Frequently Asked Questions

Israel has become one of the world’s leading hubs for early-stage venture capital, with dozens of top-tier VC funds actively backing startups (Check out the full list here).

Horizon Capital was recognized as one of Israel’s most active early-stage VC funds in 2023 and as a leading player in follow-on investments in 2024. The fund focuses on pre-seed and seed investments, supporting Israeli founders from day one through scale.

Whether you’re a first-time founder or a repeat entrepreneur, Horizon offers more than capital, we’re your earliest partner.

Israel has become one of the world’s most dynamic early-stage tech ecosystems. Often called the “Startup Nation,” it consistently ranks among the top countries for innovation, venture capital activity, and tech talent.

Take a look at the numbers that tell the full story:

• Israel has the highest number of startups per capita. Over 9,200 active tech companies operate in Israel, making it the global leader in startups per population size.
• The Israeli high-tech sector contributes 20% of the country’s GDP and 53% of its exports, employing nearly 400,000 people.
• Israel is a global innovation leader, investing 4.3% of its GDP in R&D – the highest percentage worldwide, and boasting one of the world’s highest ratios of engineers and scientists per capita.
• Israel has a strong venture capital ecosystem: In 2023 alone, Israeli startups raised $7 billion, showing resilience despite global economic headwinds.

• Home to over 130 unicorns, Israel ranks among the top countries worldwide in the number of private tech companies valued at over $1 billion.

At Horizon Capital, we invest at the heart of this innovation engine, supporting Israeli founders from the earliest stages, helping them scale globally, and empowering them through hands-on support, our exclusive Evolver program, and a strong founder community.

Read more about the vibrant Israeli ecosystem here, here, and here.

Israel offers a vibrant early-stage funding ecosystem, and founders have several paths to raise seed capital. The most common options include:

Angel investors: Experienced entrepreneurs or tech executives who invest early and often provide mentorship alongside capital.

Venture capital funds: Many Israeli VCs invest at the seed stage. Horizon Capital is a leading early-stage VC that backs ambitious founders from day one and supports them with strategic guidance, global scaling, and our founder-only program, Evolver.

Government support: The Israel Innovation Authority offers non-dilutive grants and incubator programs to help founders build and validate early-stage technologies.

International grants & accelerators: Programs like Horizon Europe, the BIRD Foundation, and global accelerators (e.g., Techstars, Google for Startups) offer funding and mentorship for Israeli founders.

Corporate investors: Strategic investments from global tech firms or Israeli corporations are also available for startups in aligned verticals (e.g., Intel Capital, Microsoft for Startups, Cisco Investments, Qualcomm Ventures, Salesforce Ventures, AWS Startups).

At Horizon Capital, we help founders navigate this funding landscape, raising smarter and building faster from day one.

Absolutely. Horizon Capital is one of Israel’s leading early-stage VC funds and was recognized as one of the most active in 2023. We specialize in backing first-time founders at the pre-seed and seed stages, even before traction or a fully built product.

What sets us apart is our close, hands-on involvement from day one — we don’t just write the check.
Through our Evolver program, we work side by side with founders, providing weekly actionable support across product strategy, fundraising, go-to-market, hiring, and U.S. expansion.
We’ve backed many first-time entrepreneurs, helping them turn early ideas into global companies.

If you’re a first-time founder looking for more than capital, Horizon Capital is built to be your first real partner.

In Israel, pre-seed funding typically refers to the earliest stage of a startup’s journey, before there’s a working product, revenue, or formal traction. These rounds usually range from $100K to $500K and are designed to validate the core idea and build an initial MVP. Funding can come from angels, early-stage VCs, or government grants.

Seed investment typically follows initial market validation, such as a working product, early user adoption, or pilot customers. In Israel, seed rounds usually range from $2M to $10M, and are often led by venture capital firms, sometimes alongside strategic or angel co-investors.

These rounds help startups expand their team, refine product-market fit, and accelerate go-to-market execution. Most Israeli VCs, including Horizon Capital, play an active role in both leading and supporting early-stage companies.

Horizon Capital invests in both pre-seed and seed stages, backing ambitious Israeli founders from day one.

At the pre-seed stage, Horizon typically invests between $500K and $2M, well above the standard benchmark in the Israeli market. This larger initial investment gives founders a longer runway to build, test, and refine their product, reach early milestones, and prepare for a strong seed round.

By providing more capital early on, we help startups move faster and with greater focus, while preserving founder ownership and momentum. This extended runway allows our portfolio companies to reach critical milestones faster and with less dilution, increasing their chances of success in future funding rounds.

