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 10, 2026
Time
03:00am 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.
Office Hours - Book your first Office Hours with Local Leaders and Mentors to get guidance on the next steps for your business.
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.
Weekly Focus
1. Accelerator Kickoff
2. Vision & Mission
3. Customer Development
4. Revenue & Business Models
5. Pitch Mastery
6. Mentor Idea Review
7. Legal & Equity
8. Go-to-Market & Scale
9. Product Development
10. Investor Progress Review
11. Co-Founders & Team
12. Growth
13. Funding
14. Graduation
Sprints
Pitching
Customer Development
Leadership Development
Sales & Customer Acquisition
Product Development
Revenue Modeling
Legal & IP
Branding & Design
Financial Planning
Team & Advisors
Fundraising Prep
Post-Program Onboarding
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 11, 2026
Time
03:00am 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.
Market Research - Utilize our market research template to collect accurate and available market information on the customer problems you are analyzing.
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.
Weekly Focus
1. Accelerator Kickoff
2. Vision & Mission
3. Customer Development
4. Revenue & Business Models
5. Pitch Mastery
6. Mentor Idea Review
7. Legal & Equity
8. Go-to-Market & Scale
9. Product Development
10. Investor Progress Review
11. Co-Founders & Team
12. Growth
13. Funding
14. Graduation
Sprints
Pitching
Customer Development
Leadership Development
Sales & Customer Acquisition
Product Development
Revenue Modeling
Legal & IP
Branding & Design
Financial Planning
Team & Advisors
Fundraising Prep
Post-Program Onboarding
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
Nov 18, 2026
Time
03:00am 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.
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.
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.
Weekly Focus
1. Accelerator Kickoff
2. Vision & Mission
3. Customer Development
4. Revenue & Business Models
5. Pitch Mastery
6. Mentor Idea Review
7. Legal & Equity
8. Go-to-Market & Scale
9. Product Development
10. Investor Progress Review
11. Co-Founders & Team
12. Growth
13. Funding
14. Graduation
Sprints
Pitching
Customer Development
Leadership Development
Sales & Customer Acquisition
Product Development
Revenue Modeling
Legal & IP
Branding & Design
Financial Planning
Team & Advisors
Fundraising Prep
Post-Program Onboarding
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
Nov 25, 2026
Time
03:00am 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.
Revenue Models - Narrow down that problem to three potential revenue models, and thoroughly analyze the positives and negatives of each model.
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.
Weekly Focus
1. Accelerator Kickoff
2. Vision & Mission
3. Customer Development
4. Revenue & Business Models
5. Pitch Mastery
6. Mentor Idea Review
7. Legal & Equity
8. Go-to-Market & Scale
9. Product Development
10. Investor Progress Review
11. Co-Founders & Team
12. Growth
13. Funding
14. Graduation
Sprints
Pitching
Customer Development
Leadership Development
Sales & Customer Acquisition
Product Development
Revenue Modeling
Legal & IP
Branding & Design
Financial Planning
Team & Advisors
Fundraising Prep
Post-Program Onboarding
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 02, 2026
Time
03:00am 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.
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.
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.
Weekly Focus
1. Accelerator Kickoff
2. Vision & Mission
3. Customer Development
4. Revenue & Business Models
5. Pitch Mastery
6. Mentor Idea Review
7. Legal & Equity
8. Go-to-Market & Scale
9. Product Development
10. Investor Progress Review
11. Co-Founders & Team
12. Growth
13. Funding
14. Graduation
Sprints
Pitching
Customer Development
Leadership Development
Sales & Customer Acquisition
Product Development
Revenue Modeling
Legal & IP
Branding & Design
Financial Planning
Team & Advisors
Fundraising Prep
Post-Program Onboarding
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
Dec 09, 2026
Time
03:00am 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.
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.
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.
Weekly Focus
1. Accelerator Kickoff
2. Vision & Mission
3. Customer Development
4. Revenue & Business Models
5. Pitch Mastery
6. Mentor Idea Review
7. Legal & Equity
8. Go-to-Market & Scale
9. Product Development
10. Investor Progress Review
11. Co-Founders & Team
12. Growth
13. Funding
14. Graduation
Sprints
Pitching
Customer Development
Leadership Development
Sales & Customer Acquisition
Product Development
Revenue Modeling
Legal & IP
Branding & Design
Financial Planning
Team & Advisors
Fundraising Prep
Post-Program Onboarding
This week, you'll incorporate your company, set up the legal foundation, protect your intellectual property, and start building your advisory board.
Date
Dec 16, 2026
Time
03:00am 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.
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.
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.
Weekly Focus
1. Accelerator Kickoff
2. Vision & Mission
3. Customer Development
4. Revenue & Business Models
5. Pitch Mastery
6. Mentor Idea Review
7. Legal & Equity
8. Go-to-Market & Scale
9. Product Development
10. Investor Progress Review
11. Co-Founders & Team
12. Growth
13. Funding
14. Graduation
Sprints
Pitching
Customer Development
Leadership Development
Sales & Customer Acquisition
Product Development
Revenue Modeling
Legal & IP
Branding & Design
Financial Planning
Team & Advisors
Fundraising Prep
Post-Program Onboarding
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 06, 2027
Time
03:00am 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.
