layers founders need to get right: reading market signals to decide who you serve and when to pivot, using product analytics to understand how customers actually use what you've built, and making infrastructure decisions that support growth without adding complexity you don't need yet. You'll leave with practical frameworks for each layer and a simple diagnostic for figuring out where your biggest problem really lives.
❯ Guest Speakers include:
- Jonathan Greechan (Co-Founder & CIO, Founder Institute, GP Founder Capital)
- Carlos Ignacio Sanabria (Partnerships Manager, Designli)
❯❯ RSVP now at https://fi.co/e/406838/meetup to get your link and join us live!
❯ What You'll Learn:
- Which market signals show who your best customers are, and when it's time to pivot
- How to use product analytics to see how customers actually use what you've built
- Which metrics matter at your stage, and which ones can wait
- How to make infrastructure decisions that support growth without adding complexity you don't need yet
- A simple diagnostic to find out whether your biggest problem is the market, the product or the tech
❯ Featured Speaker:
- Carlos Ignacio Sanabria - Partnership Manager @ Designli: Carlos is the Partnerships Manager at Designli, where he helps SaaS founders turn product ideas into clear development strategies and scalable roadmaps. He works with startups at every stage, from early concepts to live products that need stronger execution, better development operations, or a path back on track. Originally from Venezuela and now based in Mexico City, Carlos has worked across the US, UK, Australia, and Latin America, collaborating closely with founders, accelerators, and startup communities.
About Designli: Designli helps you build software people actually pay for, plugging SaaS experts into your team with a system that's helped 200+ companies build and scale.
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❯❯ Don’t miss this live, interactive online event packed with valuable insights! RSVP now at https://fi.co/e/406838/meetup to get your link and join us live!3 attendees
Venture Trailblazers Featuring Mac Conwell
·OnlineOnlineVenture Trailblazers is an exclusive event series that connects leading investors, founders, and ecosystem leaders from across the globe to discuss the latest trends in startups and venture capital. For this edition, we are honored to welcome McKeever “Mac” Conwell II, Founder and Managing Partner of RareBreed Ventures and one of the leading voices for pre-seed investing outside the major tech hubs. The goal of Venture Trailblazers is to educate and connect founders, leaders, mentors, and investors across the global Founder Institute, VC Lab, and FI Venture Networks. . Mac Conwell joins Adeo Ressi for the next edition of Venture Trailblazers. .
❯❯ RSVP now at https://fi.co/e/407532/meetup to get your link and join us live!
❯ What We’ll Cover:
- Mac’s path from Baltimore software engineer and two-time founder to building one of the most community-driven funds in venture
- How he raised a $10M Fund I on Twitter with 194 LPs and $10K minimums, and what emerging managers can borrow from that playbook
- Finding “rare breed” founders outside the big tech hubs, and why overlooked markets and legacy industries are full of opportunity
- What he looks for in a pre-seed check, and why customer acquisition matters more than having the best product
- Lessons from building the first state-backed pre-seed fund for underrepresented founders, and from testifying before Congress on access to capital
- Raising Fund II in a reset market, including the Series A gap, AI-or-nothing capital, and his advice for emerging managers building enduring firms
❯ Who Should Attend:
- Emerging managers raising Fund I or Fund II, especially those building an LP base from scratch
- Pre-seed founders building outside major tech hubs or in overlooked industries
- Angels and accredited investors interested in backing emerging funds
- Ecosystem leaders and economic development organizations working to expand access to capital in their regions
-> About Venture Trailblazers: Venture Trailblazers is an exclusive event series that educates and connects operators and investors across the global Founder Institute, VC Lab, and FI Venture Network communities. Each edition spotlights a leading voice from the ecosystem in a candid conversation on what’s driving the next wave of innovation in venture capital.
-> About VC Lab: VC Lab is the leading venture capital accelerator worldwide for new and emerging managers. 900+ funds have successfully completed the program, building ethical and enduring venture capital firms around the world. The program provides all the tools needed to launch a fund and close on capital in six months or less. Managers participate in weekly fund-building sprints, receive tactical advice from experienced domain experts, and join a collaborative, global community of peers. VC Lab also develops essential fundraising skills and offers access to Decile Hub, the trusted venture platform for VCs to generate top decile returns. .❯❯ Don’t miss this live, interactive online event packed with valuable insights! RSVP now at https://fi.co/e/407532/meetup to get your link and join us live!
1 attendee
How to Build an AI Employee That Starts Today
·OnlineOnlineWhen you are the whole team, every lead you don't qualify and every customer email you answer at 11pm comes out of the hours you should spend building. You can't hire yet. An AI agent can take one of those jobs now. In this live session, Seth Ward, Founder & CEO of 4142, builds an AI agent from start to finish: connected to a real model, doing a single real job like qualifying a lead or drafting a follow-up, and deployed where it actually runs. No slides, and questions are open throughout. Register now and leave with a clear plan for your first AI hire.
❯ What You'll Learn:
- How to pick the one job in your company an AI agent should take on first;
- How to turn that job into instructions an agent can actually follow;
- How to connect the agent to a real AI model and give it the information it needs;
- How to deploy it somewhere it runs on its own, beyond a demo;
- How to repeat the same build for sales, support and follow-ups as your company grows.
❯ Featured Speaker:
- Seth Ward - Founder & CEO @ 4142, an AI foundry behind Squidgy, Handled, YEAA and FanatIQ. Through Squidgy, his team lets entrepreneurs and small businesses describe a task in plain English and turn it into an AI agent with no code. In 1995 he co-founded i, one of the first web marketing agencies, and went on to work with Vodafone, AOL and News International before serving as CEO of Pynk. Based in London, he runs live AI agent build sessions for founders, including at Nomad Cruise and Bansko Nomad Fest.
❯ Who Should Attend:
- Aspiring founders who want to see what an AI agent can do inside a real business;
- Solo founders handling sales, support and admin on their own;
- Professionals with deep industry expertise planning the move from employee to entrepreneur;
- Anyone curious about AI who wants to build with it, not just read about it.
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❯❯ Don’t miss this live, interactive online event packed with valuable insights! RSVP now at https://fi.co/e/407649/meetup to get your link and join us live!
3 attendees
Past events
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