What does the founder get, and what does the team give up?
The founder benefit is a hypothesis, so name it precisely: learning what operating records the company holds, who controls them, and whether a licensing conversation is worth having at all. SourceX opens with a short questionnaire and no uploads, which keeps the founder's cost small. Money is not part of the benefit you measure, because it may never arrive.
The constraint is attention. Platform teams already run several founder services; Andreessen Horowitz's enterprise roster, for instance, lists operating staff under Go-To-Market Network, Full Stack Talent, Operations and Marketing headings. Any new program draws on those same hours and the same founder goodwill. So keep three questions on separate lines and never net them against each other: is it useful to founders, what does it cost the team, and what might it pay.
| Term | Meaning in this model |
|---|---|
| Qualified introduction | Passes the four published fit facts on metadata, the CEO agreed to talk, and the company submitted a verified application through your link |
| Fit facts | A peak of 50+ full-time employees, contractors not counted; an operating history the company can document; the rights to license; a contact with authority |
| Comparator | Your own hours per completed introduction in another founder service |
| Usefulness score | The founder's 1 to 5 answer to one question after the first conversation |
Why the base case books zero revenue
Follow the published steps from an introduction to a possible reward:
| Step | What has to happen | Published timing |
|---|---|---|
| Credit | The company submits a verified application through your link | First valid introduction within a 90-day window |
| Qualification and Master agreement | SourceX qualifies the company, which signs one Master agreement | No fixed duration published |
| Inventory | Inventory assessment after the Master signature | Initially up to 30 days |
| Deal confirmation and delivery | A Dataset Deal Confirmation fixes the dataset and payout; data is delivered | No fixed duration published |
| Acceptance | SourceX reviews the delivered data | Up to 30 calendar days |
| Closing and company payment | Closing is recorded; the company invoices | Due within 60 calendar days of a valid invoice |
| Reward | Final acceptance, cleared payment, the company paid, finance approval and your tax and payment details | Due within 60 days of final acceptance or completed handoff, whichever comes later |
Some steps can finish sooner than their maximums, but several have no published duration, and a lead, meeting or signed agreement alone earns nothing. A team cannot count on a reward landing inside a pilot quarter, so the model books zero and judges the pilot on what it can observe. The six stages page and the stage duration benchmark explain how to measure the later stages once there are real cases.
The time-to-qualified-introduction model
Hours per unit are assumptions for a two-person platform team. Replace every one with your own logs after the first month.
Base case (Illustrative): a fund whose portfolio and close network include a fair number of established companies.
| Stage | Unit of work | Hours per unit | Entering stage | Stage hours |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 0. Setup | Read the terms, sign the partner agreement, check fund policy and founder disclosure | 6 per team | One team | 6 |
| 1. Desk screen | Score each company on the four fit facts from what you already know | 0.2 | 30 companies | 6 |
| 2. Relationship check | Confirm who can ask the CEO | 0.25 | 18 companies | 4.5 |
| 3. First founder conversation | Metadata questions, then whether they want to talk | 0.75 | 10 companies | 7.5 |
| 4. Fact follow-up | Fill the missing fit facts | 0.5 | 8 companies | 4 |
| 5. Introduction | Submit with consent through your link; answer application questions | 0.5 | 4 companies | 2 |
| Result | 3 verified applications | 30 hours in total | 3 qualified introductions | 10 hours each |
Stop case (Illustrative): a seed-heavy portfolio screened on its own.
| Stage | Hours per unit | Entering stage | Stage hours |
|---|---|---|---|
| 0. Setup | 6 per team | One team | 6 |
| 1. Desk screen | 0.2 | 30 companies | 6 |
| 2. Relationship check | 0.25 | 5 companies | 1.25 |
| 3. First founder conversation | 0.75 | 3 companies | 2.25 |
| 4. Fact follow-up | 0.5 | 2 companies | 1 |
| 5. Introduction | 0.5 | None | 0 |
| Result | 16.5 hours in total | No qualified introductions | Stop |
The stop case is not a failure of effort. In this illustration most companies are too young to pass the size and history tests, and no amount of follow-up changes that. The right move is to stop screening the portfolio alone and, if anything, test the wider network with the five-ring relationship map.
After an introduction, the partner's role is light; how involved a partner stays covers it. Budget a quarter-hour per company per month for status questions.
Measuring founder usefulness. After stage 3, ask one question: "Did this conversation tell you something about your company's records that you will act on?" on a 1 to 5 scale, plus a yes or no: "Did you feel pressed to go further?" Nobody has published answers to these questions yet; what you see is the measurement design.
When to expand, pause or stop
| Reading at day 90 | Expand | Pause | Stop |
|---|---|---|---|
| Hours per qualified introduction | At or below your comparator | Up to 1.5 times your comparator | Above 1.5 times, or no qualified introductions |
| Median founder usefulness | 4 or higher | 3 | 2 or lower |
| Founders who felt pressed | None | One, understood and fixed | More than one |
| Desk-screen pass rate | Rising as the team learns | Flat | Near zero |
The cut lines are our assumptions; set your own before day 1 and do not move them at day 90. Any founder who felt pressed is a reason to pause and review, whatever the hours say.
Which companies may enter stage 5
Only companies that pass the fit facts and whose CEO knows about and wants the conversation. Companies in the U.S., Canada and the EU qualify, as do companies in the UK, Australia, New Zealand, India, Singapore, South Africa, Latin America, the UAE and Saudi Arabia when at least 70% of the data is in English. Ask about systems, record types, years and administrators, and stop there: no files, samples or logins. Demand for the records and any contractual limits on reuse remain open until SourceX's review. Signing the SourceX Channel Partner Agreement (formerly the Channel Partner Non-Circumvention and Non-Disclosure Agreement) comes before the first submission, and each company credits one partner only.
What would make this conclusion wrong
- Founder fatigue. Another platform offer can feel like noise. No data on founder reaction has been published; the pressure question exists to catch it early.
- Long cycles. With inventory and acceptance windows of up to 30 days each and payment terms after Closing, compensation cannot be planned inside a quarter-long pilot.
- Demand and rights. SourceX applies the criteria of each program, and client-owned records are usually not a fit, so a well-run screen can still yield few introductions.
- Assumed hours. Every hour figure above is invented for illustration. Your logs will differ, and the verdict should follow your logs.
What to log from Monday. For one quarter, log team time in 15-minute blocks against the six stage names, ask the usefulness question after every first conversation, and compute hours per qualified introduction on day 90. The first-month plan for venture platform teams gives the week-by-week tasks, and the page for platform teams summarizes the program.
Next step
Refer a company. No cap on rewards. Default reward on a company's first qualifying transaction: the greater of $50,000 plus 5% and 15% of Actual Supplier Payout, with no cap; further qualifying transactions first agreed within 12 months of the first Closing pay 15%. Eligibility and payment conditions apply, including the USD 100,000 Minimum Transaction, and a signed Schedule A or addendum can differ. A lead, meeting or signature alone does not trigger payment.
If your day-90 readings say expand, or you want to start the clock, register the team, run each candidate against who qualifies and keep the program terms next to your time log.
A decision about investing in SourceX is a different question from whether this work earns your team's hours; investor materials are shared on request through the SourceX investor overview.
This article is for information only and is not an offer to sell or a solicitation of an offer to buy securities. Any offering by SourceX is made only to verified accredited investors through its offering documents.