The gap between the two numbers is usually wide, and nobody has published how wide. SourceX has released no figures on how many network contacts become introductions, so this page gives you the audit rather than a ratio.
Why a reach figure overstates who you can ask
Platform programs describe their networks in terms of reach, and the figures honestly describe access. The a16z speedrun perks page, for example, offers founders access to a16z and speedrun's network of executives and decision-makers at more than 2,000 companies. LinkedIn defines reach the same way for individuals: a 2nd-degree connection is someone connected to one of your 1st-degree connections, and a 3rd-degree connection is connected to one of your 2nd-degree connections. Each extra degree multiplies the count and thins the relationship.
LinkedInA data licensing introduction needs something those numbers do not measure. Under the program, the CEO authorizes a licensing discussion and signs for the company. Other executives can own records, sponsor the idea internally or prepare the case, but their yes does not replace the CEO's. The fund's shareholding does not replace it either: SourceX's guidance on licensing across a portfolio says each company signs its own agreement, even when a fund coordinates. And SourceX's screening guidance says an introduction is usually not a fit when the decision maker has not been told it is happening.
So the audit asks one question about each contact: how many separate yeses stand between this list entry and a CEO who wants the conversation?
| Term | Meaning on this page | Counts as reachable? |
|---|---|---|
| Reach | Companies with any path from your team, at any degree | No |
| Relationship owner | The person who knows the CEO and can ask to be heard | Not on its own |
| Contact consent | A dated yes from a named person to one specific next step | Only at the top rung |
| Reachable decision-maker | A CEO who asked for the conversation, at a company whose four fit facts are known and passing | Yes |
The reachability audit with contact consent
Five rungs, each needing a different permission. A row climbs one rung at a time and records the date and scope of every yes. Nobody skips a rung, and nobody contacts the CEO before the relationship owner has agreed.
| Rung | Test question | Whose yes | What you record | Usual reason a row stops here |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 0. Listed | Does the company appear in a list your team holds? | Nobody's yet | Source list and date | It is a name, not a relationship |
| 1. Owner named | Does someone in your network know the CEO personally and recently? | The relationship owner, to being named | Owner, how they know the CEO, last contact | The only link is a functional executive or a former employee |
| 2. Owner will ask | Has the owner agreed to raise data licensing with the CEO? | The relationship owner, to asking | Date, and what the owner may say | The owner will not spend the goodwill |
| 3. CEO will listen | Has the CEO agreed to hear a short explanation? | The CEO, to hearing more | Date, and which facts the CEO lets you share | The CEO is not interested now |
| 4. CEO wants the call | Has the CEO asked to be introduced, and are the four fit facts known? | The CEO, to the introduction | Date, fit facts, who will submit | A fit fact fails or is still unknown |
Three recording rules keep the audit honest.
- Every yes has a scope. "You can mention it to her" is rung 2, not rung 4. Write down what the person agreed to, in their words, and nothing broader.
- A no closes the row, whatever paths remain. If a CEO declines through one relationship owner, do not look for a second owner to ask again. Re-asking through another route spends two relationships and ignores the answer.
- Consent ages. People change jobs and companies change hands. Date every yes, and confirm it again before acting on one older than an interval you set in advance, for example six months.
The consent record template covers what to write down at rungs 3 and 4, and the warm introduction explainer describes the double opt-in that rung 4 formalizes.
Three rows through the audit (Illustrative)
Illustrative. The three companies are generic, their facts are invented, and no row implies an outcome.
A. An owner-led company that reaches rung 4. A 95-person environmental testing laboratory is still run by its founder as CEO. A fund partner has known her for eight years through an industry association board. The partner agrees to ask (rung 2); she agrees to a short call (rung 3); afterwards she asks to be introduced and confirms the basics: peak headcount above 50 full-time employees, sixteen years of sample, chain-of-custody and quality records in the lab's own system, and no customer contract she knows of that assigns those records away (rung 4). One relationship, two dated yeses, ready to submit.
B. A network intermediary that stalls at rung 2. The COO of a 1,400-person specialty insurer mentors in the fund's go-to-market program. She is keen and knows where the claims and underwriting files live, but she is not the authorizer. In the audit she becomes the relationship owner for her own CEO, and the row sits at rung 2 until she has asked him. Her enthusiasm is valuable as internal sponsorship; questions about policyholder data belong to SourceX's rights review, not to her or the platform team. Whether to work through a sponsor or go straight to a CEO is weighed in introducing through a sponsor or directly to the CEO.
