Join us for the next session in our Venture Bites online series, hosted by the Oxford Saïd Entrepreneurship Centre.

Fundraising mechanics 101, best practices, and common pitfalls.

Fundraising is more than just about selling a vision to investors. It’s about running a disciplined process, much like building a sales pipeline. In this session, Iynna Halilou (GP at the MBA Fund) will demystify the mechanics of raising venture capital. Drawing on lessons from multiple market cycles, she will break down what founders need to know going into a raise:

- Fundraising Mechanics 101: what goes into a raise, the “hidden rules” of venture capital, and the must-haves that move deals forward. – Common Mistakes founders make when approaching VCs. – Timing & Momentum: how to engineer urgency in a round.

Whether raising a first institutional capital or planning for future rounds, this guest lecture will equip founders with practical tools, a sharper sense of timing, and the confidence to drive their process effectively.

Founded in 2018, the MBA Fund is an early-stage venture capital firm, investing in founders from top startup ecosystems, starting at Harvard, Stanford, Wharton, and Berkeley.

Iynna Halilou is a General Partner at the MBA Fund, an early-stage venture capital firm backing founders from Harvard, Stanford, Wharton, and Berkeley. Previously, she was an investor at Moxxie Ventures, a San Francisco-based fund led by former Twitter executives, where she focused on AI, climate tech, and digital health.