The best way to launch your startup

Antler is an on ramp to venture capital and helps you launch your startup from scratch. We surround you with everything you need to build at lightning speed. Join our upcoming AMA to learn more (register here)!

* For the September residency, French founders will need to relocate to Amsterdam, Berlin, or Munich.

Join an upcoming AMA session

  • Funding for your startup in just 5 weeks
  • Get your first cheque from a global VC

Who should apply to the Antler Residency in the US?

We look for founders with a proven track record of execution (across a range of academic and professional backgrounds), who are fiercely ambitious, who possess an intense bias towards execution, and who are innately driven to change the world. You must be able to attend our eight-week Residency in-person in either Austin or New York City. We are entirely focused on the 0 to 1: the earliest stages of team and business building. You can come to us with just an idea - if you're truly ready to sprint forward and build, we'll work with you from day zero.

If you're looking to find a co-founder, validate your business idea, and launch a startup, the Antler Residency is for you.

Individuals

Looking for a co-founder?

Are you an individual ready to start something new, and looking for the right co-founder?

Antler brings together an exclusive group of ambitious people to explore ideas together. Meet, learn, and co-create with exceptional builders. Join us to turn your vision into reality. Individuals and teams will join the same residency kicking off in March 2025.

Teams

Already have the dream team?

Do you already have a team and are ready to start building. Joining Antler gives you the opportunity to build alongside like-minded, ambitious founders.

Build long-lasting relationships, gain access to coaching, network resources, investor introductions, and valuable support—regardless of your idea’s stage. Individuals and teams will join the same residency kicking off in March 2025.

What to expect from Antler in the US

The Antler program in the US begins with an in-person, pre-investment founder Residency that runs for eight weeks. Founders have the opportunity to pitch our Investment Committee at week eight. Those who receive funding from our Investment Committee move into weekly coaching with our Antler team with a focus on rapid growth and rigorous fundraising preparation.

01

Phase 1: Residency

Join the Antler Residency to find your cofounder, validate your ideas, and launch your business. For each batch we hand select 80 founders in each of our three locations from more than 8,000 applications. That means you will be surrounded by more than 250 of the best and brightest founders from all over the country. All accepted founders may apply for a $2.5k living expense grant. The first seven weeks of the Residency is in-person and designed to give you an effective and intimate community to find your co-founder. Thoughtful social events, team hackathons, a batch wide directory, and a co-founder toolkit all support you in finding your perfect co-founder.

Pitch to Antler's Investment Committee

After building with us in Residency, you may have the opportunity to pitch our Investment Committee for pre-seed funding to launch your startup at week eight. One pitch, one committee: it's a simple, straightforward process. If you receive funding, we will write you a check for $200,000 via SAFE for 8% of your new company. If you don't receive funding, we will sit down and tell you exactly why—100% transparency.

02
03

Phase 2: Build and fundraising sprint

Once you receive investment from Antler, you will then move into Phase 2: the Antler portfolio experience. Here you work to find product-market fit, build your team, and successfully raise your seed round. Funded teams will meet online on a weekly basis to track progress on team, product, customer traction, and investor relations. They will also meet regularly with the Antler team for hands on support and coaching leading up to the Investor Showcase.

Antler Investor Showcase

When founders are ready to raise their next rounds of funding, they are eligible to opt into Antler's Investor Showcase. This is how we share our investments with outside investors. We take a hand selected, curated approach to helping you meet investors — no standing on stage, no demo day. We make relevant introductions based on stage, sector and business models to more than 500 investors that we work closely with to help you build a strong and relevant funnel to raise your seed round.

04

Our founders are diverse and exceptional

Here are some of the teams we've backed.

Application process

Our Fall 2024 Residency kicks off in March 2025! Learn more about how to apply today below.

Application

Once you submit your application, our scouting team will review it. Candidates who meet our criteria will move forward in our process.

1st-round interview

Your first interview will be with a member of our scouting team where we get to know you, get a better understanding of your background, and figure out if our program would be an ideal fit for you, together.

2nd-round interview

Your second interview will be with a partner who sits in the location you've applied to in order to further evaluate your entrepreneurial aspirations and learn more about our Residency.

