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Croatia - Central Eastern Europe Fall 2026
Virtual

Program Schedule

Our flagship 'FI Core' program combines structured sprints with constant feedback to help you reach the milestones needed for investment and growth.

Jul 21

Early Application Deadline

Nov 10

Final Application Deadline

Nov 18

Join the Equity Collective

Nov 23 05:00 pm week 1

Kickoff

This week, you'll get familiar with the program, set up your AI toolkit, prove your AI proficiency, and prepare to introduce yourself to the cohort.

Date
Nov 23, 2026
Time
10:00am CST

Sprints

Every Founder follows the Agentic Track — an AI-personalized curriculum that adapts each sprint to be more advanced or more basic based on your stage, with powerful free AI agents to help complete the work.

The below deliverables are in addition to any custom "Epic Sprints" you may receive based on your specific challenges, and are just high-level previews of the 10-15 deliverables you'll complete through Working Groups and Office Hours:

Deliverables

The Agentic Track

Personalized by AI to your startup's needs — more advanced or more basic — with powerful free AI agents to help you complete the company building work.

  1. Office Hours - Book your first Office Hours with Local Leaders and Mentors to get guidance on the next steps for your business.
  2. Hotseat Pitch - Prepare a one sentence verbal pitch for the weekly "Founder Hotseat", where you present to Mentors during the Feedback Sessions.
The Agentic Track

Personalized by AI to your startup's needs — more advanced or more basic — with powerful free AI agents to help you complete the company building work.

Sprints
Pitching
Customer Development
Leadership Development
Nov 24 05:00 pm week 1

Vision

This week, you'll explore the biggest possible idea to pursue, validate real customer problems, define your personal purpose, and draft your first pitches.

Date
Nov 24, 2026
Time
10:00am CST

Sprints

Below are just high-level previews of the 10-15 deliverables you'll complete through Working Groups and Office Hours:

Deliverables

The Agentic Track

Personalized by AI to your startup's needs — more advanced or more basic — with powerful free AI agents to help you complete the company building work.

  1. Market Research - Utilize our market research template to collect accurate and available market information on the customer problems you are analyzing.
  2. Personas - Build an initial Buyer Persona to better understand your target customer's needs, challenges, and buying process.
The Agentic Track

Personalized by AI to your startup's needs — more advanced or more basic — with powerful free AI agents to help you complete the company building work.

Sprints
Pitching
Customer Development
Leadership Development
Dec 01 05:00 pm week 2

Validation

This week, you'll select one business to focus on, validate it deeply through customer development, and build an initial mockup of your product.

Date
Dec 01, 2026
Time
10:00am CST

Sprints

Below are just high-level previews of the 10-15 deliverables you'll complete through Working Groups and Office Hours:

Deliverables

The Agentic Track

Personalized by AI to your startup's needs — more advanced or more basic — with powerful free AI agents to help you complete the company building work.

  1. Customer Interviews - Develop a longer series of customer interview questions based on your initial interviews and key assumptions, with at least ten open-ended customer interview questions for each customer problem.
  2. Revenue Modeling - For each remaining customer problem, develop or improve a professional landing page targeted to your initial customer archetype, and quickly build up a mailing list to receive customer feedback.
The Agentic Track

Personalized by AI to your startup's needs — more advanced or more basic — with powerful free AI agents to help you complete the company building work.

Sprints
Pitching
Customer Development
Leadership Development
Sales & Customer Acquisition
Dec 08

Refund Deadline

Dec 08 05:00 pm week 3

Model

This week, you'll test pricing with real customers, build a revenue model that can scale, and map out the human and agent roles needed to run your business.

Date
Dec 08, 2026
Time
10:00am CST

Sprints

Below are just high-level previews of the 10-15 deliverables you'll complete through Working Groups and Office Hours:

Deliverables

The Agentic Track

Personalized by AI to your startup's needs — more advanced or more basic — with powerful free AI agents to help you complete the company building work.

  1. Revenue Models - Narrow down that problem to three potential revenue models, and thoroughly analyze the positives and negatives of each model.
  2. Professional Pitch Deck - Use our templates to develop a professional three minute long pitch deck, based on the feedback, concepts and flow that have resonated from your Hotseat pitches.
The Agentic Track

Personalized by AI to your startup's needs — more advanced or more basic — with powerful free AI agents to help you complete the company building work.

