Antler backs the world’s most driven founders, from day zero to greatness. In Amsterdam’s vibrant tech hub, we bring together exceptional founders from all backgrounds to build companies that move the world forward.
We are looking for people who want to turn their ambitious ideas into successful businesses. Our founders are domain experts, serial founders, product builders, or business leaders with wavering drive and together we can make progress inevitable. Whether you're an individual with a dream looking for a co-founder or an idea, or an early business looking to accelerate your growth, Antler is the perfect place to make it happen.
Are you a solo founder or looking to find a co-founder and to validate your idea? Or perhaps you are a co-founder team ready to take the next step. Or maybe you don’t have an idea but are yearning to join forces with one of our exceptional founders to embark on the entrepreneurial journey. That’s what we are here for. During our 9-week residency you’ll meet a community of like-minded founders, focus your vision towards success, and be supported by our truly global community of founders, advisors, and investors. The best teams will continue on the journey with us as a Antler portfolio company raising a €100k pre-seed funding.
Do you already have a team or an incorporated business that you would like to get backed by Antler? In Amsterdam, we accept applications also from founders with existing (incorporated) businesses that might already have a product in the market and a growing customer base. These teams go through the investment process including initial assessment meetings, due diligence, and a final pitch to the investment committee to reach the final investment decision. Antler is determined to support driven founders from day zero to greatness. Applications for this track will be accepted on a rolling intake. All applications are sent in using the same application form. In the application form, you are able to further specify your situation.
Are you a solo founder or looking to find a co-founder and to validate your idea? Or perhaps you are a co-founder team ready to take the next step. Or maybe you don’t have an idea but are yearning to join forces with one of our exceptional founders to embark on the entrepreneurial journey. That’s what we are here for. During our 9-week residency you’ll meet a community of like-minded founders, focus your vision towards success, and be supported by our truly global community of founders, advisors, and investors. The best teams will continue on the journey with us as a Antler portfolio company raising a €100k pre-seed funding.
Do you already have a team or an incorporated business that you would like to get backed by Antler? In Amsterdam, we accept applications also from founders with existing (incorporated) businesses that might already have a product in the market and a growing customer base. These teams go through the investment process including initial assessment meetings, due diligence, and a final pitch to the investment committee to reach the final investment decision. Antler is determined to support driven founders from day zero to greatness. Applications for this track will be accepted on a rolling intake. All applications are sent in using the same application form. In the application form, you are able to further specify your situation.
Our next in-person residency starts on September 25, 2023.
You join us at the Antler offices in Amsterdam for nine weeks to get to know all the other founders in the program, start validating your ideas, and find your co-founder.
Tracking out means you have found your co-founder and you are ready to start building. This is when you will be assigned a specific coach who will guide you to be ready for the next step. Weekly pitches, iterating on your product, and sharing and growing with your fellow founders will shape this phase. Track out is always based on your own progress and can happen at a different time for different teams.
This is the moment. A successful pitch to the Investment Committee means you’ll raise €100K funding from Antler.
We back driven founders building game-changing companies from day zero.
Founders supported
Portfolio companies
Third-party capital raised by Antler’s Netherlands portfolio
Valuation for six Netherlands portfolio companies
The full application process takes about 2-3 weeks to complete. Once you apply, our scouting team will guide you through the full process and will be available to answer all your questions. All interviews are done online.
The full application process takes about 2-3 weeks to complete. Once you apply, our scouting team will guide you through the full process and will be available to answer all your questions. All interviews are done online.
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The full application process takes about 2-3 weeks to complete. Once you apply, our scouting team will guide you through the full process and will be available to answer all your questions. All interviews are done online.
Don't just take it from us. Hear from phenomenal people who joined Antler Netherlands to launch their company.
Mira Gleisberg
RespiQ
Antler acted as a platform that allowed me to combine the two things I am truly passionate about: Healthcare and business.
Valentin Kassarnig
SpeechifAI
Many decisions are made in uncertainty that define the outcome of your company. Antler gives me the support needed to make those decisions.