01
0
02
1
03
2
04
3

Application process

Our Fall 2024 Residency kicks off in March 2025! Learn more about how to apply today below.

Application

Once you submit your application, our scouting team will review it. Candidates who meet our criteria will move forward in our process.

1st-round interview

Your first interview will be with a member of our scouting team where we get to know you, get a better understanding of your background, and figure out if our program would be an ideal fit for you, together.

2nd-round interview

Your second interview will be with a partner who sits in the location you've applied to in order to further evaluate your entrepreneurial aspirations and learn more about our Residency.

01
0
02
1
03
2
04
3
05
4

Application process

Our Fall 2024 Residency kicks off in March 2025! Learn more about how to apply today below.

Application

Once you submit your application, our scouting team will review it. Candidates who meet our criteria will move forward in our process.

1st-round interview

Your first interview will be with a member of our scouting team where we get to know you, get a better understanding of your background, and figure out if our program would be an ideal fit for you, together.

2nd-round interview

Your second interview will be with a partner who sits in the location you've applied to in order to further evaluate your entrepreneurial aspirations and learn more about our Residency.

01
0
02
1
03
2
No items found.

Founder testimonials

Don't just take it from us. Hear from phenomenal people who joined Antler in the US to launch their company.

Malcolm-Wiley Floyd

Stairs Financial

Antler’s collection of founders, operators and investors is the strongest platform for an early stage founder on the market.

Manuel Shoenfeld

PowerX

Building a startup with Antler allows you the room to develop, grow or even pivot your business idea, providing you with the guidance you need along the way.

Trisha Goyal

Break Sports

Antler truly understands what it means to be a founder and are truly involved as partners with portfolio companies at the earliest stage.

Jacob Shoihet

Marco Capital

Antler really did accelerate Marco's trajectory: we created a broad network of VC connections and raised a material amount of additional institutional cash. This allows us to make the impact that we want to achieve: we’re building the premier tech-enabled trade finance platform in Latin America. Antler has been an integral partner in powering us forward.

Entrepass Partner

Our team

Jeff Becker
Partner

Jeff is a sales leader and investor. Over a nine year run at LinkedIn, Jeff held a series of roles launching new business units and leading sales teams to best-in-company performances as the business grew to 770 million members and $10B in revenue. Separately, Jeff launched his own company, Earhoox, scaling it across the globe. He is also an active angel investor focused on health, wealth, and happiness. Before coming to Antler, he was a General Partner at Forum Ventures, focused on early stage B2B SaaS.

Tyler Norwood
Managing Partner, U.S.

Tyler Norwood is Managing Partner for Antler in the United States, where he oversees the firm’s US growth and geographic expansion. Tyler joined Antler in 2017 as its fifth full-time employee and has been instrumental in launching and scaling the firm. Prior to joining Antler, Tyler was the Global Head of Business Development for Global Fashion Group (GFG), where he was in charge of launching a marketplace business model for GFG’s companies across 21 different countries; he also assisted with the company’s IPO in Frankfurt in 2017. Before GFG, Tyler was the Interim Head of Marketplace at Jabong, which he helped sell for $70 million in 2016, and Head of Marketplace Vietnam at Zalora, the largest fashion e-commerce company in Asia. Along the way, Tyler has also completed the Vietnam Marathon, Singapore Marathon, and Boulder Iron Man. Tyler is passionate about providing a better on ramp to Venture Capital for founders who want to change the world and hands on support for founders in the first 6 months of launching a new startup.

Ryan Sommerville
Partner

Ryan Sommerville is a General Partner at Antler US. As the first hire for Antler's US expansion four years ago, he played a pivotal role in establishing the firm's presence in New York and Austin. As Head of Portfolio, Ryan spearheaded Antler US’s portfolio management, driving the success of the firm's investments and supporting the growth of portfolio companies. Prior to Antler, Ryan built and scaled ventures in the financial services, apparel, and technology sectors and served as the Director of Financial Programs at Start Small, Think Big.

