Deal sourcing is the first step towards an investment process in Venture Capital. Pratim Pathak from pi Ventures walks through the learnings developed on how to source effectively and strategically as a part of the pi fellows program.

1. piVentures2020AllRightsReserved
Deal Sourcing
by
Pratim Pathak, Associate @ pi Ventures
@pratim_pathak1

2. piVentures2020AllRightsReserved
Process of creating a pipeline of startups basis a firm’s investment
strategies/thesis, from a universe of existing startups and entrepreneurs
• Deal Flow • Deal Sourcing • Outbound • Inbound

3. piVentures2020AllRightsReserved
Pacing @ 1000 meetings/year, it’d take us 100k years to
cover one cohort!
This creates both, a unique opportunity and a problem
*https://get2growth.com/how-many-startups/
~100mn startups/year* ~500mn entrepreneurs, globally*
Numbers don’t lie (?)

4. piVentures2020AllRightsReserved
`
All startups
Deep-tech
Stage/Ticket size
Sweet-spot
India Connect
Historical data
A VC’s Sourcing Venn
Diagram
• Quantitative/Objective
• Measurable

5. piVentures2020AllRightsReserved
• Patterns
• Heuristics
• Qualitative Metrics
• Subjective Aspects
• Feedback Loop
• Fine-tuning

6. piVentures2020AllRightsReserved
Directly to founders Social-media Platforms Incubators/Accelerators InvestorsTools/Software
One way of creating a healthy pipeline of companies,
is to go Outbound..
Secondary Primary

7. piVentures2020AllRightsReserved
..What if, like any other marketing problem, we could turn
this, to Inbound?
^NETWORK!
Leveraging diversity in the Investment
Team
Events/Conferences
Blogs/Thought-leadership
Articles
Mentoring/helping Founders Doing great deals!

8. piVentures2020AllRightsReserved
Inbound-
Network
25%
Inbound-
Cold
21%
Referral
17%
Investment
Banker
10%
Outbound
19%
Outbound-
Tool
8%
Oubound
35%
Inbound
65%
Inbound/Referral
71%
Outbound
29%
All Companies Met So Far AI First Companies
Source split for..
Deep-dive Portfolio
Inbound/Referral
100%
Substantial majority of our deal flow across different stages has been some form of
inbound or referral

9. piVentures2020AllRightsReserved
Coverage
(#Startups that raised ₹)
(#Startups that raised ₹)
U
(#Startups met before they raised ₹)
=
• Funding news from public databases (Inc42, Yourstory, LinkedIn, Tracxn etc)
• Filtering out what’s relevant, basis DeepTech/AI/Stage/Funding amount etc
• List of all startups met so far (~1350 for pi Ventures)
• Good metric to evaluate how effective deal sourcing is
• Repeated quarterly
%

10. piVentures2020AllRightsReserved
Re–Sourcing is a great Resource
Met/Evaluated but have
passed
100+ companies to stay
connected with, at scale Need to resurrect conversations
Brand-recall Hit PMF/Tech progress Environment change, Behavior shifts,
Tailwinds

11. piVentures2020AllRightsReserved
Quick Takeaways:
• Inbound is crucial, but outbound is important too!
• Idea is having access to the best entrepreneurs
• Coverage is important
• Qualitative/Quantitative learnings should feed back to learning
• Help founders, selflessly
• Reputation vs Brand
• Whenever get an opportunity, source!
If you can help introduce to 4 deep-tech companies by name from your network!
(Helpful, but highly optional)

12. piVentures2020AllRightsReserved
Thank you,
Happy Sourcing!