What's the fundraising story of Taro?

The abridged version (I hope to make a course on pitching/fundraising soon!)

• We raised entirely on SAFE notes with a set valuation cap. No discounts, super pro-rata, or other terms. It took some back-and-forth to determine a reasonable valuation cap and how much we were trying to raise.
  • The guidance from YC was to raise enough capital for ~3 years of operations, so you can safely hit the next company milestone (profitability or another round of funding).
• The whole process took ~4 months end to end, from August - November 2022. But the bulk of it was done in < 2 months.
• ~123 investors in our database. Majority were angels, some institutions.
• Average of 30 min for the first meeting, and usually people committed after 1-2 calls.
• Some VCs really dragged their feet and kept asking for more meetings and more information. The best VCs were able to commit after a single meeting and then wire money shortly after.