Prerna Sharma
Partner

Prerna Sharma is a General Partner at Antler US and head of the firm’s Austin office. Prerna joined Antler in 2018 in Singapore and was among the first 5 employees of the firm. Before moving to Austin, Prerna was instrumental in expanding Antler’s presence globally along with creating our core methodology on founder origination. Before Antler, Prerna was employee #3 at Uber Asia, where she helped scale Uber across all cities in Asia. After Uber, Prerna successfully laid the entire People & Culture framework at Flow Traders Asia, a leading Dutch proprietary trading firm, specializing in ETFs. Prerna graduated as a Computer Engineer and spent her early career in India building highly scalable products for massive companies like AMEX and GE Healthcare.

Lisa Potocsnak
Associate Partner, Finance & Operations

Lisa joins Antler with over 16 years of experience in Venture Capital. Before Antler, Lisa was the CFO of Tribe Capital. Prior to Tribe, Lisa served as VP of Finance for Khosla Ventures and as the part-time CFO for several smaller firms including Asset Management Ventures & Prospect Ventures. She started her career at Morgenthaler, based in Cleveland, Ohio.

Charles Hayley-Bell
General Partner

Charlie Hayley Bell leads Capital and Investor Relations for Antler US. Charlie has 20 years of alternative investment experience in the US, and Latin America across both public and private markets advising investors and raising capital for hedge funds, real estate, PE, and venture capital. Charlie is an investor in early and growth stage technology and CPG companies. He previously was with HSBC, Archstone Partners, and Old City Securities. He holds a MA from Edinburgh University.

Roslyn Jin
Associate Partner

Roslyn is a strategy and business development specialist with a background in hypergrowth sales, financial markets, and international policy. Prior to Antler, she helped launch the enterprise segment at WeWork and partnered with financial services accounts to develop custom innovation solutions. Previously, she held positions in structured derivatives at Bank of America Merrill Lynch and U.S.-China trade policy at the Executive Office of the President. Roslyn holds a BA from Cornell University and an MBA with an emphasis in strategy and product management from NYU Stern.

Caroline Healey
Senior Principal

Caroline works with founders in Antler's Austin office and leads Antler's US marketing and growth functions. Prior to joining Antler, Caroline worked at NationSwell as an associate producer and in finance at Visa. Caroline graduated Cum Laude from the University of San Diego, where she obtained her BBA in Finance and Business Economics.

Rio Hodges
Senior Principal

Rio is a Senior Principal at Antler US. Prior to Antler, Rio was focused on growth strategy and innovation at frog where he was a Senior Strategist, shaping ideas into commercially viable products and services. Previously, Rio had experience in both growth equity and early-stage VC.

Cody Sugarman
Principal, Data Science

Cody is a Principal on the investing team at Antler. He studied Computer Science at Stanford University before joining Goldman Sachs as a quantitative trader. He has since run product at an early stage FinTech startup, taught >1000 students how to code through his organization Code Sleep Repeat, and most was recently at General Catalyst as the Head of Data Science. He enjoys surfing in California and complaining about the weather in New York.

Cash Allred
Principal

Cash is a principal on the investment team at Antler. Previously, he was a tech-focused investor at Sweater, the first early stage VC fund available to the public. Cash draws on both a technical and investment background, with time spent at Lucid Software (data engineer) and an early stage impact fund (impact investment associate). Cash holds a BS in Information Systems from Brigham Young University.

Kelly LaBuff
Principal

Kelly is a Principal on the investing team at Antler. Prior to Antler, she worked across the startup ecosystem at the intersection of technology, climate, and capital. She was a product manager at an edtech nonprofit, a system design engineer and operations manager at agtech startups Plenty and Sensei Ag, Chief of Staff at an energy and climate business, and an intern at three venture capital firms while completing her MBA. In her free time, she can be found exploring a new city, listening to Planet Money or My Climate Journey, climbing, surfing, or searching for a new local coffee spot. Kelly holds a BS in Mechanical Engineering from Stanford University and an MBA from Harvard Business School.

Jake O'Shea
Principal

Jake is a professional matchmaker and entrepreneurship enthusiast. After graduating from UT Austin, Jake joined Capital Factory's Investor Relations team, eventually growing to the role of Director of Platform managing the fund’s value add services for portfolio founders. After Capital Factory, he joined Foundation Capital, a 30 year old bay area Pre-Seed fund where he built out their Portfolio support function and managed the firm's relationships with F500 VP and CLevel executives. At Antler, Jake identifies high potential future founders and runs them through Antler's investment process. Outside of work, Jake is an avid fan of the NBA and enjoys grilling, walking his two dogs Rainey and Tedder, and trying new cuisines.

