paulwilsonn

https://capitalreach.ai/

We’re rebuilding the core of our investor outreach tool.

This month we replaced our old investor list + campaign system with an organization-based model. Instead of individual, messy contact lists, everything is now structured around verified organizations, which makes targeting and scaling a lot saner.

What changed:

10,000+ verified investor organizations

Cleaner data → fewer bounced emails, less manual filtering

Faster campaign setup (less configuration, fewer edge cases)

A foundation that lets us add smarter targeting and sequencing later

This was a breaking change, so we reset existing lists and campaigns. Users just re-onboard, reconnect email, and relaunch — takes ~2–3 minutes.

Still early, but the new structure already feels more reliable than what we had before.

Curious what others here are rebuilding or shipping this month

Talking to founders lately feels surreal - some with barely an MVP are raising fast, while others with actual revenue get ignored. The inconsistency is huge.

It makes me wonder: Is the fundraising system actually broken right now, or are founders misreading how VCs evaluate deals in 2025?

Some observations I keep hearing: • “Warm intros” matter more than traction • VCs want optionality, not conviction • Storytelling beats metrics until Series A • AI hype is crowding out everything else • Half the “no’s” have nothing to do with the startup

So I’m curious: For anyone raising, investing, or recently closed, what’s actually happening behind the scenes? Are founders blaming the system, or is the system just evolving faster than founders expect?

Genuinely interested in unfiltered perspectives.

A lot of startup advice is vague. I’m interested in concrete stories:

How did you actually get your: first 10 users first 50 users first 100 users?

What channels worked? What totally failed?

Any tactics that still work in 2025 despite all the noise?

Please share your experience.

Another multi-platform outage strikes, as Cloudflare suffers issues and triggers downtime on popular websites like X (formerly Twitter), as confirmed by the official Cloudflare Status page.

It started around 6:00 AM ET, when Cloudflare's support portal provider started "experiencing issues", and saw the degradation of Elon Musk's social platform, alongside popular video games like League of Legends reporting issues via downdetector.

I built an AI platform that helps founders automate investor outreach and follow-ups - kind of like a fundraising copilot.

Curious how others here are streamlining their fundraising or growth workflows lately?

Every founder I know (including me) spends too much time on decks and demos instead of shipping. We justify it as “raising awareness” or “community building.” But I’ve never seen a pitch deck go viral-only real products.

Anyone else feel this trap?

Always love hearing about what others in the HN community are hacking on -side projects, startups, tools, art, anything. What’s keeping you up at night (in a good way)?

No feedback, no one to bounce ideas off, no “nice job” at the end of the day. The freedom is great, but it gets weirdly quiet.

Anyone else relate?

Hey HN,

Curious to know what people here are building -side projects, startups, or even experiments. What’s your current project, what problem are you trying to solve, and what stage are you at?

We Currently Built CapitalReach AI - https://capitalreach.ai

Would love to hear what everyone is working on and maybe get inspired.

Everyone talks about “hustle” and “vision,” but in your experience - what’s the one skill that actually makes or breaks a startup founder today?

Could be something obvious (like storytelling or hiring) or something subtle (like staying calm when nothing works, or writing great investor emails).

Curious what you’ve learned the hard way — what skill do you wish you’d built earlier?