Nathan Latka

Founderpath

Founderpath is a private credit fund investing out of our 3rd ($145m) fund. We provide non-dilutive capital to founders.

Funding criteria:
$1-$20m in recurring revenue
Been in business for at least 2 years
B2B SaaS with predictable revenue
Founder owned and led

Sample terms:
$1-$5m Term Loan
Interest rate as low as 16%
No warrants or personal guarantees
Payback over 48 months
12-24 interest only period
These terms may change and are for discussion purposes only. Non binding. Not intended to be an offer.

Next Steps:
Signup at Founderpath.com
Connect your billing tools
Get an offer quickly

CEO, Chief Investment Officer

Penguin Random House

CapitalistBook.com : "How to Be a Capitalist Without Any Capital" will be published Feb 2019 by Portfolio Penguin owned by publishing giant, Random House.

Author (Story of my first SaaS Company, WSJ Bestseller, 28k copies purchased)

The Latka Agency

I interview private B2B SaaS CEO's (60/week:
- Ask them to share data like ARR, CAC, Churn, ARPU, Growth, Valuations, Burn
- Publish the data in "excel form" on GetLatka.com for benchmarking

GetLatka.com Founder (List of Private SaaS Companies)

- 8,000,000 downloads
- Fastest growing business show ever (measured in audience growth)
- 15 minute daily interview with one of the worlds Top Entrepreneurs

Host, Executive Producer "The Top Entrepreneurs" Podcast

Roanoke-Blacksburg Innovation Network

Focused on driving entrepreneurial growth in the Roanoke-Blacksburg area.
- Launched 24/7 NuSpark coworking space (2 companies accepted into Techstars)
- $4m+ in capital raised by local startups in Q3/4 2014

Board Member

Heyo

Heyo helps businesses market on Facebook. We work with over 2,000 customers and brands on a monthly basis with over 100,000 total users. 

- 147% yoy revenue growth from FY1 to FY2
- $2.5m in capital raised through Series A
- Featured reports on social marketing/sales space in the Wall Street Journal and other major national outlets

Founder, Chief Executive Officer (Acq. Votigo)

The Fan Page Factory

Custom built Facebook fan pages for businesses who lacked development talent or Facebook strategic insight. Executed from under dorm room lofted bed. 

- 100 customers in 6 months
- Sold $73k in revenue
- Self taught FBML
- Facilitated transition from professional services company to highly scaleable SaaS company

Founder

The Social Consultant

Social Media, Performance Based Consulting Firm

- Facebook Fan Page customization
- Professional Social Media  Branding and Imaging
- Social Media Site Set Up 
- Custom Integration of Branding and Imaging Into Social Media Sites
- Application Installation/Editing to Link All Social Media Accounts
- Custom FBML Coding to Allow for a Better Fan Experience
- On Call Support
- Countless Training Videos

The Social Tee

-Specializing in Creative Marketing Apparel to Increase Your Online Following-

♦ Professional Quality Shirt Design
♦ Social Media URL's Listed on Shirts 
♦ Creative Marketing Plans
♦ Monthly "Social Tee's"
♦ Helps you Create Hundreds of Thousands more Views

Ida Lee Parks and Recreation

-Tennis Dome Operations, Patron Clinics and Training Workshops-

♦ Secretary at the Front Desk
♦ Handled Accounting Software and Transactions
♦ Tennis Instructor to Patrons Ranging in Age From 6-70 y/o

Tennis Assistant

O'Neil Architects

-Editor and Field Measuring-

♦ Made Edits to Head Architects Plans
♦ Measured in Field Dimensions to Convert to CADD Drawings
♦ Worked With AutoCADD Extensively

Editor

CEO, at Founderpath. Investing in Software Founders out of our 3rd fund ($145m). 216 portfolio companies.

We'll invest $1b in SaaS founders without taking equity. Check out Founderpath.com to see how much capital you can get. 

Podcast has 11m downloads
Book hit WSJ Bestseller list
Frequent cable to discuss SaaS/valuations/public markets
10,000 read Latka Magazine (shipped each month)

Now lending money to founders: Founderpath.com

Founderpath provides Debt Financing to Software Companies (B2B SaaS) out of our 3rd ($145m) fund.

Funding criteria:
$1-$20m in recurring revenue
Been in business for at least 2 years
B2B SaaS with predictable revenue
Founder owned and led

Sample terms:
$1-$5m Term Loan
Interest rate as low as 16%
No warrants or personal guarantees
Payback over 48 months
12-24 interest only period
These terms may change and are for discussion purposes only. Non binding. Not intended to be an offer.

