Entrepreneurs First

Entrepreneurs First starts from an uncomfortable question: how many people with the potential to build global startups never do — not because they lack talent, but because they lack the right context? A co-founder, a credible idea, peer pressure, initial capital, social permission to take risk. EF was founded in 2011 to answer exactly that question. Founded in London by Alice Bentinck and Matt Clifford, Entrepreneurs First flipped one of the implicit rules of traditional venture capital. In the classic model, investors wait for teams, products and traction to exist. EF invests earlier: it seeks exceptional individuals — often engineers, researchers, scientists — who don't yet have a co-founder or a startup, and puts them in the right room. Its real product is not capital. It's the environment. The programme works through cohorts selected at acceptance rates below 1%. Participants receive an initial grant, access to mentors and advisors, intensive co-founder matching sessions, and positive pressure from an exceptionally high-calibre peer group. Within a few months, they must find a co-founder, build a credible startup thesis, and pitch at Demo Day to investors. Those who don't find the right match or the right idea leave the programme — and often return to their careers with a radically different perspective. Over 15 years, EF has demonstrated that this model works. Companies born from its programme include Cleo (AI fintech for personal finance, valued at over $500M), PolyAI (conversational AI for enterprise customer service), Gensyn (distributed computing for AI training) and Aztec (privacy infrastructure on blockchain). The declared portfolio value in 2026 exceeds $16 billion in aggregate. After programmes in London, Paris, Berlin, Singapore and Bangalore, in 2025 EF opened a structured hub in San Francisco — the most significant step in its history. The thesis is that the density of talent, capital and customers in the Bay Area allows EF startups to grow faster, find their first US enterprise customers, and attract follow-on rounds from tier-1 investors. This is not about abandoning Europe, but about connecting European talent to the American system. In 2025, EF announced the raising of $200 million in new capital, confirming the model's durability and LP confidence over the long term. Matt Clifford, EF Chair and UK government adviser on AI, described the round as an investment in the next generation of founders who will build the infrastructure of the artificial intelligence era. The economic model is equity-based: EF typically takes around 10% of equity in the startups created through the programme, in exchange for the co-founding pathway, the initial grant, and network access. Economic returns come from portfolio exits and follow-on rounds — a model that requires patience but one that, with the right startups, generates extraordinary returns. Entrepreneurs First demonstrates that entrepreneurial talent is distributed far more widely than we think. The problem is not a shortage of potential founders — it is a shortage of environments capable of transforming raw ambition into global startups. EF builds those environments.