IThe problem
Small fund team, big surface area. Inbound founders, outbound investor networks, LP relationships, internal ops — all needed to scale without hiring engineers.
Tried to be realistic from the start: anything built had to be maintainable by a non-engineer. Low-code where possible, documented end-to-end.
Specific friction points: manually searching the team's collected founder database; manually processing invoices in the CFO's inbox; manually running LinkedIn outreach campaigns.
Wanted the team to own what got shipped, not be dependent on me to keep it running.
IIWhat I built
aAI talent-database Slack bot
Natural-language query across the fund's collected founder/talent pool. Slack-native, low-code on the wiring side so the platform lead can add new fields without engineering.
bInvoiceScan
Automatic invoice detection in the CFO's inbox. Parsed, categorized, pushed straight into the bookkeeping software. No more end-of-month catch-up.
cLinkedIn outreach system
Controllable from Slack — the team can run sequenced outreach without leaving their workflow. Templates managed in Airtable, sequences fired on cron.
dLow-code stack
Every build documented, owned by the team. No ongoing dependency on me to keep things running. New workstreams can be added as needed without rewriting the foundation.
IIIStack
IVResult
Platform layer the team owns end-to-end.
No ongoing dependency on Black Matter VC to keep things running.
Engagement continues on new workstreams as needs emerge — but the existing systems run themselves.
— Abby Hughes · Firstminute Capital · London