Next Steps:
Signup at Founderpath.com
Connect your billing tools
Get an offer quickly

People don’t quit jobs.

They quit feelings:

Ian and Jess are feeling ambitious.

But they have cushy full time jobs. 

Then they risked their entire savings to open a retail shop.

$40,000...

It took them 30 days to hit $10,000 of sales.

(Mostly toiler paper and candles)
 
365 days to hit $95,000 sales
Now they do $40,000/mo
To hit $1,000,000 in revenue, they need 3 new locations.

I immediately offered to invest $150,000. 

(They negotiated hard)

We agreed on a 12% interest rate and wired this week. 

Follow along here on linkedin for updates as we invest the money to grow. 

Final question is:

How much does your side hustle have to make before you quit the full time corporate job? 

🤔

CEO @ Founderpath (I invest in companies)

lemlist just bought Claap for $25M.

The deal structure is not what you think: 

Deal Price — $25M all-in.
↳ $5M cash upfront (wired today).
↳ $5M Claap loan to Lemlist (3.5% interest rate, 2 year term)
↳ $15M earn-out if Claap grows from $2M to $10M ARR before Oct 2028

Claap does $2m in ARR so $25m deal price is 10x.
If we just consider cash Lemlist had to pay upfront ($5m), 2.5x

Most founders miss this when they read M&A press.
There's a difference between Deal Price and cash wired at close.

Get creative!

Profits and creative deal making:
↳ Lemlist does $3.3m/mo in revenue ($40m ARR), profits 30% ($1m/mo) 
↳ Uses positive cash flow to fund M&A.
↳ To keep Claap founders, Lemlist issued them convertible bonds at 20% discount to next priced valuation

Timeline:
May 2024 — First conversation between Lemlist and Claap founders.
July 2024 — Term sheet signed after 60 days of diligence.
October 2024 — Deal officially closed and announcement published.
Yesterday — Claap traffic spikes 50x post-announcement.

Guillaume Moubeche has always been gracious with his time (coming on my podcast/teaching founders). 

... Charles Tenot and his team is carrying that transprency forward (and its working! $40m ARR building in public). 

I'm bullish on Lemlist:
Founder-led, profitable, and doing strategic M&A.
Building a full async-sales-communication stack.
Claap already saw 50x surge in workspace creation after the deal.

Founderpath acquired Boopos to help fund acquisitions. DM me if intersted in a term sheet. 

👇🏻 
Want my full call recording with Charles from yesterday?
Comment “Congrats Lemlist!” or “Congrats Claap!” to get early access
I'll DM you the private link tonight at 6pm EST

#Lemlist #Claap #Bootstrapping

Does anyone know an AI video tool that can do this?

I like VEED.IO (Sabba Keynejad tell me if better way to do this...)

David Zitoun does Submagic have this sort of capability yet?

I want to be able to take a video for Youtube and:
Click 1 button
Make it vertical video for Instagram Reels
Center the vertical video on whoever is speaking

Problem: Its too much work for me to manually clip each video everytime speaker changes, then drag/drop center each clip

VEED.IO

CEO & Co-founder at VEED.IO

Co-Founder @Submagic | Create viral shorts in seconds with AI

Submagic

The startup world has been selling founders a lie.

The lie: be grateful for any check, valuation is everything, giving up control is normal.

This mindset benefits investors, not you.

But some founders are waking up and choosing a different path.

A smarter path.

Like Joel, founder of Exercise.com. 

Last week, he sold for a life changing amount of money. 

It wasn't his first exit.

He had raised VC and gone the PE path at his prior 3 exits. 

But...

He told me the exit last week was “10x the personal liquidity of any of my prior exits.”

How?

 ✅ He protected his equity, kept 100% using Revenue Financing and Term Loans 
 ✅ He found patient partners, $3.5m raised from Founderpath 
 ✅ He only took money when he needed it, 19 draws he invested as he grew

He was Rule of 40 every year, proving you don't need VC to grow fast.

This gave him tons of leverage and optionality. 

First time founders optimize for valuation, second time founders optimize for optionality. 

Joel showed you the future. 

Founders building real, sustainable businesses that give them the power to choose their partners and dictate their own terms.

It's a shift from seeking validation to building a fortress.

From chasing capital to attracting it.

From giving away your destiny to owning it.

The old way is dying. 
Let's help it die faster.

What's the worst fundraising advice you've ever received? Let's talk about it. 👇

Interested in a term loan from Founderpath?

