Stealth: $1.5M raised — MatCap Case Study

BY THE NUMBERS

Every intro request, accounted for.

When the round opened, MatCap sent 67 intro requests on the founder's behalf. Here's how the network actually responded. The $1.5M total includes Untapped VC's lead, sourced outside the platform flow — these numbers reflect the platform-tracked outreach only.

Intro requests sent

Engaged · 25% accept rate

Wired · 2 platform + 1 direct

$1.5M

Total round size

RESPONSE BREAKDOWN

YES · 25%

PASSED · 30%

IGNORED · 45%

Yes · 17 intros · 3 wired (incl. Incisive via direct intro)

Passed · 20 intros

Ignored · 30 intros

FIRMS THAT ENGAGED (15+)

Outlander Labs ✓ wired

Forum Ventures ✓ wired

Incisive VC ✓ wired

Active Capital

Afore VC

Aglaé Ventures

Copper Sky Capital

Costanoa

First Round

Flex Capital

Matchstick Ventures

PerceptiveVC

Precursor Ventures

Signalfire

Stage 2 Capital

Wischoff Ventures

FIRMS THAT PASSED (18) — RECEIPTS, NOT JUST WINS

Animo VC

Array Ventures

Benchmark

Bloomberg Beta

Coalition Operators

Footwork VC

Formation Capital

Freestyle Capital

Greylock

Hannah Grey

Homebrew

Hustle Fund

Mantis VC

Menlo Ventures

New York Venture Partners

Shor Capital

South Park Commons

Visualize Venture Group

Benchmark, Greylock, Menlo, Hustle Fund, Homebrew, Bloomberg Beta, South Park Commons — Tier 1 firms took the meeting. None of them led. Untapped did.

The challenge

This founder and Mat met in 2019 — friendship first, business much later. The founder iterated through several ideas across six years (consumer services, vertical SaaS) before landing on a thesis that clicked. Through it all, the relationship deepened, but mixing money into a friendship took trust to build.

When the right idea finally landed and a real round needed to come together, the question was whether years of casual support could convert into high-conviction, targeted fundraising — and survive the inevitable tight moments.

What MatCap did

Six years of consistent show-up — events, intros, advice — long before there was equity in the room.
Early casual intros that brought in roughly $100K in initial capital.
When the larger round opened: high-conviction, targeted outreach into MatCap's network. 67 intro requests, hand-picked.
Connected the founder with key investors including Outlander Labs (AJ Smith), Forum Ventures (Nick Saah), Incisive VC (direct intro), and Untapped VC as the round lead.
Stayed in the round through the tight moments — the moments rounds either close or fall apart.

The outcome

$1.5M round closed led by Untapped VC.
Three wired checks via MatCap intros — Outlander Labs and Forum Ventures (platform), plus Incisive VC (direct intro from Mat outside the platform flow).
Tier 1 firms (Benchmark, Greylock, Menlo, Hustle Fund, Homebrew, Bloomberg Beta, South Park Commons) took the meeting; none led.
Founder built out a strong senior team and is positioned to scale.
A six-year relationship-first arc — the kind that doesn't show up in transactional networks.

A six-year founder relationship turned into a $1.5M round.