The Actual Pros/Cons List Used to Decide Whether to Raise Money.
A reconstructed decision matrix, not a template, with the one calculation most founders skip: how much bigger the company has to get for giving up a fifth of it to be worth it. The weights decide the answer, so the issue shows how.
The roadmap's version of this issue publishes a real pros-and-cons list from a founder deciding whether to raise. I don't have one, and the roadmap allows a "realistically reconstructed" matrix, so that is what this is. The business in the example is hypothetical, the scores are mine, and the only external data is two published dilution figures. It's built to be copied and rerun with your own weights.
The useful thing about a decision matrix isn't the winner. It's seeing which of your own assumptions is doing the work.
What Raising Actually Costs You
Start with the price, in ownership. Carta's published medians for software startups put the share of the company sold at about 19.5% in a seed round and 18% in a Series A. Separately, Carta found that only about one in five founding teams at venture-backed startups own 50% or more of their company after a Series A. That analysis covered more than 3,500 US startups, excluding deep tech, that raised rounds in the roughly 18 months before July 2025.
Run the medians through for a sole founder who starts with 100%. After a seed round the founder holds about 80.5%. After a Series A, about 66%. That's my arithmetic, and it ignores option pools, convertible notes and any co-founders, all of which push it lower.
| Stage | Median sold in round | Founder keeps | Company must grow by |
|---|---|---|---|
| Start | n/a | 100% | n/a |
| After seed | 19.5% | 80.5% | 1.24x |
| After Series A | 18% | 66.0% | 1.52x |
That last column is the part worth keeping. Selling a fifth of the company at the seed stage only pays off for you if the money makes the company at least about 24% more valuable than it would otherwise have become. Through a Series A, it needs to be about 52% more valuable. If you believe the capital changes your outcome by more than that, raising can be rational. If you think you'd reach roughly the same place slowly, it can't.
The question isn't "do I want money?" It's "will this money make the company worth more than the part of it I'm handing over?"
The Matrix
Here is the structure, filled in for a made-up business: a small B2B software company with paying customers and a founder weighing a seed round against staying self-funded. The six criteria are the ones I'd expect most founders to weigh. Each option is scored from 1 to 5 for how well it serves that criterion, and the weights add up to 100.
| Criterion | Weight | Raise | Don't raise |
|---|---|---|---|
| Growth is limited by cash, not demand | 25 | 5 | 2 |
| A market window is closing | 20 | 4 | 2 |
| Control and ability to change course | 20 | 2 | 5 |
| Founder wants the venture path | 15 | 3 | 4 |
| Other ways to fund growth exist | 10 | 3 | 4 |
| Time and attention the process costs | 10 | 2 | 5 |
| Weighted score (out of 5) | 100 | 3.40 | 3.40 |
It's a tie, and that's deliberate. A tie means the decision is made by something the table can't show. So test which weights break it.
Where the Answer Actually Lives
Move ten points of weight from "control" to "growth is limited by cash" (growth 35, control 10), and the matrix says raise, 3.70 to 3.10. Move ten the other way (growth 15, control 30), and it says don't, 3.70 to 3.10 in the other direction. Nothing about the business changed. Only how much you care about two things did.
That's the honest result of most matrices: they convert a gut feeling into a number you can argue with. The two weights that decide this one are the two that deserve evidence. Is growth really limited by cash? Look at whether you turn away demand, or whether the constraint is closing deals. And how much do you value control? Ask what you'd do with it, because "I'd keep deciding things" isn't an answer until you can name a decision you'd make differently.
Related reading: Issue 68 covers what happens when a single customer carries the business, which is one of the situations where a founder raises or doesn't for the wrong reasons.
Four Checks Before You Trust Your Matrix
Write the use of funds. If you can't say what the money buys and what that does to revenue within 18 months, the "growth" score is a feeling. Check the alternatives. Revenue-based financing, a bank line, customer prepayment or a slower plan may reach the same place; Issue 47 showed how much annual prepayment alone can change cash. Price the process. Raising takes months of founder attention, and the business pays for that in every month the founder isn't selling. Imagine the bad outcome. With investors, a modest sale or a slow year looks different from how it does when you own all of it.
None of this says raising is wrong. It says the decision should survive being written down.
Where These Numbers Come From
The two ownership figures are Carta's published analyses. Everything else, including the matrix, its weights, the example business and the "must grow by" factors, is my own construction and arithmetic. Neither Carta page gives a data period for the median round sizes. Figures checked November 2026.
- Carta: How much equity founders sell in each venture round. Medians for software startups; December 2025.
- Carta: Only 1 in 5 founding teams own 50 percent after Series A. 3,500-plus US startups; July 2025.
Fill In the Matrix, Then Break It
Copy the six criteria, set your own weights and score both options. Then change the two heaviest weights by ten points each way. If the answer flips, write down the evidence that would justify each weight, and go get it before you take a meeting.