Click like
Comment "keep control!" Or "term loan excel file"
I'll DM you our model so you can play with numbers before 6pm EST tonight

We’ve set aside $20m to rapidly deploy into founders working with 123g!

They are the best. Top notch operators now supporting founders.

Founderpath + 123G: $20M for SaaS growth

Founderpath just allocated $20M in non-dilutive capital exclusively for 123G SaaS Clients.

Here’s what makes this different: 
Software companies working with 123G can now
Access growth funding in five business days. No equity dilution. No board seats. Just flexible terms that align with how your business actually performs.

“This partnership makes 123G one of the few networks with both proven expertise and access to capital,” said Harpreet Grewal, CEO and Founder of 123G.

Nathan Latka, Founder and CEO of Founderpath, explains the fit: “When 123G introduces us to Founders, we are constantly impressed. These Founders
consistently demonstrate strong retention, healthy margins, and clear growth plans. We’re able to offer better terms to Founders who work with 123G because we know they’re top-notch at building capital-efficient businesses.”

The result? 
Operators who’ve built companies + funders who understand SaaS
economics = founders who can scale without sacrifice.

https://lnkd.in/e7SbMbB6

#123G #Founderpath #SaaSGrowth #NonDilutiveCapital #OperatorNetwork

Genius AI use case that is not Sales or CRM. 

$3m in children book sales:

Just hung up with Dreamstories founder Ricardo. 
Launch a few months ago
100,000 childrens books sold
$60 avg checkout, spending $100k+ on FB ads

He's top 1% of paid ads (he ran paid for Shopify in 2009)

Crushing right now. 
7 people
Super simple onboarding
Parents upload a photo → AI creates the story → checkout.

That’s it.

He built dreamstories to personalize bedtime like Spotify personalized playlists.

💡 Key numbers:
100,000+ books sold
$3M+ revenue
< $1M raised
Six-figure Facebook ad months

The magic? Simplicity + paid media discipline.

 COmment if you're using paid ads and Ill send you his full playbook.

Thrilled to share Founderpath has invested $40,000 in Scott's cake company. 

We're experimenting with new financial products for CPG brands. 

If you're looking for capital, shoot me a DM.

JSESSIONID

li_at

Entrepreneur & Business Owner | Experienced COO | Driving Innovation & Growth in Bakery, Food Manufacturing, Restaurant, Retail, Direct-to-Consumer, Grocery, & Wholesale | Owner of Texas Pecan Cakes Bakery.

Never thought I’d be negotiating an investment deal on YouTube! Nathan Latka of Founderpath from tech to Texas cakes 🤠
I joined Nathan Latka on The Deal to share how I turned a small bakery into the brand behind “The Cake Texans are NUTS about!”  We talked about growth, margins, and how a small Texas bakery turned into a nationwide brand in just one year. 

Watch the live negotiation and backstory here → https://lnkd.in/g6852rU8

#TexasPecanCakes #Entrepreneur #MadeInTexas #TheDeal #Founderpath

Who is building an AI Agency with at least $100k in revenues?

“If you think your pricing is too low. I’d argue it’s probably not low enough.”

Nathan Latka opened the Centre Stage at SaaStock Europe this morning with a super tactical session on AI growth tactics.

From bottoms-up virality to anti-AI marketing, Nathan packed in 9 data-driven strategies founders can apply immediately:

💡 Key takeaways:

- Go bottoms-up: Borrow B2C tactics for B2B growth — think open-source tools, free tiers, and community virality.

- Use other people’s traffic: Launch in emerging app exchanges where competition is low.

- Find your enemy: Great brands polarise. If you stand for nothing, you stand for no one.

- Know your quadrant: Bootstrapped founders should start with cheap and fast growth tactics before investing in costly ones.

- Leverage affiliates: Treat affiliate partners like commission-only sales teams at scale.

Build “monuments,” not noise - Create media assets AI can’t replicate (like books, live events, and communities) to own attention and drive long-term growth.

And this is just the start…
Still to come on Centre Stage: Manny Medina (Paid), Audrey Soussan (Ventech), Joaquim Lecha (Supersonik), Justina Chung (Bessemer Venture Partners), and Arnon Shimoni (Paid) with more growth lessons from Europe’s top AI and SaaS leaders.

#SaaStockEurope #SaaS #AI #SaaSGrowth #B2BSaaS

year end financial audits.

founders, what are you paying?

is $78k too much?

They do $40,000/mo selling toilet paper, candles, snacks.

I offered $120,000 for 12%. Would you take the deal or leave it?

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