Do I need all 34 items at pre-seed?

No. Corporate documents, the cap table, team agreements and basic financials cover most pre-seed checks; the rest matters at seed and beyond.

Can I share the checklist with my co-founder?

Copy the missing items with the button and paste them anywhere.

Does SeedScope store my answers?

No. The checklist runs in your browser.

Startup Due Diligence Checklist for Fundraising

Corporate

0/5

Certificate of incorporation, bylaws or articlesThe documents that prove the company exists and how it is governed.Fully diluted cap tableEvery share, option, SAFE and note, with the owner and the date. One spreadsheet, no surprises.Board and shareholder resolutionsApprovals for prior rounds, option grants and major contracts.Prior round documentsSigned SAFEs, notes, subscription agreements and side letters.Registrations and good standingTax registration, company registry extract, any foreign qualifications.

Financials

0/5

P&L and bank statements, last 12 to 24 monthsInvestors reconcile the two. Discrepancies cost trust.18 to 36 month projection with assumptionsA driver-based model: customers, price, churn, costs, hiring.Current runway and monthly burnOne number each, updated this month.Revenue by customerShows concentration. Three customers at 80 percent of revenue is a question, not a problem.Debt, loans and grants outstandingIncluding repayment terms and any conversion rights.

Team

0/5

Founder bios, roles and time commitmentFull time or not, and who owns which decisions.Employment and contractor agreements with IP assignmentEveryone who touched the product assigned their work to the company.Option plan and vesting schedulesPlan documents, grants, cliffs and acceleration terms.Founder equity split and vestingWritten and signed, including what happens if a founder leaves.Org chart and 12-month hiring planLinked to the use of funds in the deck.

Legal and IP

0/5

IP assignments from every contributor, including contractorsThe most common gap in young companies, and the easiest to fix now.Trademarks, domains and social handlesOwned by the company, not a founder’s personal account.Open-source and third-party licence inventoryWhich licences your dependencies use and whether any are copyleft.Material contractsTop customers, key suppliers, partnerships, leases.Disputes and litigation disclosureAnything pending or threatened, even if small.

Product and technology

0/5

Architecture overviewA one-page diagram and a short description of what runs where.Security practicesSecrets management, access control, backups, incident history.Privacy compliance and policiesGDPR or local equivalent, privacy policy, terms of service, data processing agreements.Product roadmap for 12 monthsWhat ships when and why.Technical debt and AI-generated code reviewWhat you know is fragile, and what was generated rather than written.

Commercial

0/5

Customer list and pipelineStage, value and expected close date.Retention and cohort dataMonthly cohorts with usage and revenue retention.Pricing and unit economicsCAC, payback, gross margin, LTV where it exists.Competitive landscapeWho else solves the problem and why customers chose you.Customer referencesTwo or three customers willing to take an investor call.

Compliance and admin

0/4

Tax filings up to dateCorporate, payroll and VAT or sales tax.InsuranceLiability, cyber and directors and officers if any.Licences and permitsSector-specific approvals where needed.Data room indexA folder structure with consistent file names and a one-page index.

Due diligence checklist: what investors ask for before they wire

What is due diligence in a seed round?

What goes in a data room?

Which gaps kill deals?

What is different for AI-built products?

Questions founders ask

Do I need all 34 items at pre-seed?

Can I share the checklist with my co-founder?

Does SeedScope store my answers?

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