Joining RnDAO's Entrepreneur in Residence Program - 2025

RnDAO is designed to outperform the traditional way of building startups.

Most startups are built from scratch. Founders have to do everything by themselves and for the first time. This leads to many trials and errors. However, it’s not necessary to reinvent the wheel. We can enable startups to benefit from the learnings and resources (access to customers, talent, and investors) of having built multiple similar startups. This is done by operating as a Venture Studio - a systematic assembly line for startups.
Venture Studios go beyond what accelerators and incubators offer by:

• Being there from the start. You don’t need a full team, a well-researched problem and solution, and a shiny pitch deck. We operate from the very start of researching a market and coming up with ideas, then validating them thoroughly. We build on solid foundations or pivot early, so you don’t waste years on the wrong idea.
• Hands-on support. Accelerators and incubators offer mentorship to give you feedback but when it comes to actually doing the work, you’re on your own. In venture studios, there’s a team that will jump in the trenches with you and help you craft sales campaigns, recruit talent, prepare pitches to investors, review UX designs and copy, navigate legal questions, or anything else that’s needed.
• Build on top of everyone’s assets. Having multiple startups under one roof means we can leverage each other’s brand credibility, marketing channels, talent, and investor networks, and even integrate the products. We unlock this by focusing on a single vertical (more overlap) and using cross-ownership between startups, which incentivizes collaboration beyond what accelerators or incubators can do. This is RnDAO’s own addition to the usual venture studio model. We call this approach Swarms. 

When to join RnDAO?

You can join RnDAO as an:

• Aspiring entrepreneur: Work with us to develop a venture via our Entrepreneur in Residence Program, validating one of the venture opportunities our research team has identified.
• Early-stage venture: If you have already founded your venture and started building, you can apply to be incubated by RnDAO and become part of our product ecosystem.
• Contributor: Join one of our existing teams and help them grow.

This article focuses on joining as an aspiring entrepreneur (for both first-time founders and serial entrepreneurs looking to start their next venture).

Who is this for?

We welcome both first-time and serial entrepreneurs looking to build a startup. We’ll provide you with mentorship, a monthly stipend, market research, tools, and community to validate a startup idea.

Our research team is constantly scouting for startup ideas and analyzing their market potential. These ideas are turned into Venture Opportunity Briefs and taken by our Entrepreneurs in Residence (EiRs), who work to validate them and turn them into successful startups. EiRs can also bring their own ideas and propose them to our team and co-develop a Venture Opportunity Brief to work on.

As such, EiRs don’t need to bring an idea or a team. We can provide you with both. The critical ingredient we expect from you is a sharp mind and the drive to build something great.

EiRs must be passionate about Collaboration Technology (CollabTech) and embrace a culture of collaboration as part of our Swarm.

What is CollabTech?

CollabTech refers to tools that enhance human(e) collaboration, evolving traditional B2B SaaS and other tools for organizations, the gig economy, and creators. If your startup builds products that help people work better together, you’re in the right place. CollabTech can use AI agents, blockchain infrastructure, and more.

What is a Swarm?

A Swarm is a network of startups or companies, focused on a similar domain, and that collaborate to grow faster. Companies in a Swarm benefit from the scale of a whole product ecosystem (distribution to customers, access to capital, market insights, product integrations, etc.) while retaining the speed of a startup. More about Swarms here. 

How does the EiR program work?‍

Each EiR is given a monthly stipend and up to 6 months to validate an idea and “graduate” to the next phase. If successful, we’ll incorporate a venture with you as a (co)founder, put in $50,000, and work with you to build an MVP, market test it, and fundraise with our network of investors.

