Would you lead MorrowDesk’s $2 million seed round?
An AI memo can arrange claims. Check who paid, who renewed and which customer you have not heard from.
The question
MorrowDesk is a fictional AI support tool for freight brokers. You run a $100 million seed fund. The founders seek $2 million at an $18 million pre-money valuation. You have two days to decide whether to lead diligence.
| Known today | |
|---|---|
| Paying customers | 20 |
| Average monthly revenue per customer | $4,000 |
| Monthly recurring revenue | $80,000 |
| Revenue from largest three customers | 60% |
| Completed annual renewals | 0 |
Invented data. Revenue differs by customer. The $4,000 is the company-wide average, not a uniform contract price.
- FounderEight reference customers love the product. We prepared the AI memo from those calls.
- Independent customer AThe tool saves time, but a MorrowDesk operator still checks every difficult ticket.
- Independent customer BWe would renew only if it works with less help from the founder.
“Which evidence would you collect next, and would you commit to lead today?”
Not saved by this site. Your browser may restore text when you navigate back.
A strong answer, step by step
Open each step in turn. This is one strong answer, not the only one.
Step 1: Separate claims from observations
What would you do here? Open the move you’d make.
Treat eight good references as product-market fit.
Tempting, but it misses something. The founder chose the references. Praise does not establish retention or independent delivery.
Separate paid use, selected references and untested renewal demand.
The strong move. This keeps verified revenue distinct from what the customer must still prove.
Reject the company because it has no annual renewals.
Tempting, but it misses something. A young company may have no customers old enough to renew. Test the risk rather than treating age as failure.
See how a strong candidate says it
“The $80,000 MRR is observed. Durable demand is still a hypothesis: there are no completed annual renewals.”
Why it works: Different evidence can support different claims.
Step 2: Test the dependence on people
What would you do here? Open the move you’d make.
Ask for more founder-selected references.
Tempting, but it misses something. More selected evidence can repeat the same bias.
Ask AI to score the eight positive calls.
Tempting, but it misses something. A score cannot repair a biased source list or reveal work that is missing.
Choose customers ourselves and inspect assisted versus independent completion.
The strong move. This tests whether the value survives beyond the founder’s personal delivery.
See how a strong candidate says it
“I would select customers from the full list and inspect tickets completed without founder help.”
Why it works: Independent selection and work records can challenge the sales story.
Step 3: Name the investable insight
What would you do here? Open the move you’d make.
Use the size of the AI market as the main reason.
Tempting, but it misses something. A broad market does not establish this product’s demand or economics.
Tie paid urgency to a specific workflow, then test scalable delivery.
The strong move. This is a claim diligence can support or overturn.
Call the founders exceptional and stop there.
Tempting, but it misses something. Founder quality matters, but it does not answer the delivery and concentration risks.
See how a strong candidate says it
“The thesis is a repeatable freight workflow with paid urgency. The open question is whether software can deliver it at a good margin.”
Why it works: A useful thesis connects a customer problem to a scalable advantage.
Step 4: Make a bounded decision
What would you do here? Open the move you’d make.
Promise the full check now to avoid losing the deal.
Tempting, but it misses something. Urgency changes timing, not the quality of the evidence.
Pass permanently until there are several years of audited results.
Tempting, but it misses something. This demands mature-company evidence from a seed business.
Advance diligence with two explicit conditions and a deadline.
The strong move. This commits effort while preserving a decision based on the highest-value missing facts.
See how a strong candidate says it
“I would lead the next diligence step, not promise a check. I need independent customer evidence and fully loaded delivery cost before committing.”
Why it works: A decision can advance the opportunity without pretending the unknowns are solved.
The answer, in short
- Decision
- Advance diligence; do not commit the $2 million yet.
- Because
- Paid use is real, but independent delivery, retention and concentration remain open.
- What would change it
- Independently selected customers renew, and work records support a scalable margin.
Common traps
- Treating the founder’s chosen sample as independent.
- Equating paid pilots with durable retention.
Check your answer
- Did I separate facts from hypotheses?
- Did I choose an independent evidence source?
- Did I state the investable insight?
- Did I make a decision and name its conditions?
Last reviewed Nov 10, 2026