Sample Pitch Decks

It’s a rare startup that tears down its own pitch deck, but that’s exactly what Equals did after it raised a $16 million Series A round. Equals’ mission is not to replace the spreadsheet, but to ensure that a spreadsheet can do whatever its users throw at it. As an inveterate spreadsheet user, this is an approach that I can get behind — I’ve built entire software solutions with extremely complex spreadsheets as the back end. Furthermore, as a pitch deck connoisseur, I can also get behind the bright and bold design of…

When I was a student in the U.K., I remember that renting appliances like washing machines and televisions was the norm for some people, especially students living in short-term accommodations. Israeli startup Xyte (pronounced “excite”) has just raised $30 million, as it sees a return to this sort of hardware-as-a-service model to be the way forward for manufacturers whose margins are under constant pressure. If it works so well for software-as-a-service, why not hardware? Xyte let me take a…

As a species, we have a problem. Bacteria are becoming more and more resistant to antibiotics. Makes sense: Antibiotics kill off all the bacteria they can, but the remaining ones that somehow survive continue to grow and spread. Guess which gene they all have in common? That’s right, the one that makes them resistant to antibiotics. We’ve known this for years, but instead of accelerating, the work on new antibiotics is slowing down significantly. Why? Capitalism: It’s really expensive to develop new drugs, and once…

The world is full of businesses that try to help streamline the process of setting up a company. Doola is one such startup, and it has raised a cool $12 million to date since its inception in 2020. The company just closed a $1 million “strategic investment round” from HubSpot Ventures, less than a year after its $8 million Series A, and today we get to take a good look at the pitch deck it used to raise that round. Usually, when a startup raises a small amount of money following a decent-sized…

This week, we’re taking a look at a pitch deck from Rypplzz (pronounced “ripples”), a spatial technology startup that recently raised $3 million. Rypplzz uses radio waves to provide location tracking since they are supposedly more precise and easier to work with than GPS. Venues like museums and sporting arenas can use its tech to help guide visitors through their space or deliver information depending on their location. I have to admit, this deck didn’t set me alight, so I was a bit surprised by its success. Still,…

This week’s Pitch Deck Teardown comes to you from the PCB-laden confines of CES in Las Vegas. Today, we’re looking at the slide deck that video analytics firm Qortex used to raise a $10 million seed round. Qortex uses AI to help brands, media companies and creators identify the right moments in a video to insert an ad and maximize engagement, so this is going to be a fun one. So, without further commercial interruptions or preamble, let’s get to it.  We’re looking for more unique pitch decks to tear down, so if you…

Originally a Facebook group started during the COVID-19 lockdowns in 2020 that people used to cook healthy meals for others nearby, HomeCooks has now evolved into a comprehensive marketplace for chefs. It facilitates the entire process for its chefs, from cooking to delivery, and offers over 200 meal options. The company recently raised $3.2 million in crowdfunding on Seedrs. Positioning itself as the “Etsy of food,” HomeCooks has grown rapidly and today serves around 7,000 customers. Let’s look…

About 2% of the world’s CO₂ emissions come from pressurized, jet-powered sausages careening through the air. Earlier this week, I covered one startup, Metafuels, that thinks it has a solution for reducing aircraft emissions. I was able to talk the company’s founders into giving me the pitch deck for their $8 million seed round so we could do a deep dive into the materials it used to raise the funding. We’re looking for more unique pitch decks to tear down, so if you want to submit your own, here’s how you can do…

AI is everywhere, and predictably, sales teams are among the early adopters. So I wasn’t surprised to see Scalestack raise $1 million to help make sales teams’ lives easier. So, as we’ve done every week for the past 18 months or so (I can’t believe this is going to be the 75th pitch deck teardown!), we’re going to put the deck Scalestack used to raise its round under the proverbial microscope and see what it got right and where it could have done better. Let’s go! We’re looking for more unique pitch decks to tear…