C. A no-fit counterexample that consents instantly. The founder-CEO of a 38-person developer-tools company in the portfolio answers the platform team within the hour and would take any call. The row reaches rung 3 in a day. It still fails: the company is below 50 full-time employees at peak, and most of its product data sits in customer tenants. The audit marks it "consented, not fit" and names the condition that would change it. Quick consent is not fit, and the warmest founder is the row most likely to be submitted by mistake.
Reachable contacts versus mandate-fit companies
Consent tells you a CEO will talk. Fit tells you whether there is anything to talk about. Report them separately, because they fail for different reasons and different people fix them.
Fit, by contrast, is measured against the published screening criteria: whether full-time employment reached 50 or more at peak, with contractors excluded from the count, whether the operating history is documented, whether the company holds rights to license the records, and where it is located. 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.
At rung 3 a CEO can usually answer those questions in a few sentences, which is why the audit checks fit there and not earlier. Every question stays at metadata level: which records, roughly how many, over how many years, in which system and who administers it. Nobody on the platform team asks for files, samples, exports or logins. What stays unknown until SourceX reviews the company: whether its records match current demand, whether customer contracts limit reuse and what any license would cover.
After an audit, report three counts to your partners, never the reach figure alone:
- Reachable decision-makers: rows at rung 4 with all four fit facts passing.
- Consented, not fit: rows at rung 3 or 4 where a fit fact fails. They show where the network is warm but its companies are too young or too small.
- Fit, no path: rows whose fit facts pass on public information but where nobody owns the CEO relationship. They argue for widening the network, not for cold outreach.
Queue the rows by the next yes each one needs
SourceX has not published conversion rates or typical payouts, so a queue sorted by imagined deal value is sorted by guesses. Sort by the next yes each row needs, and whose it is:
- Rung 4: no conversation needed; agree who submits.
- Rung 3 with fit facts still open: one call with the CEO.
- Rung 2: the relationship owner's ask. It costs them goodwill, so collect these into one request per owner.
- Rung 1: ask whether the owner is willing at all.
- Rung 0: leave alone until someone volunteers a relationship.
Within each group, a documented event with a date, such as a scheduled system migration or an archive deletion, moves a row up; a quarter-end does not. Whoever submits must first sign the SourceX Channel Partner Agreement (if the signature predates the rename, the version signed as the Channel Partner Non-Circumvention and Non-Disclosure Agreement still binds, unchanged). Of everyone in the chain, only one partner can be credited for a company, the one who made its first valid introduction inside the 90-day attribution window, with credit landing when the company's verified application comes in. Settle before rung 4 whether the relationship owner or the platform team will be that partner.
Where this audit misleads
- Consent is not demand. A rung-4 company with four passing fit facts can still be declined, because SourceX checks relevance to its current data needs during review.
- Rights. The most visible records may belong to clients, and SourceX's screening guidance treats client-owned material as usually not a fit. The audit records what the CEO believes; the rights review decides.
- Reach figures describe a date. Programs revise how they describe their networks. Treat any reach number, your own included, as a statement of access on the day it was written, not a count of relationships.
- Relationship cost is unmeasured. Nothing has been published on how relationship owners respond to being asked. Log every decline at rung 2 so that your own audit starts to produce that evidence.
Methods note. For each company the audit records the highest consent rung reached, with its date and scope, and how many fit facts are known. Fit facts come from the published criteria (SourceX terms and who-qualifies page, checked 2026-10-26). The audit does not measure record quality, buyer demand or any payout, and rung order is a sequence of permissions, not a score of value. To list the network before auditing it, use the network opportunity worksheet; for a ring-by-ring view of who owns each relationship, see your next AI data introduction may sit outside the portfolio.
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.
When a row reaches rung 4 with four passing fit facts, register for a partner link, check the row against who qualifies and read the program terms before the introduction goes out. The overview for venture platform teams covers the program from the portfolio side, and the guides hub lists related methods.
Readers assessing SourceX as a business, rather than referring a company to it, can request investor materials through the SourceX investor overview; that decision is separate from any introduction.
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.