This Firm Funds Founders After Watching Them Work for Weeks
The firm invites top applicants to a working tryout, then bets on how they execute.
Aparti · Startup Lessons & VC Insights with Jeff Becker/Antler and Igor Sheremet/ ApartiMost venture capital firms want proof before they write a check: customers, revenue, or growth. Antler, a pre-seed firm that backs companies at the very beginning, does the opposite. It invites people in before they have any of that, watches how they work for weeks, and then decides.
The filter starts with an interview, said Jeff Becker, a general partner at Antler. He looks for origin stories and evidence that someone can do something exceptionally well, a detail so unusual it opens a window into how the person thinks. Candidates in roughly the top 5% to 10% of interviews get invited to a residency.
A residency is a working tryout. Founders show up in person, test ideas, look for co-founders, and start building. Igor Sheremet, chief executive of Aparti, a startup that makes AI tools for family law firms, went through the process. He recalled, in approximate figures he gave in an interview, that his cohort drew about 4,000 applications and produced about 10 investments.
The point of those weeks is observation. Becker said the best way to judge such an early bet is to spend time with founders, trading texts and emails and watching how they talk to customers, recruit, raise money, and ship product. He pays attention to small habits, like whether someone is concise or verbose, and then projects that style of execution across the life of a company.
The logic is that at this stage there is no company performance to analyze. There are no customers to call and no sales to chart, so the question is simpler and more personal: are these founders exceptional, and would you want to work for them. If the people are outliers, Becker said, they will find their way to something worth building.
Only about 10 of roughly 4,000 applicants in Igor's cohort got investment. The decision is based on behavior rather than a pitch deck.
Questions people ask
What does pre-seed mean?
It means the very first outside money into a startup, often before there is a finished product, customers, or revenue. Checks are usually small and meant to pay for a few months of building and testing. Later rounds, called seed and Series A, typically require more proof that the idea works.
How is this different from an accelerator like Y Combinator?
A traditional accelerator usually admits teams that already have a co-founder and an idea, then coaches them for a few months in exchange for equity. Antler admits individuals even before they have a team or a settled idea, and helps them find co-founders during the residency. Investment comes at the end, only for a small share of participants.
Do founders pay to join the residency?
No. Founders are not charged to participate and do not have to incorporate a company to try out, which keeps the risk low for people testing whether startup life fits. Antler makes money in the usual venture way, by taking an ownership stake only in the companies it funds and hoping some become very valuable.