W24 Orange Fund

Fund Closing Date: Dec 22nd

Please keep this information confidential. Not endorsed by or affiliated with YC.

Led by YC alumni and investors David J. Phillips and Nate Matherson, the W24 Orange Fund aims to invest in the top 10-25% of Y Combinator Winter 24 batch companies.

Y Combinator (YC) is the most prestigious startup accelerator in the world. It has funded 4,000+ companies, including Airbnb, Stripe, Cruise, DoorDash, Coinbase, Dropbox, Instacart, Quora, Reddit, and Twitch. YC interviews and selects two batches of companies per year and has a 1.5-2% acceptance rate.

The combined valuation of all YC companies nears $600B, including 90+ companies worth $1B+, and 16 public.

Typically only well-connected investors can invest in what they believe could be "the next Airbnb" — in fact, industry insiders line up weeks before the batch ends to secure an allocation in these hot companies.

Demo Day invitations are limited even for established VC investors, and the most promising startups close rounds before Demo Day.

The fund managers of the W24 Orange Fund are YC Alumni and have access to batch information and companies before other investors do. David and Nate will vet companies and invest the fund into the top quartile of startups.

LPs in the fund will get access to multiple deals across different industries of the Y Combinator Winter 24 batch.

The Fund Managers

David J. Phillips is the CEO and founder of Fondo (W18), the number one accounting platform for YC companies. David is an angel investor in 30+ startups, including top YC companies Rippling, Flexport, Armory, Career Karma, Yummy, and Treinta. David was previously the co-founder & CEO of Hackbright Academy, where he bootstrapped the coding boot camp until it was acquired by Capella Education (NASDAQ:CPLA).

Nate Matherson is a 2x founder and YC alum: LendEDU (W16) was acquired, and Positional (S21) is still active. Nate is an angel investor in over 40 YC startups. Nate invests almost exclusively in YC companies and focuses on SaaS, dev tools, and fintech. He runs a rigorous process during each YC batch cycle, working to invest in the best companies from each batch before Demo Day. Nate has invested in several top YC companies, including Karbon, Yummy, and Moonshot Brands.

12 Unicorns

Wefunder has a long history of raising YC batch funds since 2014. We’ve invested in 12 unicorns to date.

$2B—$5B

Rappi: Consumer tech company that specializes in providing online delivery services.

Checkr: Automates and speeds up the process of professional background checks.

Ginkgo Bioworks: Developer of biological engineering products and custom microbes across multiple markets.

EquipmentShare: Equipment and digital solutions provider serving the construction industry to help contractors accelerate productivity.

Ironclad: Contract lifecycle management platform used by companies to handle every type of contract workflow.

GrubMarket: GrubMarket is a technology enabler and digital transformer of American food supply chain industry.

$1B—$2B

Mux: Video platform designed to make video streaming and analytics possible for every development team.

Apollo: Market sales platform that helps accelerate the growth of an organization.

Astranis: Space startup that builds small and low-cost telecommunications satellites to provide internet access in remote regions.

Mashgin: Software company that makes AI and computer vision checkout systems.

ShipBob: Global logistics company that offers an e-commerce fulfillment order platform for direct-to-consumer brands.

Teleport: Provides infrastructure services such as connectivity, authentication, authorization, and audit into a single platform.

Our Orange Funds have higher returns than the top quarter of VC firms

Internal rate of return (IRR): IRR represents the rate at which a series of cashflows are discounted so that the net present value of cashflows equals zero. For fund-level IRRs, any remaining value in the fund is treated as a distribution in the most recent reporting period.

Total value to paid-in (TVPI): A measurement of both the realized and unrealized value of a fund as a proportion of the total paid-in, or contributed, capital. Also known as the investment multiple, TVPI can be found by adding together the DPI and RVPI of a fund. Some venture funds may be structured with a deployment period of 2-3 years and capital calls which could result in a lower TVPI metric.

Getting Into Deals

One of the key advantages of investing in the W24 Orange Fund is our team's connection and reputation within Y Combinator, giving us excellent access to investments.

1. David and Nate are both serial founders. They have been through YC’s program and have been investing in YC startups for years.
2. Wefunder is a YC alum (W13). We have also hosted 120+ fundraises for YC companies on the platform.
3. YC founders love us as investors. Wefunder has an "A" rating on YC’s Bookface (their internal knowledge base), with a total of 120 investments. Our last two YC funds had 100% “A” ratings from YC founders with 68 investments.
4. Optimal fund size. We keep our funds between $500K-1M per manager to ensure full deployment in the target batch while maintaining the highest quality of companies. Our last two funds were both oversubscribed in two weeks.

Evaluation and Investment Process

YC receives around 20,000 applications per batch and chooses approximately 200 companies (~1% acceptance rate compared to Harvard's 4%). From those 200 companies, we select 20-40 for our fund.

David and Nate will invest across multiple industries, including generative AI, fintech, healthcare, consumer, enterprise analytics, security, and infrastructure. The anticipated check sizes will be between $25K-$100K with a total of 20-40 investments, depending on the final fund size.

David and Nate will begin identifying companies and making investments well in advance of Demo Day, to secure allocations early and take advantage of favorable pre-Demo Day terms.

David and Nate will attempt to identify the best companies in the batch. They will make decisions to maximize the long-term value of the fund, and to provide the best returns possible for investors.

We invest alongside the best venture capital firms and angel investors worldwide. 

Key Terms and Fund Admin

• Admin. The fund will be administered by the Wefunder team.
• Funds. The investment will be split equally between two funds W24 Orange Fund DJP, managed by David Phillips, and W24 Orange Fund NM, managed by Nate Matherson.
• Reporting. We will provide LPs with regular performance updates on our investments.
• Distributions. Distributions to LPs happen following each individual liquidity event.
• Fees. Each fund charges 20% carried interest and a yearly management fee of 1%.
• Minimum Investment: $5,000.
• Closing date: December 22nd 2023

FAQ

How many investors are allowed in the fund?

Only 250 investors are allowed in the fund.

Can you accept international investors?

Yes, we can accept investments from anywhere, besides sanctioned countries. Sanctioned countries include Cuba, Iran, North Korea, Russia, Syria, and the Donetsk, Crimea, and Luhansk regions of Ukraine.

Do you accept non-accredited investors?

Only accredited investors are allowed to invest, accreditation is self-verified.

Are there capital calls?

No, all funds are fully called upfront

I have more questions.

Feel free to email Mattia at mattia@wefunder.com

1. Net investor IRR after fees and carry. Marked as of December 2023, to latest valuation paid by an investor. Unaudited. Realized and Unrealized.
2. Total Value to Paid In Capital. Marked as of December 2023. Unaudited. Realized and Unrealized.

Past performance is not indicative of future results. There is no guarantee that any fund will achieve the same exposure to, or quality of, startups held by any existing fund. We do not provide investment advice to investors and no communication, through this website or in any other medium, should be construed as a recommendation for any security. All data reported as of 12/01/23, net of fees and carry, for YC funds more than 2 years old.