Share of founders who never receive personal liquidity from their startup. A decade or more paper rich, cash poor.
Don't get carried away. Get carried forward.
Aclarys is the Fund of Founders. Pooled credit, not pooled equity. No ownership transfer.
Median Series B founder ownership is 21.8%. By Series D it is 10.4%. Median time from Seed to Series D is 8 years. By that point the employees you hired hold more of the company than you do.
| Round | Founders | Employee pool | New investors | Prior investors |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Seed | 54.8% | 12.1% | 20.6% | 12.5% |
| Series A | 35.6% | 14.4% | 20.0% | 30.0% |
| Series B | 21.8% | 15.6% | 16.5% | 46.1% |
| Series C | 16.1% | 16.8% | 12.6% | 54.5% |
| Series D | 10.4% | 18.2% | 10.2% | 61.2% |
By Series C, the median employee option pool overtakes the founder's stake – and the gap widens by Series D.
The cohort is compounding. UK AI startups raised a record $12.6bn in H1 2026 – nearly three quarters of all UK venture capital. London is minting paper-rich founders faster than anywhere in Europe.
Pooled tokenised credit, issued against unrealised founder equity. Settles through regulated infrastructure. Clears institutional credit diligence on its own terms.
Pay interest on part of the advance – and cover the rest with a small, capped share of the exit.
Borrow against your equity – no sale, no share transfer, no cap table change. Tax deferred to exit, subject to your jurisdiction and counsel.
10+ founders per pool. Methodology auditable and repeatable per portfolio company.
Issued on regulated rails. Diversified by stage, sector, and exit horizon.
Both tranches open at issuance. Allocators choose their mix within pool-level limits.
Three steps on the founder side. Founders contract with the SPV. The SPV pools across founders and distributes to buyers separately. The two sides never meet.
Each pool is curated for stage, sector, and exit horizon. Composition locked at issuance.
Pools diversify for buyers, not against founders.
Set at signing: interest on part, a small capped exit share on the rest. Settles at your exit.
Founder choice. Every part priced at origination.
Founder identities stay private throughout. The stake on the cap table is untouched.
Cash against a pledge of future proceeds, not in exchange for shares.
Pricing is methodology-led. Each company in the pool is modelled on its own cap table, peer set, and exit-horizon distribution.
Your advance isn't shares times a discount. We run your company through the full model – every lens, shown to you openly – and walk you through it. Share your cap table and business plan under NDA for a confidential chat.
Indicative only. Pool 1 goes live later in 2026 – nothing is binding until then.
Aclarys originates the pool. Founders supply the underlying. Institutional buyers take the senior tranche. The junior tranche is where the bridge thesis becomes a product.
Founders of venture-backed private companies, Series A or later, with material personal equity exposure and no near-term liquidity event. Founders contract with the SPV, not with buyers.
Identity stays private through origination, issuance, and reporting.
Family offices, niche-asset private credit funds, and insurance balance sheets seeking yield against a non-correlated underlying.
First claim on aggregate pool cashflows.
Underwritten on credit-fund terms.
Where Aclarys bridges to DeFi-native distribution. Operators, post-exit founders, and accredited investors take residual claim on pool cashflows with equity-shaped exposure.
Open at pool 1 issuance, distributed through regulated venues.
Founder equity is real collateral – concentrated, unpriced, and untouched by credit markets. Turning it into something an allocator can hold is a screening problem before it is a pricing one.
Founders of venture-backed companies hold most of their wealth in a single private position, years from liquidity. Governed by boards, repriced every round – and bankable nowhere.
Every lender in the category prices cashflows. Nobody prices exit proceeds.
Every company is screened on what its capital structure would leave behind at exit. Where preferred holders would consume the proceeds, the name is out – however strong the founder.
Pool composition locked at issuance. The discipline is the product.
Registered digital securities, issued natively on Solana. You choose your senior/junior mix within pool-level limits. Reported on a fixed cadence.
Sellable to another qualified buyer through the register.
Composition, coverage, economics and sensitivities are shared in conversation with qualified allocators – including what drives any individual company's inclusion.
Posture only on this page. Nothing here is an offer or a solicitation.
First-pool conversations are running through summer 2026. Founders, credit allocators, accredited investors, or anyone with a clear reason to be on this list – tell us in a sentence.
Indicative figures available in conversation under NDA after sign-up.
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