F4 Champions · Season 1
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F4 Champions · Season 1
You're researching investors. We want to see what you're building.
Join the open accelerator where your standing changes with what you ship. Enrollment closes August 2.
14 VC firms investing in edtech and aerospace & defense at the Pre-Seed stage.
F4 Fund tracks 14 VC firms that actively invest in edtech + aerospace & defense at the Pre-Seed stage, with check sizes ranging from $25K – $500M (median: $625K – $625K). As of July 2026, and 93% lead or co-lead rounds. Rankings are based on F4's proprietary analysis of 1,544+ researched VC firms, scored by data completeness, portfolio depth, investment recency, and stage alignment.
| # | Firm | Check Size | Portfolio | Leads? | Activity | Decision | Intro |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | ▶ Rough Draft Ventures Young student founders with ambitious vision and strong execution ability can build transformational companies. Providing accessible capital plus institutional support at the earliest stage unlocks value that might otherwise remain invisible to traditional VC. University students represent a unique cohort—bright, ambitious, and unconstrained by traditional career paths. Cambridge | $25K – $800K | 22 | Leads | Active | ~2 wks | Open |
| 2 | ▶ Spacecadet Ventures Founders building the possibly impossible deserve capital plus marketing support. Great technology combined with exceptional storytelling and narrative development creates world-changing moonshots. We provide both the capital and the story-telling expertise to help founders achieve escape velocity. New York | $250K – $1M | 99 | Leads | Active | ~2 wks | Open |
| 3 | ▶ The Venture Collective (TVC) Permanent balance-sheet investor backing highly defensible, category-defining, mission-driven companies solving the world's biggest problems. Focus on founders transforming legacy industries with emphasis on diversity, equity, and inclusion. New York | $100K – $2M | 53 | Leads | Active | ~2 wks | Open |
| 4 | ▶ Manta Ray Back mission-driven founders addressing significant global challenges through leading-edge technology. Provide flexible and patient capital, leveraging our time, resources, and networks to support portfolio company success. Focus on founders with authentic social and environmental missions alongside commercial viability. London | $250K – $3M | 55 | Both | Active | ~1 mo | Open |
| 5 | ▶ Unpopular Ventures Invest in the smartest people, regardless of what they're building, especially if the idea sounds bad in the beginning. Focus on exceptional founders in overlooked markets and non-consensus businesses. Optimize for founder quality over sector fit. San Francisco | $25K – $1M | 42 | Leads | Active | ~1 wk | Open |
| 6 | ▶ Icehouse Ventures Back exceptional Kiwi founders building globally transformative companies, from day one to IPO. New Zealand founders represent a significantly undervalued asset class, and Icehouse provides capital plus an ecosystem of 3,000+ investors and deep operational support. Auckland | $100K – $10M | 41 | Leads | Active | ~2 mo | Open |
| 7 | ▶ Soma Capital Soma invests in technical founders building innovative companies across all sectors. We believe in building deep friendships day 1 with brilliant superhumans pushing humanity forward. Our founder-first approach emphasizes non-dilutive capital, founder autonomy, and access to Fortune 500 networks for customer development. San Francisco | $100K – $2M | 33 | Leads | Active | ~1 wk | Open |
| 8 | ▶ GAN Ventures We back founders everywhere-else outside traditional tech hubs. We believe exceptional talent, innovation, and business opportunities exist across all geographies. Through the GAN network of 100+ accelerators and studios worldwide, we provide capital, mentorship, and global connections for founders building scalable solutions. Denver | $50K – $250K | 11 | Both | Active | ~2 wks | Open |
| 9 | ▶ Vibe Capital Investing in the picks and shovels of volatility caused by convergent forces (AI, Web3, Deep Science) intersecting with demographic shifts and climate change. We seek to create venture-scale returns by backing bold founders building more equitable, beneficial, transparent, and accessible structures. New York | $250K – $500K | 26 | Both | Active | ~2 mo | Open |
| 10 | ▶ Halogen Ventures The smartest place you can invest your capital is in women. We bet on early-stage female-founded and female-led companies creating groundbreaking consumer and B2B software technologies that solve meaningful problems in families, healthcare, childcare, education, climate, and sustainability. Santa Monica | $100K – $1M | 29 | Follows | Active | ~1 mo | Req'd |
| 11 | ▶ Streamlined Ventures Visionary founders are the true catalysts of transformation and progress. We partner with exceptional founders at the seed stage to help them build extraordinary companies through intensive operational support, structured tools, and candid guidance. Palo Alto | $250K – $10M | 26 | Leads | Active | ~2 wks | Open |
| 12 | ▶ Stout Street Capital Great startups can be built anywhere. We believe in founder-centric investing with operational support from a team of successful founders. We serve undernetworked geographic regions. Denver | $100K – $500K | 26 | Both | Active | ~2 wks | Open |
| 13 | ▶ Gigafund Back the world's most ambitious and transformative entrepreneurs capable of building world-defining companies over 20+ years. Invest in founders with independent thought and first-principles vision to solve humanity's biggest problems across all sectors and geographies. Austin | $1M – $500M | 18 | Leads | Active | 3+ mo | Open |
| 14 | ▶ TheoryForge Operator-led fund investing in ambitious founders building transformative AI applications. We partner with technical founders who understand AI/ML deeply and are solving real customer problems with capital efficiency. Great product is always the best marketing. | $200K – $500K | 38 | Both | Active | ~2 wks | Req'd |
Investors on this page also frequently invest in these sectors
What other stages do these firms also invest in?
What other sectors do these firms also invest in?
Firms that frequently co-invest with investors on this page
F4 Fund tracks 14 VC firms that actively invest in edtech + aerospace & defense at the Pre-Seed stage. These firms are ranked using a composite score that weighs data completeness (30%), portfolio depth (30%), investment recency (25%), and stage alignment (15%).
Based on F4's analysis, the median check size for pre-seed edtech + aerospace & defense investors is $625K – $625K, with a full range from $25K – $500M. The distribution breaks down as: 5 firms in the <$500K range, 3 firms in the $500K-$1M range, 3 firms in the $1M-$2M range, 2 firms in the $5M-$10M range, 1 firms in the $10M+ range.
Among the 14 firms tracked, 93% lead or co-lead rounds, and 7% typically follow. Founders seeking a lead investor should filter for firms marked "Leads" or "Both" in the rankings table above. Lead investors typically set deal terms and anchor the round.
The best pre-seed edtech + aerospace & defense investors combine domain expertise with an active portfolio in the space. Among these firms, 14% prefer warm introductions, and the average firm has 37 portfolio companies. Look for firms whose check size matches your raise, whose stage preference aligns with yours, and who have a track record of supporting companies in your sector through multiple growth phases.
Firm profiles are continuously updated through F4's research pipeline, which combines LLM-powered web research, portfolio analysis, and transcript extraction. The ranking data refreshes every 12 hours. Editorial analysis is reviewed weekly. Individual firm profiles are re-researched on a 30-day cycle or when new information surfaces.