Data room folder structure
A folder tree you can copy straight into Drive, named the way diligence expects to find it.
Copyable template
Diligence and closing · Checklist
Data room checklist
Everything a seed data room is expected to hold, grouped by area, as a list you can keep.
A seed data room does not need the volume or the formality of a later-stage diligence archive. What it needs is accurate ownership, numbers that hold still, customer evidence, and a clear record of what is not finished yet.
Build the minimum credible set and keep the first version short enough that someone will actually read it. A room assembled to compensate for a story the evidence cannot support does not survive contact with the questions underneath it.
The list below follows the eight categories a seed room usually needs, plus the index that sits on top and the access controls that go around it. Gaps at this stage are normal rather than disqualifying — name each one, give it an owner and a date, and leave it visible.
Checklist
What is in it
Index and labelling · 4 items
What a reviewer meets first, and what stops them working from the wrong file.
Company · 2 items
What the company is, and how it was formed.
Capitalization · 4 items
Who owns what, including everything outstanding that would convert.
Intellectual property · 3 items
Whether the company owns the work the company is built on.
People · 2 items
Who is here, what they own, and who you plan to add.
Customers and contracts · 4 items
What people are actually doing, and on what terms.
Financials · 6 items
The numbers you already produce, gathered and defined so they hold still.
Product or technology · 3 items
What you have built, and what is still planned.
Legal and compliance · 3 items
The materials a review would reasonably reach for.
Access and version control · 4 items
Who can see the room, and what they see when they do.
The questions the room has to support · 7 items
Short answers you can give directly. The room backs these up rather than standing in for them.
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The template is ready. Add your email to open it, and you will also get The Raise Memo — a note for founders raising capital.
How to use it
Notes
Review the room before each new investor receives it, and record the question and the source after each diligence request — a question you get repeatedly usually means the deck, a metric definition, or the folder structure needs work rather than that the room is missing a file. Do not build the full room before you know who the likely investor is or what decision the materials are meant to support, and never use a public folder for confidential company records.
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