If you're thinking about launching your first venture fund, this Cohort 22 info session explains exactly how the VC Lab venture capital accelerator works, why it's free, and what it takes to get from application to a first close. Kelly Schricker, head of Decile Labs, and Mike Suprovici, co-founder and head of acceleration at Decile Group, walk through the program's structure, the admissions funnel, and the fund sizing mistakes that sink first-time managers. It's essential viewing for anyone weighing whether they're ready to raise a fund one.
Watch the full session here:
What This Venture Capital Accelerator Actually Is
VC Lab is Decile Group's flagship venture capital accelerator for launching a fund one, and it operates at serious scale. Through its programs, Decile Group has helped launch over 900 venture funds across 80 countries, and Kelly noted the current stat is that they're helping launch over 60% of all VC funds worldwide. Mike put it at roughly 70% of new VCs launching through VC Lab.
The most important thing to understand is what the program is not. "This is a closing program. This isn't like a learning program. This isn't school," Mike explained. You're expected to start talking to limited partners within the first few weeks and turn those conversations into commitments and a first close. Outside this ecosystem, new managers typically take one to two years to reach a first close. Inside VC Lab, it takes three and a half months, because the entire curriculum is built around that single milestone.
Each week brings two live sessions, one AMA and one mentor session featuring a recently successful manager, an LP, or an operations expert. There are group office hours, one-on-one opportunities, a Slack community approaching 2,000 emerging managers, and weekly curriculum that's practical rather than academic. Think "go talk to five limited partners," not homework. Managers halfway through Cohort 21 are landing roughly $100K to $200K in commitments per week.
How a Free Venture Capital Accelerator Makes Money
Every training program at Decile Group is free, and Mike was direct about why. Charging would create bad incentives, because a paid program would have to keep underperforming managers enrolled instead of optimizing for outcomes. So how does the business work?
Decile Group makes money on the infrastructure side. It runs what Mike called the leading fund administration product for emerging venture funds, and most graduates end up using it because it's built from the experience of thousands of VCs. There's Start Fund, which you can explore at decilegroup.com. And there's a fund of funds business, which benefits from Decile seeing most of the world of new and emerging managers. The front office, the training, and the community all stay free. The back office infrastructure, which every fund has to pay for anyway, is the revenue engine.
The data question came up directly in the Q&A, and the answer was unambiguous. Your data in Decile Hub is yours. "Decile is not in the data business. We're in the firm success business," Mike said. The platform offers full MCP integration and CSV export. Decile uses data proactively to help individual funds, for example by featuring a manager in LP events when fundraising velocity stalls, and uses anonymized data to improve the curriculum. It doesn't sell data to anyone.
The Funnel: From 3,000 Applications to 50-70 Closed Funds
Know the numbers before you apply to this venture capital accelerator. Roughly 2,500 to 3,000 people start applications for every cohort. Around 200 to 300 are accepted and start the program. Roughly 50 to 70 funds finish and complete a first close.
There are no formal prerequisites, no required pedigree, and no specific school you need to have attended. What admissions looks for is a network strong enough to support both deal flow and fundraising, plus an investment strategy that actually matches your background. Your first close will come primarily from what VC Lab calls confidants, people who already know and trust you, the ones you can text or WhatsApp directly. Most applicants have far more of these than they realize.
Mike also pushed back hard on two common instincts. First, you don't need a deck early on, because trusted first-degree investors are backing you, not slides, and "all a deck is is an extension of the thesis." Second, don't wait to recruit a co-GP. Fund partnerships are 10 to 15 year commitments, breakups are often fatal to a fund, and 66% of the funds VC Lab launches are solo GPs. Test potential partners in venture partner roles first and promote them across funds two and three.
Fund Sizing: Set the Target Low and Oversubscribe
Mike's core rule: your target isn't an aspirational number. It's the fund size you're certain you can raise comfortably, with no doubt in your mind. Then you oversubscribe it.
The logic comes down to how LPs behave. The vast majority of limited partners are prevented by charter from investing in emerging managers, so fund ones get raised primarily from high net worth individuals writing checks around $250K, with small family offices arriving in fund two and institutions much later. That's why a $20M first fund is so hard. When one attendee asked about raising $20M, Mike advised setting the target at $10M and oversubscribing to $20M if things go great, and noted the GP commitment would be 1%. He's seen managers with 300 angel investments and multiple unicorns struggle to reach $10M.
Undersubscribing, on the other hand, can wreck you. Conservative allocators flag fundraising risk, existing LPs feel sold a strategy you can no longer execute, and fund models scale up but never down. VC Lab has seen funds oversubscribe by 3x, including a $27M fund that set its target at $9M.
On minimum viable size: in a traditional Delaware structure, it's very difficult to make the numbers work under $5M, and $3M to $5M is about the floor if you want to own all three entities. Start Fund brings the barrier down to as little as $150K, though Mike recommends getting at least $1M to $2M in the fund for enough shots on goal. Start Fund also solves the pay problem. In traditional structures, management fees get consumed by operations, which is why most emerging GPs earn nothing in fund one. Start Fund sends roughly 10 years of management fees in the first two years, so money starts arriving as soon as you close your first LPs.
Agentic AI Advisors and What's New in Cohort 22
The venture capital accelerator includes an agentic advisor inside Decile Hub, trained on the thousands of questions the team has answered rather than the open internet, which Mike considers full of bad VC advice. The big shift for this cohort is that the advisors are becoming proactive instead of reactive. Rather than waiting for you to ask, they'll suggest follow-ups with specific LPs, offer to send them for you, and recommend new LP archetypes based on where you're already converting. The curriculum itself is agentic too, adjusting to your current situation week by week.
Frequently Asked Questions
Who owns the data in Decile Hub? You do. Decile Group doesn't sell data and only uses anonymized data to improve programs, plus fund-level signals to proactively help managers, like featuring stalled funds at LP events. Full export and MCP integration are available.
How does Decile Group make money if the programs are free? Through fund administration, Start Fund, and its fund of funds. Training and front office tools are free; the back office infrastructure every fund needs is the paid product.
What GP commitment do I need for a $20M fund? 1%. But Mike's advice was to set the target at $10M and oversubscribe to $20M rather than risk an undersubscribed raise.
What's the attrition rate? Roughly 3,000 applications, around 300 program starts, and 50 to 70 funds completing a first close per cohort. Dropping out is fine, and you can defer to a later cohort if life intervenes.
Apply to Cohort 22 Before August 24
Cohort 22 kicks off in mid-September, and applications close on August 24. Applications are reviewed on a rolling basis, and accepted managers get early support on their thesis, Hub setup, and LP pipeline before the cohort even begins, so there's no advantage in waiting. Learn more about VC Lab and explore the full programs overview to find the right fit. If you're not ready to close a fund yet, Venture Institute teaches the fundamentals, and if you've already raised a proper fund one, Emerging Institute helps fund two and fund three managers go after institutional capital.
As Mike put it in his closing words, the fundraising numbers are up 4x from two or three years ago, a new generation of LPs is entering the asset class, and the world needs far more allocators funding startups at pre-seed and seed. Bet on yourself and get the application in.
Watch the full session here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uKXE-1GzEX0