User:Mikkojarvenpaa/HackFwd

HackFwd

HackFwd is a European evergreen pre-seed fund started in 2010 by Lars Hinrichs. HackFwd only invests in developers with prototypes or demos for a fixed timeframe of 12 months. This timeframe is used to get to beta and create a viable business case. HackFwd provides a support structure doing all administrative work and helps with finding advisors. Of the 30% equity stake that HackFwd takes, 3% are given back to the founders to distribute to advisors and mentors. HackFwd's headquarters are in Hamburg and the company invests across Europe.

HackFwd provides funding to startups of one to three people for a year. As of early 2011 funding ranges from 91,000 EUR to 191,000 EUR depending on the size of the founding team. The investment sizes are fixed and detailed on the website. HackFwd differs from many accelerators and incubators in that the startups invested in do not move to central location. Instead, they run quarterly events (called Build events) where all HackFwd members come together for feedback and expert mentorship sessions, which are designed to offer the most relevant support to startups in different phases of the program. Some of the material from the Build events is made public on the Where Passion Meets Momentum video website.

HackFwd makes most of the funding process transparent and releases much material in the public, including a standardized contract called “Geek Agreement”, which details the terms of finance. While a startup cannot directly apply to the program, they can find a person who is part of the referrer network (staff, founders, alumnis, academia) and go through them. All referrers are listed on the website. HackFwd's business model evaluation tool Phase 2 Generator is also publicly available, and can be used to submit a business idea to a referrer, or privately as a tool for constructing and evaluating a business model.