Early seedMenlo ParkSince 2015

Togetherwe can doit.

We offer our early stage portfolio companies capital, attention, and experience that enable them to focus on innovations that have impact on the economy and humanity.

Pitch us →Our portfolio

Our mark: three hexagonal rings, two magenta and one white, built from honeycomb and linked together.

Stage

Early seed

The first institutional seed investment.

Check

$500K–$1M

Then help raising from tier-one VCs.

Involvement

Board seats

Typically through Series A, sometimes beyond.

Portfolio

19 companies

Listed on our portfolio page today.

Latest · CognichipCognichip launches ACI Enterprise, AI infrastructure for chip design ↗

01Why Candou

Good judgement comes from experience.

Candou is an early seed round firm focused on supporting entrepreneurs with unique and defensible ideas. We are uniquely positioned to help shape your plans into investible businesses, fund your seed round and then help you raise money from tier-one VCs.

We provide clear back and forth with our portfolio companies and strive to be transparent in all our interactions.

The operators behind the checks

2 IPOs
Faraj Aalaei took Centillium and Aquantia public as CEO; Aquantia was later acquired by Marvell.Faraj Aalaei
$4B+
Shareholder value generated by the Centillium, Beceem and Enverv exits, companies Shahin Hedayat co-founded.Shahin Hedayat
$700M
Revenue Nader Vasseghi’s Cisco business unit reached within 5 years, after Cisco acquired his company AuroraNetics.Nader Vasseghi
35+ yrs
Of financial leadership for Linda Reddick, including CFO of Aquantia and of Centillium Communications.Linda Reddick

02Portfolio

Every company, a chamber.

Candou’s investments focus on some of the most exciting technology areas shaping the future. Each chamber says what the company does. Tap or click one to visit it.

Portfolio details →

03Focus

We call it BASIC.

We are interested in innovative technologies that are differentiated, solve a real problem and have a large addressable market. We don’t invest in life sciences, consumer products, B2C and mobile apps.

B2B
AI
SaaS
IoT
Cloud Infrastructure

04Testimonials

What founders and LPs say.

Best of breed Silicon Valley entrepreneurs with great judgment and a passion for excellence.

Irwin Federman · General Partner, U.S. Venture Partners

05Team

Repeat founders, senior operators.

A team of successful repeat entrepreneurs and senior executives with the vision and operational expertise to identify trends, invest in great early-stage teams, and support nascent companies through their growth and scaling processes.