Samantha Cerqueira
Director of Program

Sam is a management professional with over 7 years progressive experience in customer experience, operations, team building and project management for the hospitality industry. She joins us from WeWork where she was a Community Lead. Prior to WeWork, Sam worked for the Four Seasons Hotels as a Guest Experience & Operations Manager.

Lauren Houpt
Senior Program Manager

Lauren is our Senior Program Manager on the U.S. platform & founder experience team. She joins Antler from Alloy Labs, a consortium of 80+ mid-sized and community banks across the U.S. where she led multiple projects leading to industry publications, bank/fintech partnerships, and lobbying & standardization efforts alongside the FDIC, OCC and FRB. Previously she worked at Nymbus, a banking core start-up company, where she worked alongside the sales & marketing teams to analyze niche data to drive B2B sales. In her free time she enjoys skiing, teaching (and taking) pilates classes, reading, and walking her dog MJ (named after her favorite CO ski mountain, Mary Jane).

Kaila Lim
Community Manager

Kaila creates life-changing experiences for our founders. She leads founder residency and community events in NYC. She formerly led community experience at The Org for founders and CHROs. Prior to that, she worked as a B2B software sales trainer at Sprinklr, Procore and CreatorIQ and used to volunteer with Seoul Startups in Korea as a community host and speaker. She also coaches executives and founders in public speaking and storytelling.

Besart Çopa
Principal

Besart is a Principal on Antler’s team in NYC. Before Antler, he founded his own venture-backed startup, Chestr, the #1 Chrome shopping wishlist. Before Chestr, he worked at AnchorFree, the company behind the world's most popular VPNs: Hotspot Shield and VPN Super. During college, Besart interned in VC at Citi Ventures and a16z. He’s incredibly excited to support NYC founders full-time with Antler.

Kaila Lim
Community Manager

Kaila creates life-changing experiences for our founders. She leads founder residency and community events in NYC. She formerly led community experience at The Org for founders and CHROs. Prior to that, she worked as a B2B software sales trainer at Sprinklr, Procore and CreatorIQ and used to volunteer with Seoul Startups in Korea as a community host and speaker. She also coaches executives and founders in public speaking and storytelling.

Cash Allred
Principal

Cash is a principal on the investment team at Antler. Previously, he was a tech-focused investor at Sweater, the first early stage VC fund available to the public. Cash draws on both a technical and investment background, with time spent at Lucid Software (data engineer) and an early stage impact fund (impact investment associate). Cash holds a BS in Information Systems from Brigham Young University.

Cody Sugarman
Principal, Data Science

Cody is a Principal on the investing team at Antler. He studied Computer Science at Stanford University before joining Goldman Sachs as a quantitative trader. He has since run product at an early stage FinTech startup, taught >1000 students how to code through his organization Code Sleep Repeat, and most was recently at General Catalyst as the Head of Data Science. He enjoys surfing in California and complaining about the weather in New York.

Claire Tempest
Associate

Claire joins Antler from an internship at Pax Momentum, a B2B sales accelerator. Her work prior was in NGO as the Director of Operations for Teton Adaptive Sports in Jackson Hole, WY. Claire graduated Summa Cum Laude from Utah State University with a Bachelors of Science in Geography. She grew up skiing and mountain biking in Salt Lake City, UT and looks forward to continuing both in Boulder, CO.

Kasim Abdullahi
Principal

Kasim is a venture associate for the Boulder program. Before Antler, Kasim was a senior analyst at Goldman Sachs, working in both Asset Management and Client Wealth Management. Kasim is also experienced with saas in early-stage startups. Kasim is focused on developing a robust scouting strategy and driving Antler's vision to create a growing community in the Boulder and Mountain west regions.

Malcolm-Wiley Floyd
Co-founder & CEO
Ryan Sommerville
Partner

Ryan Sommerville is a General Partner at Antler US. As the first hire for Antler's US expansion four years ago, he played a pivotal role in establishing the firm's presence in New York and Austin. As Head of Portfolio, Ryan spearheaded Antler US’s portfolio management, driving the success of the firm's investments and supporting the growth of portfolio companies. Prior to Antler, Ryan built and scaled ventures in the financial services, apparel, and technology sectors and served as the Director of Financial Programs at Start Small, Think Big.