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.
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.
Weekly Focus
1. Accelerator Kickoff
2. Vision & Mission
3. Customer Development
4. Revenue & Business Models
5. Pitch Mastery
6. Mentor Idea Review
7. Legal & Equity
8. Go-to-Market & Scale
9. Product Development
10. Investor Progress Review
11. Co-Founders & Team
12. Growth
13. Funding
14. Graduation
Sprints
Pitching
Customer Development
Leadership Development
Sales & Customer Acquisition
Product Development
Revenue Modeling
Legal & IP
Branding & Design
Financial Planning
Team & Advisors
Fundraising Prep
Post-Program Onboarding
This week, you'll push for 10% weekly growth, track both your business and AI performance metrics, and discuss growth strategies.
Date
Jan 13, 2027
Time
03:00am 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.
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.
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.
Weekly Focus
1. Accelerator Kickoff
2. Vision & Mission
3. Customer Development
4. Revenue & Business Models
5. Pitch Mastery
6. Mentor Idea Review
7. Legal & Equity
8. Go-to-Market & Scale
9. Product Development
10. Investor Progress Review
11. Co-Founders & Team
12. Growth
13. Funding
14. Graduation
Sprints
Pitching
Customer Development
Leadership Development
Sales & Customer Acquisition
Product Development
Revenue Modeling
Legal & IP
Branding & Design
Financial Planning
Team & Advisors
Fundraising Prep
Post-Program Onboarding
Similar to the Mentor Idea Review, the Investor Progress Review is the second major test in the program. In this session, Founders will focus on give a long presentation their progress and traction to a panel of Investors and Advisors for a detailed review. Founders will be evaluated based on their progress in the program, the company's scalability, and more.
Date
Jan 20, 2027
Time
03:00am 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.
Polished Investor Pitch Deck - Create an expanded, 12-slide pitch deck incorporating any feedback from the Investor Progress Review, using our templates.
Growth - Make progress on your growth goals, and examine or adjust how your strategy and the system to keep yourself accountable is performing.
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.
Weekly Focus
1. Accelerator Kickoff
2. Vision & Mission
3. Customer Development
4. Revenue & Business Models
5. Pitch Mastery
6. Mentor Idea Review
7. Legal & Equity
8. Go-to-Market & Scale
9. Product Development
10. Investor Progress Review
11. Co-Founders & Team
12. Growth
13. Funding
14. Graduation
Sprints
Pitching
Customer Development
Leadership Development
Sales & Customer Acquisition
Product Development
Revenue Modeling
Legal & IP
Branding & Design
Financial Planning
Team & Advisors
Fundraising Prep
Post-Program Onboarding
In this Feedback Session, Founders will receive feedback from Mentors on their team plans and product progress. In addition, Mentors will discuss how to identify the roles needed to build a world-class company, how to develop a strategy to recruit, onboard and retain the best people, and more.
Date
Jan 27, 2027
Time
03:00am 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.
Hiring Process - Develop a hiring and onboarding process using our guidelines to add team members into your organization, and begin executing on the process.
Test Projects - Develop at least one test project for each of your top two or three roles, which should create opportunities for credible candidates to demonstrate their skills.
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.
Weekly Focus
1. Accelerator Kickoff
2. Vision & Mission
3. Customer Development
4. Revenue & Business Models
5. Pitch Mastery
6. Mentor Idea Review
7. Legal & Equity
8. Go-to-Market & Scale
9. Product Development
10. Investor Progress Review
11. Co-Founders & Team
12. Growth
13. Funding
14. Graduation
Sprints
Pitching
Customer Development
Leadership Development
Sales & Customer Acquisition
Product Development
Revenue Modeling
Legal & IP
Branding & Design
Financial Planning
Team & Advisors
Fundraising Prep
Post-Program Onboarding
Date
Feb 03, 2027
Time
03:00am 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.
Sales - Pursue aggressive goals to close new revenue or users, which may be signups, payments, a signed contract, a pre-payment or a signed letter of intent.
Pivot - Consider a pivot if you are not meeting your growth goals, sales, product or hiring progress targets. If you decide to Pivot, schedule a call with one of your Local Leaders to discuss your proposed pivot in the business and do the same with your advisors.
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.
Weekly Focus
1. Accelerator Kickoff
2. Vision & Mission
3. Customer Development
4. Revenue & Business Models
5. Pitch Mastery
6. Mentor Idea Review
7. Legal & Equity
8. Go-to-Market & Scale
9. Product Development
10. Investor Progress Review
11. Co-Founders & Team
12. Growth
13. Funding
14. Graduation
Sprints
Pitching
Customer Development
Leadership Development
Sales & Customer Acquisition
Product Development
Revenue Modeling
Legal & IP
Branding & Design
Financial Planning
Team & Advisors
Fundraising Prep
Post-Program Onboarding
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 17, 2027
Time
03:00am 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.
