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Portfolio Pro-Rata & Special Deals

Expert DOJO Preferred
Deals- Scouts

Expert DOJO is one of the most unique investment models to hit the United States. Accelerators have existed for a long time and even thrived in the last 10 years but Expert DOJO have created an entirely new category by focusing absolutely everything on driving user and revenue growth as opposed to just investment. This obsessive focus has been instrumental in increasing our Internal Rate of Return to an unusually high level of 173% in just a few short years.

Our program is full of growth specialists to help the startups we invest in soar. That’s our secret sauce. 70% of our companies are from outside the USA, which also helps us create this global bridge between the Silicon Valley investment dollars and the innovation that the rest of the world has to offer.

Expert DOJO is one of the most active pre-seed investors (US) since COVID-19, right after TechStars and Y Combinator. We made around 70 investments in 2021 and intend to do another 1,000 over the next 10 years. We’ll not have to raise another fund over the next 3-5 years and are ready to take Expert DOJO and our portfolio companies to the next level.

We were recently featured in Forbes, and you can read the full article here.

is focused on growth

About the program

There’s only one thing that our program is focused on and that is growth. We build, grow, and scale the companies that we bring in through a very structured program. Our goal with this program is to build a vision for startups to take over the world. We are a team of strategists, and we will help you execute that vision. On top of that, we go deeper than anyone else to close that next round of investment. The relationships between Expert DOJO and our portfolio companies are long term. We start with a 6-month startup program and stay close to the companies over the next 2-3 years. As our program is virtual, it doesn’t matter where in the world the startup is located.

For our programs we bring in the best trainers on the market. We collaborate with external growth hackers and mentors to get tailored results for each of our startup’s needs. Our trainers are paid for best results, and are handpicked for their specific skill sets.

What we include in the program:

  • Unicorn Vision
  • Branding
  • Influence
  • Digital Marketing
  • Sales Workshops
  • User Acquisition
  • Revenue Growth
  • Distribution Plans
  • Growth Coaching
  • One on one Mastermind
  • Investor Training
  • Investor Pitching to +200 Active Investors
  • Top 10 VC Funds in the US
$100,000 in each of our startups

HOW WE INVEST

We initially invest up to $100,000 in each of our startups and help them get traction and go to market faster than they could ever do by themselves. By utilizing our massive resources and network, we help our companies unlock aggressive growth to quickly scale in the US market and globally. We typically invest in pre-seed and seed stage startups that have a product, go to market strategy, and a potential for high growth. As the companies grow, we make follow-on investments up to $1M. We remain industry agnostic and invest in founders from all over the world from all backgrounds.

potential to scale quickly

WHAT WE REALLY LOVE

Any company that has the potential to scale quickly. The emerging markets like Africa and India are some of our favorite parts of the World to find deals in, as the skillset is very high, the markets are emerging and the opportunities are endless.

There are a few different pillars we especially look into when making an investment:

  • Is there an Epic Insight?
  • Execution power of the founders.  Are they good at getting products to market?
  • Does the team have domain expertise?
  • Have the founders exited before?
  • Is the founder a good money raiser?
  • Can we see a direct path to 100k a month, and eventually 10M MRR?
  • Product market fit? This is an important one for us.
85% of our startups receive a follow-on investment

STRUCTURE & STATS

We haven’t needed to raise a fund. Expert DOJO’s investments are made by our single LP. During 2021 we made close to 70 investments, which brings our portfolio to 180+ startups. We intend to make 500 investments over the next 3 years, and we’ll not need to raise a fund for these investments either.

85% of our startups receive a follow-on investment and our portfolio has grown 300% over the past 2 years. The 50k, or 100k investments are made by SAFE notes, for 3.5% or 7% equity.

A large number of our companies are raising big rounds right now.  We’re constantly supporting these companies to achieve their full potential, and hit their next targets including follow-on investments of up to 1 million USD.

THREE DIFFERENT TYPES

SCOUT OPPORTUNITIES

  1. The first is a brilliant future General or Venture Partner who wants to perfect selection, sales and diligence skills. You will start with our investment team and work an agreed amount of hours for a small stipend, deal commission and back end carry.  This Scout will be fully trained in all aspects of the Expert DOJO program. We believe this training is the best in the business and will set up the scout to be an excellent General partner for a fund in the future.
  2. The second is a highly skilled individual who wants to grow with Expert DOJO in a gradual and low pressure manner. This person already knows where to find good deal flow and has a desire to monetize that deal flow. There is no stipend or training but for a $750 deal commission and 1% of DOJO back end carry. This referral requires an investment memo.
  3. The Third Scout type is an individual in another fund or an angel investor who does not want exceptional companies to miss out on initial investment that may not currently be a fit or ready for their fund yet. There is no stipend or commission but they will receive back end carry at 1% of the DOJO carry level. No memo required.
will be a manual approval process

HOW IT WORKS

  1. Join the Scout Program. This will be open to all, although there will be a manual approval process to keep the quality high and make sure you are in the right group.
  2. Make introductions to the Venture Partner who is partnered with you.
  3. Circle back with an investment memo with your diligence, to confirm your commission and carry payment.
We invest in all of our portfolio companies

WHAT’S A CARRY SHARE

Our fund is structured, like most venture funds, with 20% carried interest (aka “carry”). We invest in all of our portfolio companies, and then start getting money back in the form of either exits or Shared Earnings from those portfolio companies. Once our LPs and investors have gotten all of their initial capital back, then carried interest kicks in and we keep 20% of whatever else comes back to the fund. That’s carry at the fund level.

Our scout carry sharing model is done at the individual deal level. So if a scout sends us a deal and we invest, they will get a percentage of the profits from that one investment. Let’s say we end up investing $100k into the company, the scout would get 1% or 2% of our carry on the $100k investment, depending on the scout’s contract.

Reminder: As scouts perform well over time, we will look at recruiting fund managers from the scout program.

APPLY NOW

TO APPLY

Email anastasia@expertdojo.com and let us know which scout program you’re interested in, and why you make a good fit. Please include your previous investment history and what your deal flow looks like.