Samantha Cerqueira
Director of Program

Sam is a management professional with over 7 years progressive experience in customer experience, operations, team building and project management for the hospitality industry. She joins us from WeWork where she was a Community Lead. Prior to WeWork, Sam worked for the Four Seasons Hotels as a Guest Experience & Operations Manager.

Roslyn Jin
Associate Partner

Roslyn is a strategy and business development specialist with a background in hypergrowth sales, financial markets, and international policy. Prior to Antler, she helped launch the enterprise segment at WeWork and partnered with financial services accounts to develop custom innovation solutions. Previously, she held positions in structured derivatives at Bank of America Merrill Lynch and U.S.-China trade policy at the Executive Office of the President. Roslyn holds a BA from Cornell University and an MBA with an emphasis in strategy and product management from NYU Stern.

Rio Hodges
Senior Principal

Rio is a Senior Principal at Antler US. Prior to Antler, Rio was focused on growth strategy and innovation at frog where he was a Senior Strategist, shaping ideas into commercially viable products and services. Previously, Rio had experience in both growth equity and early-stage VC.

Prerna Sharma
Partner

Prerna Sharma is a General Partner at Antler US and head of the firm’s Austin office. Prerna joined Antler in 2018 in Singapore and was among the first 5 employees of the firm. Before moving to Austin, Prerna was instrumental in expanding Antler’s presence globally along with creating our core methodology on founder origination. Before Antler, Prerna was employee #3 at Uber Asia, where she helped scale Uber across all cities in Asia. After Uber, Prerna successfully laid the entire People & Culture framework at Flow Traders Asia, a leading Dutch proprietary trading firm, specializing in ETFs. Prerna graduated as a Computer Engineer and spent her early career in India building highly scalable products for massive companies like AMEX and GE Healthcare.

Navi Singh
Partner, Global Investments

Navi is Global Partner at Antler in New York and Head of Technology at the Antler U.S. fund where he guides Antler startups and holds several board positions. Previously, Navi was a deeptech focused researcher at MIT and Entrepreneur in Residence at TandemLaunch, an aspiring startup foundry and seed fund in North America. As a former co-founder of a MIT-backed startup that invented and commercialized novel imaging technology, Navi has experienced all facets of the tech startup journey. He is a Web3 enthusiast and holds a Bachelor’s degree in Molecular Sciences from University of St. Andrews in the UK.

Lisa Potocsnak
Associate Partner, Finance & Operations

Lisa joins Antler with over 16 years of experience in Venture Capital. Before Antler, Lisa was the CFO of Tribe Capital. Prior to Tribe, Lisa served as VP of Finance for Khosla Ventures and as the part-time CFO for several smaller firms including Asset Management Ventures & Prospect Ventures. She started her career at Morgenthaler, based in Cleveland, Ohio.

Johnny Watson
Director, Boulder

Johnny is a business development specialist and serial entrepreneur with a knack for turning ideas into action. Prior to Antler, he focused on the growth of early-stage technology companies, spanning from fintech to digital health to Web3. Johnny is a certified business coach and strives to help others reach their ambitious goals as they navigate the founder journey. He is dedicated to scaling this impact with the Antler community, in Colorado and beyond.

Joe Cardini
Principal

Joe joins Antler with a background in sales and business development. Throughout his career, he’s had the privilege of cultivating and managing relationships with the world's largest organizations in an effort to support their key strategic initiatives at hyper-growth companies like Forter and Okta.

Jeff Becker
Partner

Jeff is a sales leader and investor. Over a nine year run at LinkedIn, Jeff held a series of roles launching new business units and leading sales teams to best-in-company performances as the business grew to 770 million members and $10B in revenue. Separately, Jeff launched his own company, Earhoox, scaling it across the globe. He is also an active angel investor focused on health, wealth, and happiness. Before coming to Antler, he was a General Partner at Forum Ventures, focused on early stage B2B SaaS.