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.
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.
Weekly Focus
1. Accelerator Kickoff
2. Vision & Mission
3. Customer Development
4. Revenue & Business Models
5. Pitch Mastery
6. Mentor Idea Review
7. Legal & Equity
8. Go-to-Market & Scale
9. Product Development
10. Investor Progress Review
11. Co-Founders & Team
12. Growth
13. Funding
14. Graduation
Sprints
Pitching
Customer Development
Leadership Development
Sales & Customer Acquisition
Product Development
Revenue Modeling
Legal & IP
Branding & Design
Financial Planning
Team & Advisors
Fundraising Prep
Post-Program Onboarding
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 24, 2027
Time
03:00am 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.
Weekly Focus
1. Accelerator Kickoff
2. Vision & Mission
3. Customer Development
4. Revenue & Business Models
5. Pitch Mastery
6. Mentor Idea Review
7. Legal & Equity
8. Go-to-Market & Scale
9. Product Development
10. Investor Progress Review
11. Co-Founders & Team
12. Growth
13. Funding
14. Graduation
Sprints
Pitching
Customer Development
Leadership Development
Sales & Customer Acquisition
Product Development
Revenue Modeling
Legal & IP
Branding & Design
Financial Planning
Team & Advisors
Fundraising Prep
Post-Program Onboarding
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
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
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
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 10, 2026
Time
03:00am 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.
Office Hours - Book your first Office Hours with Local Leaders and Mentors to get guidance on the next steps for your business.
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 1106:00 pmweek 1
Vision & Mission
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 11, 2026
Time
03:00am 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.
Market Research - Utilize our market research template to collect accurate and available market information on the customer problems you are analyzing.
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
Nov 1806:00 pmweek 2
Customer Development
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
Nov 18, 2026
Time
03:00am 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.
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.
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
Nov 25
Refund Deadline
Nov 2506:00 pmweek 3
Revenue & Business Models
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
Nov 25, 2026
Time
03:00am 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.
Revenue Models - Narrow down that problem to three potential revenue models, and thoroughly analyze the positives and negatives of each model.
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 0206:00 pmweek 4
Pitch Mastery
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 02, 2026
Time
03:00am 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.
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.
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
Dec 0906:00 pmweek 5
Mentor 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
Dec 09, 2026
Time
03:00am 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.
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.
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
Dec 1606:00 pmweek 6
Legal & Equity
This week, you'll incorporate your company, set up the legal foundation, protect your intellectual property, and start building your advisory board.
Date
Dec 16, 2026
Time
03:00am 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.
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.
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 0606:00 pmweek 9
Go-to-Market & Scale
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 06, 2027
Time
03:00am 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.
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.
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 1306:00 pmweek 10
Product Development
This week, you'll push for 10% weekly growth, track both your business and AI performance metrics, and discuss growth strategies.
Date
Jan 13, 2027
Time
03:00am 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.
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.
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
Jan 2006:00 pmweek 11
Investor Progress Review
Similar to the Mentor Idea Review, the Investor Progress Review is the second major test in the program. In this session, Founders will focus on give a long presentation their progress and traction to a panel of Investors and Advisors for a detailed review. Founders will be evaluated based on their progress in the program, the company's scalability, and more.
Date
Jan 20, 2027
Time
03:00am 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.
Polished Investor Pitch Deck - Create an expanded, 12-slide pitch deck incorporating any feedback from the Investor Progress Review, using our templates.
Growth - Make progress on your growth goals, and examine or adjust how your strategy and the system to keep yourself accountable is performing.
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
Jan 2706:00 pmweek 12
Co-Founders & Team
In this Feedback Session, Founders will receive feedback from Mentors on their team plans and product progress. In addition, Mentors will discuss how to identify the roles needed to build a world-class company, how to develop a strategy to recruit, onboard and retain the best people, and more.
Date
Jan 27, 2027
Time
03:00am 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.
Hiring Process - Develop a hiring and onboarding process using our guidelines to add team members into your organization, and begin executing on the process.
Test Projects - Develop at least one test project for each of your top two or three roles, which should create opportunities for credible candidates to demonstrate their skills.
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
Branding & Design
Financial Planning
Team & Advisors
Fundraising Prep
Post-Program Onboarding
Feb 0306:00 pmweek 13
Growth
Date
Feb 03, 2027
Time
03:00am 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.
Sales - Pursue aggressive goals to close new revenue or users, which may be signups, payments, a signed contract, a pre-payment or a signed letter of intent.
Pivot - Consider a pivot if you are not meeting your growth goals, sales, product or hiring progress targets. If you decide to Pivot, schedule a call with one of your Local Leaders to discuss your proposed pivot in the business and do the same with your advisors.
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 1706:00 pmweek 15
Funding
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 17, 2027
Time
03:00am 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.
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.
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 2406:00 pmweek 16
Graduation
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 24, 2027
Time
03:00am 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 17+
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
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
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
Quickly preview the program dates or copy them in plain-text format
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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