Meet the Antler Netherland's team
Youri is leading the charge to help build the next generation of entrepreneurs born out of Antler Amsterdam. An Associate Partner at McKinsey & Company, he spent the last 7 years working on innovation and transformation programs with incumbents and startups in the private, public and social sectors - both across Europe and Latin America. Youri is adept in big-bang cosmology and has held various stints as a musician across Europe, Africa, Japan and Brazil.
Ronald Jan is an experienced operator, entrepreneur and investor, with expertise in a.o. e-commerce, fintech and healthtech. He has spent over a decade with various C-level roles in tech startups including Rocket Internet and Delivery Hero. Previously he has been a strategy consultant at Booz & Co and an investment banker at ABN Amro. INSEAD educated.
Saskia started her career at BCG in Recruitment, and Egon Zehnder (Executive Search), after which she joined UBER and helped scale their Eats & Rides businesses in Europe, the Middle East and Africa. Her most recent role has been with OYO, a Softbank-backed hospitality company, where she helped launch their European business from scratch. At Antler, Saskia has an integral role in scouting founders both for the Amsterdam team but also supporting teams throughout Europe.
Rosa is the Program Manager for Antler’s Amsterdam office. She has built up five years’ worth of supply chain and operations experience, within both corporate as well as start up sectors of logistics and F&B. Born in South Korea but since having lived in France, China, UK and currently the Netherlands, she holds a masters degree in management from Imperial College Business School.
Marijn is Investment Manager at the Antler Amsterdam office. Previously, she worked at FMO – the Dutch entrepreneurial development bank, ING / ING Ventures and Deloitte. At Deloitte, she focused on connecting technology startups with investors for early stage funding rounds and acquisitions in emerging ecosystems such as FinTech, CleanTech, HealthTech, and Mobility
Matteo is a former entrepreneur and an experienced professional in consultancy and recruitment. After a BSc in Economics and Management from Bocconi University and an MSc in Finance from VU Amsterdam, Matteo started his career in Huxley as a Recruitment Consultant for tech and financial roles within banking and fintech organizations mostly in the Netherlands and Italy. His passion for startups and innovations led him to create his own AI startup in the hr-tech domain, bynd.ai, and to start working alongside founders to support them on their journey.
Julia is our marketing and communications expert with special interest in building startup brands. She has a background in events management and design, and has prevously worked as a Marketing Manager at Voima Ventures in Finland. She has a MSc in International Design Business Management from Aalto Univeristy and has also done some studies in programming and psychology. At Antler, she spearheads the local content as well as events strategy and supports our portfolio firms in various marketing related tasks.
Read our latest insights and stories about our phenomenal founders.
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The Antler residency is a unique opportunity to get together with 60+ other founders eager to build life-changing ventures. No matter how well you prep, it is impossible to be completely prepared for what can be truly transformational. The important thing is to be ready to fully immerse yourself, and take in everything you can during the experience. In this article, I’m outlining how to get the most out of the rollercoaster ride that is an Antler residency. As Co-Global Head of Program, having worked with 450+ founders during our eight latest residencies in Amsterdam, I have a few tips to share.
"The future is not some place we are going to, but one we are creating. The paths are not to be found, but made, and the activity of making them changes both the maker and the destination." —John H. Schaar
Our baby, UpMarket, is already two months old. It’s been an incredible experience from the point I joined Antler as a founder, only a few months ago, to now being ready to go live with our product and first customer. In this article I will share my experience on the rollercoaster that started with an idea I originally came up with during dinner.
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As everyone anticipates the next wave of ultra-successful companies in Benelux, what does it take to get there? What do the successful founders of Benelux unicorns look like? This report is an in-depth look at the Benelux startup ecosystem and its brightest stars. And above all, it is for anyone who is helping build the next 50 unicorns in Benelux.