Ivan Lopez
Partner, Head of Platform

Ivan is a serial entrepreneur and investor who has spent his career developing technology and business solutions around the globe. He gets really excited about creating scalable solutions to complex problems delivering impact on a global scale and mentoring founders. His career spans 30 years across the USA, Europe, APAC and LATAM. He has founded 8 companies in e-commerce technology, and men’s personal care products. Prior to Antler he was with Techstars as General Manager for Americas West, APAC and LATAM. He has been in leadership roles at Amazon, Disney, Sony Pictures and Hutchison Whampoa amongst other executive roles around the globe.

Charles Hayley-Bell
General Partner

Charlie Hayley Bell leads Capital and Investor Relations for Antler US. Charlie has 20 years of alternative investment experience in the US, and Latin America across both public and private markets advising investors and raising capital for hedge funds, real estate, PE, and venture capital. Charlie is an investor in early and growth stage technology and CPG companies. He previously was with HSBC, Archstone Partners, and Old City Securities. He holds a MA from Edinburgh University.

Annie Ripp
Principal

Annie is an investor focused on identifying founders at the early stages across a multitude of verticals including business and consumer technology and CPG. After graduating in 2019, Annie spent time in growth equity at Spring Lake Equity Partners where she focused on sourcing growth stage private technology businesses. Prior to Antler, Annie was an investor at BBG Ventures investing in seed stage women founded businesses.

Zoe Hall
Chief Strategy Officer
Caroline Healey
Senior Principal

Caroline works with founders in Antler's Austin office and leads Antler's US marketing and growth functions. Prior to joining Antler, Caroline worked at NationSwell as an associate producer and in finance at Visa. Caroline graduated Cum Laude from the University of San Diego, where she obtained her BBA in Finance and Business Economics.

Chia Jeng Yang
Investor
Tyler Norwood
Managing Partner, U.S.

Tyler Norwood is Managing Partner for Antler in the United States, where he oversees the firm’s US growth and geographic expansion. Tyler joined Antler in 2017 as its fifth full-time employee and has been instrumental in launching and scaling the firm. Prior to joining Antler, Tyler was the Global Head of Business Development for Global Fashion Group (GFG), where he was in charge of launching a marketplace business model for GFG’s companies across 21 different countries; he also assisted with the company’s IPO in Frankfurt in 2017. Before GFG, Tyler was the Interim Head of Marketplace at Jabong, which he helped sell for $70 million in 2016, and Head of Marketplace Vietnam at Zalora, the largest fashion e-commerce company in Asia. Along the way, Tyler has also completed the Vietnam Marathon, Singapore Marathon, and Boulder Iron Man. Tyler is passionate about providing a better on ramp to Venture Capital for founders who want to change the world and hands on support for founders in the first 6 months of launching a new startup.

Some of our Past Speakers

Throughout our residencies, successful entrepreneurs have shared their insights and experiences with our founders, offering valuable mentorship !

Clare Jones

CEO of Polarsteps

Daniel Krauss

Co-founder of Flix

Marc-Alexander Christ

Co-founder of SumUp

Francesco Wiedemann

Co-founder of Kyte

Frank Freund

Co-founder and CFO of Raisin

Robert Kraal

Co-founder of Silverflow

Clare Jones

CEO of Polarstep

Daniel Krauss

Co-founder of Flix

Marc-Alexander Christ

Co-founder of SumUp

Francesco Wiedemann

Co-founder of Kyte

Frank Freund

Co-founder and CFO of Raisin

Robert Kraal

Co-founder of Silverflow

Connect on LinkedIn

Listen to Early Days podcast

Lessons learned from the world's best founders and VCs

View all
Early Days—Episode 14: Supercritical with Michelle You

Michelle You is co-founder and CEO of Supercritical, one of the world's largest carbon removal marketplaces. But Supercritcal isn't the first startup Michelle has built and scaled. Before Supercritical, Michelle was co-founder and Chief Product Officer at Songkick, a company that helped fans discover concerts from their favorite artists. Songkick was backed by investors like YC, Index, Sequoia, Access and ultimately exited to Warner Music. 

Michelle shares how her experience at Songkick has influenced her approach to building Supercritical. We discuss the importance of user interviews, ascertaining key insights from customers, and how to structure an analytical decision making process. These are valuable, hard-earned lessons from a serial founder that you don't want to miss.