• Stipend:
  The typical stipend for an EiR during the program is $2,500 per month, depending on geography and your financial needs. This is meant to help you cover basic expenses while still motivating you to validate an idea and graduate as soon as possible to the next phase.
• Time Commitment:
  EiRs are ideally committed full-time, but we’ll occasionally accept those with a part-time commitment as long as they can commit full-time to the next phase. Entrepreneurship is very demanding, and we expect you to put in the work needed to succeed.
• Activities:
  During the EiR program, we’ll mentor and work with you to engage potential customers, analyze the competitive landscape and market potential, brainstorm and scope a solution, and ultimately develop a well-informed pitch deck for the startup.
  You can graduate as soon as you can demonstrate to our investment committee that the startup is promising enough and has sufficient customer interest to justify building an MVP. Ideally, we start selling before building.
• Iteration:
  We understand that startups operate with a lot of uncertainty and we want to retain top talent in our ecosystem. If the first idea turns out to be a dead alley, you can pick a second idea and get going. If in 6 months you haven’t been able to validate an idea, you’ll have to reapply to the program.
• Teamwork and co-founders:
  We encourage EiRs to partner together and start forming a complementary team. We’ll help you ‘date’ other EiRs and find potential co-founders.
• Hands-on support:
  We’ve gathered a team with decades of experience in CollabTech behind products like Google Suite and Asana, and have raised over $100mn for the B2B startups they’ve built. Our team works very closely with the EiRs and we’re constantly thinking about the CollabTech market and how to build successful startups, so expect us to be opinionated and argumentative. We’re also happy to be proven wrong.
  We’ll meet with you weekly to review progress, schedule additional work sessions and workshops as needed, and we are available daily in the chats for feedback and support.
• Swarm benefits:
  As an EiR you can already start to benefit from the Swarm. We have a series of communities of practice, called Guilds, where members of the Swarm exchange knowledge and give each other feedback on specific topics such as growth and sales, development, fundraising, etc. Additionally, each of our startups operates in CollabTech and can help you with introductions to customers and potential co-founders. If you ask nicely, they’ll be happy to exchange market insights and amplify your social media posts.

What happens after the EiR program?

When you graduate by validating an idea, we’ll incorporate a company with you as the founder and us as co-founders. We’ll put in some initial capital and continue working with you for up to 12 months to build up the business.
The legal agreement is based on a SAFE+TokenWarrant, a Service Contract for how our support vests, and a Swap Agreement that makes you a co-owner of RnDAO if the venture gets traction.
Generally, we’ll aim for the founding team to retain 70% of ownership, which is relatively generous for venture builder standards. Importantly, this should not be compared with an accelerator, as those provide only some light mentorship and expect you to arrive with a team, a validated idea, and even some customer traction already. We build with you from the ground up.

 Who can apply to be an Entrepreneur in Residence?

We primarily value drive and motivation. Although the following will give you extra chances of being selected:

• Skills related to software startups: product management, coding, UX design, marketing, sales, user research, pitching, and fundraising.
• You welcome feedback and like having your ideas challenged. 
• Experience leading (tech) teams and making business decisions, ideally with previous experience in fast-paced startups.

Success Stories

• Together Crew began as an RnDAO project, got selected into Techstars as one of 12 out of 750 applicants, gained traction, and now has two VCs reaching out—but no longer needs funding.
• CollabBerry originated from one of our Research Fellowships (precursor to the EiR program). We then helped them secure additional funding from Arbitrum and launch as a venture.
• Harmonica is another startup that was born from our Research Fellowships and now has a growing community of users.
• More recent startups coming out of our EiR program that ended in June 2025 are Contribo and FairAI.

The Application Process

Here's a quick summary of the steps:

1. Join RnDAO Discord and introduce yourself, mentioning you’re interested in the EiR.
2. First Call to learn more about you and answer any questions you might have.
3. Application form submission.
4. Review by the Investment Committee, including calls to get to know you.
5. Trial Period: We’ll ask you to complete a few tasks helping one of our existing startups.
6. EiR Agreement: We start our formal relationship by onboarding you as a contributor in RnDAO Labs.

Next Steps

We're here to discuss these options with you in more detail. Our goal is to work with you to build a thriving venture.

• Questions? Don't hesitate to ask us anything.
• Ready to proceed? Let us know, and we'll guide you through the next steps.

Join the RnDAO Discord and introduce yourself in the Introductions channel. Our team will then invite you to a call.

We look forward to the possibility of working together and helping your startup succeed!

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