Sprints
Pitching
Customer Development
Leadership Development
Sales & Customer Acquisition
Product Development
Revenue Modeling
Dec 15 05:00 pm week 4

Development

This week, you'll turn your mockup into a working prototype that customers can use, co-develop with a lead customer, and prepare for your first major review.

Date
Dec 15, 2026
Time
10:00am CST

Sprints

Below are just high-level previews of the 10-15 deliverables you'll complete through Working Groups and Office Hours:

Deliverables

The Agentic Track

Personalized by AI to your startup's needs — more advanced or more basic — with powerful free AI agents to help you complete the company building work.

  1. Build your Pitch Script - Practice makes perfect, especially with an early version of your pitch. The average 3 minute pitch consists of 450 words at normal talking speed. Create the written version of your script and get feedback from your peers.
  2. Idea Review Pitch Deck - Finalize your 3-minute pitch deck for the Mentor Idea Review, using our templates and guidelines. Practice the pitch at least five times with your peers, and revise it based on feedback. Upload a final video on the deliverables page.
The Agentic Track

Personalized by AI to your startup's needs — more advanced or more basic — with powerful free AI agents to help you complete the company building work.

Sprints
Pitching
Customer Development
Leadership Development
Sales & Customer Acquisition
Product Development
Revenue Modeling
Legal & IP
Branding & Design
Jan 05 05:00 pm week 7

Idea Review

This is your first major milestone. You'll present your business and product to a panel of mentors who will rate you on idea viability, presentation skill, and research thoroughness.

Date
Jan 05, 2027
Time
10:00am CST

Sprints

After the Mentor Idea Review, Founders receive a larger number of custom "Epic Sprints" with deliverables based on their specific challenges. Below are high-level previews of standard deliverables.

Deliverables

The Agentic Track

Personalized by AI to your startup's needs — more advanced or more basic — with powerful free AI agents to help you complete the company building work.

  1. Advisor Candidates - You will create (or fill out) an Advisory Board in the next 5 weeks, so develop a target list of new advisor candidates based off your identified needs and gaps in knowledge/ connections.
  2. Advisor Outreach - Leverage the FI network to get introductions to your targets where necessary, and follow our templated process to make progress on your advisory board.
The Agentic Track

Personalized by AI to your startup's needs — more advanced or more basic — with powerful free AI agents to help you complete the company building work.

Sprints
Pitching
Customer Development
Leadership Development
Sales & Customer Acquisition
Product Development
Revenue Modeling
Legal & IP
Branding & Design
Jan 12 05:00 pm week 8

Formation

This week, you'll incorporate your company, set up the legal foundation, protect your intellectual property, and start building your advisory board.

Date
Jan 12, 2027
Time
10:00am CST

Sprints

Below are just high-level previews of the 10-15 deliverables you'll complete through Working Groups and Office Hours:

Deliverables

The Agentic Track

Personalized by AI to your startup's needs — more advanced or more basic — with powerful free AI agents to help you complete the company building work.

  1. Law Firm Engagement - If you don't already have a law firm, meet with your law firm candidates and sign an "engagement letter" with your chosen firm.
  2. Corporate Formation Agreements - If you don't already have a suitable corporation, secure all of your corporate formation agreements which govern how the business conducts itself.
The Agentic Track

Personalized by AI to your startup's needs — more advanced or more basic — with powerful free AI agents to help you complete the company building work.

Sprints
Pitching
Customer Development
Leadership Development
Sales & Customer Acquisition
Product Development
Revenue Modeling
Legal & IP
Branding & Design
Financial Planning
Team & Advisors
Jan 19 05:00 pm week 9

Launch

This week, you'll launch your go-to-market engine, get your product into the hands of paying customers, and set your victory conditions for the rest of the program.

Date
Jan 19, 2027
Time
10:00am CST

Sprints

Below are just high-level previews of the 10-15 deliverables you'll complete through Working Groups and Office Hours:

Deliverables

The Agentic Track

Personalized by AI to your startup's needs — more advanced or more basic — with powerful free AI agents to help you complete the company building work.

  1. Alternatives - Identify two alternative models (markets or "pivots") for your go-to-market solution to discover the most lucrative market opportunity. Interview at least 2 customers for each alternative.
  2. Advisor Follow-Up - In the next Step you will finalize advisors, so begin finalization meetings with your top candidates, and set up test Advisor Test Projects where necessary following our templates.
The Agentic Track

Personalized by AI to your startup's needs — more advanced or more basic — with powerful free AI agents to help you complete the company building work.