Early Days—Episode 13: Surf with Swish Goswami

Swish Goswami is the co-founder and CEO of Surf, a startup that helps consumers monetize their digital footprints through the world’s first extension that passively rewards people for everyday browsing. Surf has raised over $4M to date and also provides first and zero party data to enterprises like Netflix, L’Oreal, United Talent Agency, and Electronic Arts.

In this episode of Early Days, Swish talks about his decision to drop out of the University of Toronto to work in startups, how he honed in on Surf’s ultimate value prop for brands and customers, and his thoughts on the future of consumer data privacy. Tyler grills Swish on how he recruited AAA+ talent to his team at such a young age and how he validated product-market fit with Surf's early (paying) customers.

Early Days—Episode 12: Cameo with Arthur Leopold

Cameo is the world's largest celebrity marketplace. With Cameo, you can access thousands of celebrities and request a personalized video message for any occasion from your favorite stars.

Arthur Leopold recognized the potential of selfies becoming the new autographs. He quickly joined Cameo as the first employee (COO) and invested in the startup's friends and family round. Arthur spent over 5.5 years with Cameo, serving as President through January 2023. While Arthur recently stepped down as President to start his own company, he remains a Senior Advisor and an ardent supporter of the team.

We recorded this podcast while Arthur was Cameo's acting President. In this episode of Early Days, Arthur talks about the first Cameo that started it all, combatting the chicken-egg problem in marketplaces, finding near instantaneous product-market fit with fans, and Cameo's distinctive celebrity acquisition strategy.

Early Days—Episode 11: Bubble with Emmanuеl Straschnοv

Have you ever had an idea for a really awesome product, but you get stuck because you don't know how to write code? Well, today's guest, Emmanuel Straschnov, is solving that problem as the founder and CEO of Bubble.io. Emmanuel and his co-founder, Josh, wanted to put the ability to write software at the fingertips of the entire world. In 2012, they started Bubble, and set out to build a no-code platform that equips anyone to write beautiful software. Listen to this episode of Early Days to learn how Emmanuel and Josh bootstrapped for seven years before taking external capital, building Bubble into a unicorn in the process.

Early Days—Episode 10: charity:water with Scott Harrison

In Episode 10 of the Early Days, Scott tells the story of his 16-year journey building charity:water with the mission to give people access to clean water.

Early Days—Episode 9: Esusu with Samir Goel

Did you know that nearly 45 million Americans don't have a credit score, and most are immigrant families that struggle with lack of access to basic financial services because of this? In Episode 9 of the Early Days, Samir Goel shares how watching his parents struggle with lack of access to basic financial services inspired him to build Esusu.

Early Days—Episode 8: Superside with Fredrik Thomassen

Fredrik Thomassen is the founder and CEO of Superside, a fully distributed and remote design operations platform. Fredrik explains how he and his co-founder got Superside off the ground by manually hacking together an MVP without any tech or teammates who knew how to code. We also hear Fredrik's insights on prioritizing his scope of product offerings, fundraising, and running a truly global company.

Early Days—Episode 7: Nerdwallet with Jake Gibson

Jake Gibson, co-founder of Nerdwallet, shares the story of how messing around with a friend to fix a problem getting a credit card scaled into a publicly traded company on the NASDAQ.

Early Days—Episode 6: Glovo with Sacha Michaud

Sacha Michaud, co-founder of Glovo, shares the story of how this once humble delivery company grew into a billion-dollar logistics platform in Europe.

Early Days—Episode 5: Magical with Harpaul Sambhi

Harpaul Sambhi dives into how he built Magical, a company focused on reducing monotony and pain in everyday tasks through simple, effective automation. At the time of recording, Magical had just raised $41 million in funding and automated over one billion tasks for more than 10,000 companies globally.

Early Days—Episode 4: TravelPerk with Avi Meir

Avi Meir, founder and CEO of TravelPerk, shares his story of becoming a serial entrepreneur, and how his latest venture TravelPerk is changing the game in corporate travel.

Early Days—Episode 3: Airtable with Andrew Ofstad

Andrew Ofstad, co-founder of the world's largest no-code platform Airtable, shares how three friends from college built an $11 billion dollar no-code empire that more than 80% of the Fortune 100 uses day-to-day.

