Former VC, now full-time founder coach in Berlin. I've torn down 2,400+ pitch decks and helped 140+ founders raise a combined $210M from pre-seed to Series B. My rule: the story gets the meeting, the model closes the round.
The Pre-Send Deck Checklist
Free download
The Fundraising Operating System
Instant download
The SaaS Financial Model Field Guide
Instant download
1:1 Pitch Deck Teardown
45-min 1:1 call
Financial Modeling for Founders
Online course
Founder Finance Circle
Membership · billed monthly
Live Teardown: 5 Real Seed Decks, Rebuilt
Live · Aug 20
The August cohort of Financial Modeling for Founders opens Monday, July 13 — 40 seats, and the last three cohorts sold out inside a week. Founder Finance Circle members get 48-hour early access; everyone else gets the public link right here at 9:00 CET.
Numbers are a language. I teach founders to speak it.
I spent seven years on the other side of the table — first in M&A at a Frankfurt bank, then as a principal at a Berlin seed fund, where I read north of 2,400 decks and sat through hundreds of partner debates about which founders got funded and why. The pattern was brutal and consistent: great companies lose to mediocre ones because the founder couldn't make the numbers tell the story. So in 2019 I switched sides. Since then I've coached 140+ founders through raises totaling more than $210M, built the financial models behind three acquisitions, and turned everything I know into templates, teardowns, and a course that doesn't waste your time. My promise is simple: no hype, no 'crush your round' theater — just the engineering of a fundraise, taught precisely, so you walk into every investor meeting knowing exactly what they'll check and what they'll conclude.
Founders on the results
“Daniel tore our deck apart on a Tuesday, we rebuilt it that weekend, and three weeks later we had two term sheets. We closed our €2.1M seed at a 30% higher valuation than our first offer.”
Lena Hoffmann · Co-founder & CEO, Verdano
“His model template survived diligence at a Tier 1 fund without a single restatement — the associate literally asked who built it. We raised our $4M seed in five weeks using his process.”
Marcus Chen · Founder, Relay Robotics
“I took the course knowing nothing about finance. Six weeks later I defended my model live in a partner meeting and got the follow-up email 40 minutes after we hung up. Worth 100x the price.”
Sofia Almeida · Founder, Cardline Health
Before you ask
I'm pre-revenue. Is any of this relevant to me?+
Yes — arguably most relevant. Pre-revenue raises are won on narrative logic and honest assumptions, which is exactly what the deck checklist and the modeling course teach. Your model won't forecast revenue from history; it will show investors you understand the machine you're about to build. That's what gets pre-seed checks written.
What's the difference between the Fundraising OS and the 1:1 teardown?+
The Fundraising Operating System is the complete self-serve playbook — process, pipeline, data room, term sheets. The 1:1 teardown is me applying it to your specific deck in a live 45-minute working session. Most founders read the OS first, implement for a week or two, then book the teardown to pressure-test the result. That order gets the most out of both.
Do you invest in or take equity from the founders you coach?+
No. I made that decision deliberately in 2019 — the moment I have upside in your round, my advice stops being neutral. You pay a flat, published price for everything on this page, I hold no carry in your outcome, and that independence is exactly why my feedback is blunter and more useful than what you'll hear from anyone with a stake.
Will this work outside of SaaS, or outside of Europe?+
The fundraising process, deck structure, and investor psychology are near-universal — I've coached marketplace, hardware, biotech, and consumer founders across Europe and the US. The financial model materials are SaaS-first, but the driver-based method transfers; you swap the revenue engine for your motion. If you're deep-tech pre-product, book the teardown first and I'll tell you honestly which materials fit.
— Start your creator store