The term sheet is where the real deal lives. Lawyers, VCs, and founders walk through the terms that matter, the traps, and how to negotiate without blowing up the round.
28 min
YC partner Brad Flora's Startup School talk on how startup fundraising actually works: what investors are looking for, how rounds come together, SAFEs, and how to run a tight process. Draws on YC batch data and his own founder experience.
26 min
YC partners share real investor horror stories from their founder days and from companies they've advised: exploding term sheets, tranched deals gone wrong, investors behaving badly after wiring, and how founders should protect themselves.
9 min
Dalton Caldwell and Michael Seibel break down rookie mistakes founders make around investor terms and incentives: what investors actually optimize for, misaligned terms to watch, and how naive founders get squeezed.
52 min
Former YC president Geoff Ralston's fundraising fundamentals lecture: round mechanics, dilution math, SAFEs, investor psychology, and process design for a first raise.
45 min
YC CFO Kirsty Nathoo explains SAFEs versus priced rounds with worked cap table examples, showing exactly how caps, discounts, and stacking SAFEs dilute founders.
59 min
YC's Carolynn Levy (inventor of the SAFE) and Kirsty Nathoo teach investor-school mechanics: instruments, rights, and what founders and angels each misunderstand about early-stage paperwork.
17 min
Recent YC Startup School session defining the key terms founders must know before raising: SAFEs, caps, pro rata, option pools, board seats, and liquidation preferences in plain language.
22 min
Wilson Sonsini partner Becki DeGraw walks TWiST through negotiating a term sheet: which terms actually matter, market norms, and where founders should spend negotiating capital.
24 min
TWiST legal-basics episode on board seats: why you effectively can't fire a VC from your board, and the cautionary situations that produces.
53 min
Classic Stanford GSB session walking through a venture term sheet clause by clause with the negotiating dynamics behind each term.
15 min
Early TWiST legal-basics segment on raising from angels: convertible instruments, accreditation, and the paperwork of a first close.
17 min
Hustle Fund explains the YC SAFE and dilution with worked examples: post-money caps, stacking, and the cap table founders actually end up with.
11 min
Slidebean's Caya compares SAFEs, convertible notes, and KISS instruments with real numbers, from his own experience raising for Slidebean.