Venture & Private Capital · Capstone brief
INV-07 · Underwrite a VEN team
Run diligence on a venture team's packet and write an investment-committee memo with a recommendation. Would you back this team, and what would change your mind?
The question
Run diligence on a venture team's packet and write an investment-committee memo with a recommendation. Would you back this team, and what would change your mind? "Pass" is a legitimate result.
Data room / materials
A completed AI Venture Build pitch packet from your school, shared with the venture team's and teacher's permission, or CASE-NORTHWIND if your school does not run that track. The True North key-questions bank for diligence questions (https://www.truenorth.guru/key-questions). The division-approved AI tool for USE: question drafting only. Any meeting with the venture team is arranged by the teachers. No money changes hands, and nothing is offered or solicited.
Expected failure modes
Judging the pitch instead of the evidence. Asking only friendly questions. Treating a metric claim as true without checking it against the data. Writing a "yes" because the team is classmates. Forgetting that this is a simulation.
Done looks like
A diligence log (questions asked, answers received, evidence checked); every metric claim verified or marked unverified; an investment-committee memo with a recommendation (invest, pass, or revisit), the three biggest risks, and the condition that would change the recommendation; and a feedback page for the venture team.
Five C's
CT: separating the pitch from the evidence. CR: choosing the twenty questions that matter from a bank of a hundred. CO: two diligence teams split the work and reconcile. CM: the memo and the feedback page. CZ: the venture team, who deserve honest feedback rather than polite approval.
Mentor role
An investor, banker, or founder reviews the memo. Standing instruction: reject any memo whose recommendation does not follow from its evidence. School-supervised.
Rubric calibration
R1: one team, one decision. R2: every claim checked or marked unverified. R3: comparator is the pitch taken at face value. R4: risks and change-my-mind conditions named. R5: the memo survives the venture team reading it. R6: no real investment offered; honest feedback given.
Two ways this goes wrong
(a) A warm "invest" for friends with no checked claims. (b) A harsh "pass" that never engages the team's actual evidence.
Credit lane fit
Lane A (business or entrepreneurship capstone, or a showcase paired with AI Venture Build). No verified credit claim.
An investment study, not an investment. Fictional case files. Not legal, tax, or investment advice.