Sprints
Pitching
Customer Development
Leadership Development
Sales & Customer Acquisition
Product Development
Revenue Modeling
Legal & IP
Branding & Design
Financial Planning
Team & Advisors
Jan 26 05:00 pm week 10

Traction

This week, you'll push for 10% weekly growth, track both your business and AI performance metrics, and discuss growth strategies.

Date
Jan 26, 2027
Time
10:00am CST

Sprints

Below are just high-level previews of the 10-15 deliverables you'll complete through Working Groups and Office Hours:

Deliverables

The Agentic Track

Personalized by AI to your startup's needs — more advanced or more basic — with powerful free AI agents to help you complete the company building work.

  1. Intellectual Property - If you have not already, secure and protect the intellectual property for all of the work done to date. Examine the need for patents, if applicable, following our guidelines.
  2. Team Analysis - Define and get extensive feedback on the requisite technical skills, soft skills, expertise, and networks will be needed in your core team.
The Agentic Track

Personalized by AI to your startup's needs — more advanced or more basic — with powerful free AI agents to help you complete the company building work.

Sprints
Pitching
Customer Development
Leadership Development
Sales & Customer Acquisition
Product Development
Legal & IP
Branding & Design
Financial Planning
Team & Advisors
Feb 02 05:00 pm week 11

Fundraising

This week, you'll prepare for fundraising by organizing your materials, building your investor pipeline, and deciding on your funding strategy ahead of Demo Day.

Date
Feb 02, 2027
Time
10:00am CST

Sprints

Below are just high-level previews of the 10-15 deliverables you'll complete through Working Groups and Office Hours:

Deliverables

The Agentic Track

Personalized by AI to your startup's needs — more advanced or more basic — with powerful free AI agents to help you complete the company building work.

  1. Advisor Strategy - Set up a call with each of your advisors and briefly review your "Victory Condition", the funding strategy, hiring plan, sales plan and product plan.
  2. Use of Proceeds - Examine the capital needs of the business, and extend your financial model to project revenues and expenses for a total of 24 months from now.
The Agentic Track

Personalized by AI to your startup's needs — more advanced or more basic — with powerful free AI agents to help you complete the company building work.

Sprints
Pitching
Customer Development
Leadership Development
Sales & Customer Acquisition
Product Development
Financial Planning
Team & Advisors
Fundraising Prep
Post-Program Onboarding
Feb 09 05:00 pm week 12

Demo Day

This is your final milestone. You'll pitch a panel of angel investors and VCs with a five-minute pitch and a live demo for ratings, feedback, and potential investment.

Date
Feb 09, 2027
Time
10:00am CST
The Agentic Track

Personalized by AI to your startup's needs — more advanced or more basic — with powerful free AI agents to help you complete the company building work.

Sprints
Pitching
Customer Development
Leadership Development
Sales & Customer Acquisition
Product Development
Team & Advisors
Fundraising & Prep
Post-Program Onboarding
week 13+

Post Programs

The FI Core Program is just the beginning of a life long journey.

Founder Institute Alumni get access to a series of advanced accelerator programs, ongoing support from our Silicon Valley Team, valuable partner and service discounts, and more to continue building the business for years to come.

Continued Support
Continued Support
  • Dedicated Alumni Support Team in Silicon Valley

  • Access to the world's largest network of mentors and investors (40,000+)

  • Private Alumni mailing lists

  • $2.5M+ in partner discounts

  • Invites to FI sessions & network events

  • Potential introductions to investors

Structured Post-Programs
Structured Post-Programs
  • A series of virtual advisory programs where you work with our Silicon Valley HQ team to reach next milestones

  • Funding Lab helps get your lead investor within 6 months

  • The FI Venture Network matches Alumni ready for funding with a massive pool of investors that specialize in writing 'first or second checks' of funding

  • Exclusive for FI Alumni

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The Founder Institute is the world’s most proven network to turn ideas into fundable startups, and startups into global businesses. Since 2009, our AI-native company-building programs have helped over 9,000 entrepreneurs raise over 2BN in funding. Based in Silicon Valley and with chapters across 100 countries, our mission is to empower communities of talented and motivated people to build impactful technology companies worldwide.


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