Early Days—Episode 2: Superhuman with Rahul Vohra

Rahul Vohra, founder and CEO of Superhuman, shares how he first came up with this idea, and how he has successfully competed with one of the world's most powerful companies, Google.

Early Days—Episode 1: Strava with Mark Gainey

Mark Gainey, co-founder and chairman of Strava, shares the story of how he built the world's largest online athlete community.

FAQs

What visa/citizenship requirements do I need to join Antler’s US Residency?

You can apply to our Residency if you hold any type of valid US work visa.

What stage do you invest in?

We are focused on providing founders better access to capital at the very beginning of their journey, so we back founders at the ideation stage. We'll invest as early as a clearly defined product statement and roadmap to your MVP, we'll even help you incorporate your new venture if necessary. We always aim to be the first institutional check into our portfolio companies.

Which industries do you invest in?

We are industry agnostic and invest across all technology sectors.

When do applications close? How do I refer other founders?

The next Antler US Residency will launch in March 2025 in-person Austin, TX and New York City. We highly encourage you to invite stellar fellow founders in your network to apply to Antler!

How often do I have to be in the office? What does “full-time” mean?

The Antler residency is a full-time commitment. This means that you are 100% dedicating your time to building your company. That said, it is not “mandatory” to be in the office from 9-5PM daily. The intention is to foster an engaged and supportive community of founders building together in person. As long as you show up for cohort activities and receive value from the community, you can spend your time in any way you see most fit to build your company. Most founders come in 4-5 days a week.

Do you provide a stipend?

Yes - all accepted founders who are relocating for the residency may apply for a $2.5k living expense grant. If you are joining us from out of town, check out Relocation Resources.

Can my co-founder join? Will I have help finding a co-founder?

Yes, co-founders are welcome, though we only require 1 founder to be dedicated full-time in the residency. While we do not guarantee co-founder matching during the residency, you are encouraged to meet and potentially team up with other residents, bring in folks from your network to work in the office, or canvas the Antler network for potential co-founder fits. This cohort, we will have around 80 founders joining us per location.

Does everyone get to pitch to the Investment Committee?

Not every founder or team will receive the opportunity to present to the investment committee (IC) during Pitch Week. This happens for a variety of reasons, including: dropping out for personal reasons or time commitment issues, pivoting your idea and requiring more time to validate, not demonstrating sufficient traction to put your best foot forward yet, deciding to join another founder or team, or deciding that your business is not venture scalable, amongst other reasons. If it is the case that you do not present to the Antler IC at this point in time, we will work with you on an individual basis to explore other options, such as joining our Talent Network, setting goals and a timeline for a delayed IC pitch, etc.

How many founders receive the Antler investment?

We do not have a minimum or maximum number of investments per cohort or location, though it is unlikely that we invest in 100% or 0% of founders in the residency. Historically, we have invested in 20-45% of founders in each residency. We generally make our decisions based on founder strength in domain expertise, deep understanding of the problem statement and your customer, first principled thinking and vision, execution ability, and progress made over the period of time.

Do we have to take the Antler investment?

We would never force anyone to take our money 🙂  Technically, the Memorandum of Understanding (part of your DocuSign package) is an expectation-setting legal document. We expect teams to honor the spirit of the agreement as we do. The intent is that over the eight weeks, we will earn our equity, and you will see the value of having the Antler team on your cap table and as an active advisor for continued future support as an extension of your founding team.

What happens after the eight week Residency?

If you successfully pitch to the investment committee, you will become part of the Antler portfolio and kick off Phase II. You will be assigned a deal lead to work closely with going forward, and go through a transition week where we will support you on incorporation, documentation, admin, and other items in order to receive the funding, clarify goals and milestones, and set you up on the path to scale and raise your seed.

If you are unsuccessful in pitching to the investment committee, you will still remain a valuable part of the Antler community for life. You will retain access to office space for an additional week, remain in our Slack community and other platforms, and can meet with our team to discuss next steps for your startup. Previous residents have taken on feedback and returned to pitch successfully, joined Antler portfolio companies or the talent network, or started new companies and returned to Antler. The door is always open 🔑

Contact Antler in the US

Get in touch with our team!

US