Entrepreneurs First

Entrepreneurs First (formerly Entrepreneur First,^[1] commonly shortened to EF) is an international talent investor, which supports individuals in building technology companies. Founded in 2011 by Matt Clifford and Alice Bentinck, the company has offices in London, Paris, Bangalore, New York and San Francisco.^[2][3]

Entrepreneurs First

Company type	Privately held company
Industry	High tech startups
Founded	2011
Founders	Matt Clifford Alice Bentinck
Headquarters	London , England
Area served	North America, Europe, Asia
Key people	Matt Clifford, Executive Chair Alice Bentinck, CEO
Website	joinef.com

Entrepreneurs First helped pioneer the idea of talent investing. Their approach involves finding and investing in individuals with the potential to become founders, often before they have a cofounder or idea. EF has helped create more than 600 companies with a combined value of over $11 billion as of 2025.^[2][4]

History

Entrepreneurs First was founded in 2011 by Matt Clifford and Alice Bentinck, who had worked as management consultants at McKinsey & Company since 2009. According to Clifford, the model was inspired by a McKinsey project to develop a technology cluster in East London, which would tap "talented graduates" to create startups to bolster the cluster. Believing that the model would best succeed independently, Clifford and Bentinck left McKinsey and started the program themselves.^[5] Clifford originally served as CEO while Bentinck was the CPO.^[6] In 2023 Alice took over as CEO and Matt become Chair.

McKinsey & Company provided seed funding, and KPMG, Microsoft, and Sky were early corporate sponsors.^[7]

Bentinck founded Code First: Girls in late 2012 to address the decline of women working in the tech and digital workforce, which has led to a lack of diversity in the sector.^[8]

In 2016, after four years of operating exclusively in London, Entrepreneurs First announced its expansion to Singapore.^[9][10]

Clifford and Bentinck were awarded MBEs in the 2016 Birthday Honours for services to business.^[11] In 2017, it was announced that Reid Hoffman, co-founder of LinkedIn and Partner at Greylock, was leading a $12.4 million investment into Entrepreneurs First.^[12] As part of his investment, Hoffman joined the board.^[13]

In 2018, Entrepreneurs First expanded to four additional capitals: Berlin, Hong Kong, Paris and Bangalore.^[14] The company closed its Hong Kong office in 2019,^[3] and opened a Toronto office in 2020.^[15][16] The Berlin, Canadian, and Singaporean office closed in Spring 2023 ^[17]

In 2021, it announced a partnership with Tezos Foundation to launch a platform for building Web3 startups in London, which will begin in October 2022.^[18]

In July 2022, Entrepreneurs First announced the raise of a $158 million Series C.^[19][20] Investors in the round included John Collison; Patrick Collison; Taavet Hinrikus; Reid Hoffman; Matt Mullenweg; Tom Blomfield; Nat Friedman; Demis Hassabis; Mustafa Suleyman; Elad Gil and Lachy Groom.^[19]

In October 2023, Entrepreneurs First opened a San Francisco office and held its first startup demo day there in April 2024. This commenced a new chapter in the company's history wherein all startups from London, Bangalore, Paris and New York would be obliged to relocate to San Francisco and incorporate their companies in the US.^[21]

Entrepreneurs First opened a San Francisco office and held its first startup demo day there in April 2024. This commenced a new chapter in the company's history wherein founders could relocate to San Francisco from their local hubs in London, Bangalore, Paris and New York after FORM to undertake the second LAUNCH phase of the program.

Portfolio

The portfolio of startups cofounded on Entrepreneurs First programs are now worth over $11 billion as of 2025. They include 600+ companies, ranging from pre-seed to Series C and include a number of unicorns and successfully existed companies.

Entrepreneurs First's portfolio companies have been backed by leading investors, including Sequoia, Andreessen Horowitz, Softbank and GV (formerly Google Ventures).

Among its successful startups are Tractable (valued at $1 billion as of July 2021^[22]), Cleo (named Europe's next billion dollar startup^[23]), Omnipresent, Aztec, Hertzwell, Transcelestial, Airbank, and Magic Pony Technology - who sold to Twitter for a reported $150m only 18 months after the founders met on the program.^[24][25]

Investors

Entrepreneurs First is backed by a global group of top-tier founders and tech industry leaders, including: Reid Hoffman (cofounder of LinkedIn), John and Patrick Collison (cofounders of Stripe), Demis Hassabis and Mustafa Suleyman (cofounders of Deepmind), Taavet Hinrikus (cofounder of Wise), Matt Mullenweg, Tom Blomfield (cofounder of Monzo and GoCardless), Nat Friedman (former CEO of Github), Sara Clemens (former COO of WHATNOT and Twitch), Matt Robinson (cofounder of Nested and GoCardless), Patrick O’Shaughnessy (Positive Sum), Sten Tamkivi, Elad Gil, and Lachy Groom.

Program

Entrepreneurs First runs a 12 week long program, called 'FORM', which recruits talented individuals to meet cofounders and build technology companies from scratch.^[26] Over the course of the program, individuals are encouraged to test co-founding partnerships with other participants, while developing and testing initial company ideas. During this time, participants are paid a stipend to cover their living costs, .

At the end of this 3 month period, participants pitch their companies to Entrepreneurs First's 'Investment Committee' to receive a first 'pre-seed' investment in exchange for equity.^[27] If they accept this investment then founders move to the second part of the program called 'LAUNCH'.

During this second 12 week sprint, founders typically relocate to San Francisco to access and build in the world's most valuable single market. The LAUNCH program culminates with an in-person Demo Day from the San Francisco hub on Folsom Street. Past Demo Days have been opened by renowned industry figures including Reid Hoffman and Patrick Collison.

Following Demo Day, founders continue to gain exposure to hundreds of top Seed VCs and angels across the US, Europe and Asia through the EF Demo Day online platform.

Application process

Applicants do not need to have an idea for a business or a team in place before applying, but are evaluated solely on the basis of their ambition and talent.^[7] The program looks for candidates who have either recently graduated, or have a few years of industry experience.^[28]

The program receives a large number of applications per cohort but is highly selective, taking only a small percentage of these people per cohort.^[29] Many applicants are the products of the University of Cambridge, Imperial College London, University of Edinburgh, University College London, and the University of St Andrews.^[30] Entrepreneurs First conducts its own talent searches to find and draw graduates to the program, encouraging them to apply "rather than joining Google or Facebook or doing a PhD or Postdoc".^[25]

Entrepreneurs First differs from other accelerators such as Y Combinator and Wayra in that it works with individuals rather than companies.^[31] However, its successful startups have gone on to receive investor funding from Y Combinator, as well as from Balderton Capital, Index Ventures, Notion Capital, and Octopus Investments.^[25]

In July 2015, Entrepreneurs First announced the establishment of an £8.5 million fund, backed by Encore Capital Infocomm Investments, and angel investors such as Robin Klein and Alex Chesterman, which will enable it to accept 200 participants per year for the next three years.^[25]

With the opening of their new hub in San Francisco, EF is positioning itself as the bridge to Silicon Valley, making it easier for the best global talent to build and raise in the largest software market in the world.