Our content series "It All Starts with People" delves into the passions, motivations, and vision of the exceptional founders we have the privilege of partnering with around the world. Bringing a clarity of vision to our latest spotlight is Piet Hein van Dam, co-founder of Clear, the award-winning digital self-help tool for diabetes patients.
These six Antler-backed companies are now ready to tackle some of society’s toughest challenges through innovations such as revenue-based financing for SaaS startups, autonomous robots that handle meticulous farming tasks and software that maximizes the returns of building sites.
We empower exceptional people to turn their visions into reality—tackling pressing problems, creating jobs, and unlocking their personal potential. Our founders are supported by an unrivalled network of experts and advisors from around the globe. As the world’s issues become more complex, founders are more needed than ever to solve them. What are you waiting for?
Day zero investing means backing founders from the very beginning—whether it’s pre-team or even pre-idea—and continuing to support them on their company’s journey to greatness. We are there when a founder is at the starting line, when everything is possible and nothing is certain. When they have made the life-changing decision to take the leap and build a company, leaving conventional career paths behind. When their belief, passion, and drive are often the only things fueling them. And we are still there after we make our first investment, as a long-term partner providing advice, introductions, resources, and follow-on funding—all the way to their exit.
Our global community includes founders, investors, operators, experts, and partner organizations across six continents. Antler founders scale faster—from winning their first 100 customers and marketing a new product to raising their next round of funding—with the backing of 5,000+ fellow Antler founders across six continents. They learn from the best in the business through our advisor network of 600 leading operators, our sector-focused communities, and our monthly socials across our locations. And they are powered by curated people and resources for hiring, going to market, and fundraising, along with perks from leading tech providers. Antler founders have a home with us for life—no matter what direction their business or career takes, we’re committed to winning together.
Above all, we invest in people. We believe that every great company starts with a great team—and the strongest teams pursue the best ideas. Working with thousands of founders around the world, we have found that an amazing team with a mediocre idea in most cases will outperform a mediocre team with a great idea. And great teams will often pivot their idea after finding a more pressing or interesting problem to solve. If we decide to invest, it is first and foremost because we have high conviction that the team we are backing will be future winners and because we can and want to work with the team. Read our full investment philosophy.
We are not an accelerator or incubator, we’re the day zero investor. While we take huge pride in helping our founders develop, validate, and start scaling their idea and business model in a short period of time through our residencies around the world, we don’t launch and leave. We keep supporting our founders for the full life cycle of their company—from day zero to greatness.
The pre-program and first few weeks of the residency are highly focused on getting to know everyone in the residency and finding your co-founder match. When joining Antler residency you are introduced to dozens of carefully selected potential co-founders that you have 9 weeks to work together with in one place. Additionally, we have designed the program during the residency in a way that fosters interactions with as many potential co-founders as possible until you find the one; including speed networking, lunch roulette, design sprints, and family dinners.
We attract aspiring and experienced entrepreneurs from diverse professional and cultural backgrounds. Our founders are tech, commercial and domain experts who can build and scale a product and business. Examples are software engineers, serial entrepreneurs and strategy/management consultants, but also domain experts such as those with PhDs, blockchain/insurance/supply chain experts.
Yes, every company we fund needs to have at least two co-founders. In the rare case that you don't find the perfect partner in the cohort, we encourage our founders to find a co-founder outside of Antler.
Depending on the phase of the program, we have different requirements. During the main 9-week program, we require your physical presence in our Amsterdam offices for at least the first 6 weeks or until you find a co-founder. Around this, during the pre-program and post-Investment Committee, we are more flexible.
In Benelux Anter invests in companies coming through the Antler residency but also does direct investments. Through the residency we do a fixed net investment of EUR 100K for 12% post-conversion (i.e. at a valuation cap of EUR 833.333) through a convertible loan. Direct investments to existing teams are always negotiated case by case. Our team is happy to discuss this in more detail so do not hesitate to reach out.
Anyone joining the residency becomes part of the Antler community. We want to always support Antler Alumni wherever we can and via our network, whether you'd like to continue your entrepreneurial journey or pivoting into the corporate world.
