What is the FI Funding Process?

FI Funding is a discrete offering that utilizes a defined process. We've outlined the Funding Process to give companies a better idea of what to expect after submitting and application...

All accepted applicants for FI Funding do not necessarily receive funding. FI Funding service includes circulation of your offering to the FI Accredited Investor Network. If there are interested investors, we facilitate an introduction to the investor(s). It is incumbent on the company and the investor to actually perform due diligence and ultimately close the deal. Foodshed Investors may or may not actually invest in your offering.

Application 
There is no fee to apply to Foodshed Investors. Fill out this form and we'll take a look at your deal.

Onboarding
If, after reviewing your application, we think it Qualifies, is Funding Ready, and is a good fit, we'll send you a contract and invoice you for the Onboarding Fee. When the contract and payment are received, we'll start to prepare your investor package to be sent out to the FI Accredited Investor Network via email. 

The Onboarding process consists of:

• an introductory meeting or call. 
• a quick review of your current business plan and fundraising materials
• your completion of our Px8 Impact Assessment

​Deal Circulation & Investor Management
Once all necessary Onboarding materials are collected, we'll move on to contacting investors notifying them of your offering via email. Note*** If in the process of Onboarding we discover that your company is not Funding Ready, we will need to explore transitioning your offering into our Advisory Services to do additional work before moving forward in the Funding Process. This may cost increase client costs.

If potential investors have shown interest, we'll put them directly in touch with you. You will be responsible for wrangling them, negotiating any terms that are different than in your investor package, and closing the transaction. Note*** Foodshed Investors may or may not be one of those potentially interested investors.

Deal circulation and Investor Management is included in the Onboarding fee.

Transaction Closing
​We do not charge any transaction closing or "success" fees.

Servicing
"Servicing" means administering the deal after it has funded. Servicing typically only applies to debt deals, and includes receiving payments from you and distributing them to the individual lenders, reviewing (and if necessary enforcing) the deal terms, and doing reports for you, and the lenders, on payment progress and status.

If you end up doing a debt deal through FI to accredited investors, we can provide servicing. Fees vary on a deal-by-deal basis. Sometimes they are additions to the payment schedule and sometimes they are a spread between the interest rate charged to you and the rate the investor receives. If we jointly decide to have FI service your debt, we will disclose to you what Serving Fees will be prior to the Transaction Closing.
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Governance
"Governance" refers to serving on a company's Board of Directors (or similar function in an LLC). Investors who provide governance services sometimes charge a fee and sometimes do not. If we participate in an equity deal where we are requested to serve as a Board Member, we require compensation, which can be negotiated on a deal-by-deal basis.