You can pitch Horizon Capital directly through our website using the “Pitch Us” form, or by reaching out through a warm introduction from someone in our network (it is also a great time to check out our LinkedIn page).

We review every pitch deck we receive. While we can’t move forward with every opportunity, we always do our best to reply with thoughtful feedback, especially if you’re at the right stage and in a relevant domain.

Horizon Capital invests in early-stage Israeli startups, primarily in B2B SaaS, but we remain sector-agnostic and open to bold ideas across multiple domains.

We’re especially drawn to technologies that demonstrate:

– Global scalability
– Large market potential
– Clear paths to category leadership
– Strong founding teams with deep domain expertise
– Unique market understanding or unfair advantage

We believe that a great team with sharp execution and a strong understanding of its market can succeed in any vertical. If you’re solving a meaningful problem with the ambition to lead globally, we’re ready to back you, regardless of the category.

Yes. Horizon Capital invests in pre-revenue startups, including those at the pre-seed and seed stages. You don’t need revenue or even a fully built product to reach out.

We back early-stage founders who have:
A strong team with a deep understanding of the problem and past success
A compelling insight or unique market opportunity
The ambition to build something global

If you’re building something bold and looking for your first investor, Horizon Capital may be the right partner, long before your first dollar of revenue.

Traction always helps! But it’s not a requirement.
Of course, if you have paying customers, strong user engagement, or clear market signals, it helps accelerate our investment process.
That said, we regularly back founders at the pre-seed stage, even before revenue, when what we see is:

– A strong founding team
– A well-articulated market insight
– A promising solution to a real, validated problem

Whether you’ve already launched or are still building, we’re open to partnering early, especially when the vision is bold and the thinking is sharp.

At Horizon Capital, our typical investment process, from initial introduction to signed term sheet, takes approximately 6 to 8 weeks. We prioritize efficiency and transparency, ensuring that founders are kept informed at every stage.

While timelines can vary based on factors like due diligence and legal processes, we strive to move swiftly when there’s strong alignment. In certain cases, we’ve expedited the process to meet founders’ urgent needs.

If you’re a founder seeking a responsive and supportive early-stage VC partner, Horizon Capital is committed to respecting your time and accelerating your journey.

Yes. At Horizon Capital, we specialize in helping Israeli startups expand into the U.S., one of the most important milestones for global growth.
Our support goes far beyond capital. We provide strategic guidance for building a U.S. go-to-market plan, playbooks, and hands-on help from founders who’ve done it before.

We believe that entering the U.S. market is a critical scale moment for Israeli founders, and we make it part of our core value proposition as an early-stage VC. If you’re building from Israel with global ambition, we’re the partner that helps you expand.

At Horizon Capital, we believe early-stage founders need more than capital – they need true partners. That’s why our post-investment support is built around three pillars: strategic partnership, operational empowerment, and emotional resilience.

Here’s how we support our portfolio founders after the investment:

The Evolver Program: A hands-on support methodology led by our partners. Evolver includes regular strategic sessions, ongoing weekly support in key areas (like fundraising, go-to-market, product, and hiring), and direct involvement from Horizon’s team, not just advisors or templates. Read more here.

Founder Community: Startups are hard and lonely. We built a private, trusted community of founders who share insights, challenges, and support each other. From AMAs to off-the-record meetups, this is a space for honest conversations and real help. Read more here.

Exclusive Benefits: We provide access to a curated suite of tools, credits, and services that can save each company hundreds of thousands of dollars per year. Think cloud, dev tools, legal support, and more. Read more here.

Ecosystem Access: We open doors. From early design partners and enterprise intros to top-tier VCs for future rounds, we actively connect our founders to the people who can accelerate their journey.

At Horizon Capital, we’re not passive investors – we’re in the trenches with you, from day zero to scale.

Horizon Capital is a boutique early-stage VC fund with a strong track record of backing high-potential Israeli startups from day one.

To date, we’ve invested in 20 companies and achieved results that significantly outperform industry benchmarks, including 5 successful exits, such as the acquisition of OWN for $2.1 billion.

Our active portfolio includes 1 unicorn and 10 startups that are already generating revenue and scaling post-seed, well beyond the “Valley of Death” between Seed and Series A, where most early-stage startups typically fail.

We focus on quality over quantity, building deep, hands-on relationships with our founders and supporting them through every strategic inflection point. Our tight portfolio model allows us to deliver real value for our founders and real outcomes for our LPs.

Horizon Capital runs a fast, founder-friendly selection process that emphasizes team strength, clarity of market insight, and global scale potential. But beyond speed, we go deep.

We invest significant time in due diligence, working closely with founders even before we commit, often at the pre-seed stage. This early involvement helps sharpen their strategy, validate the product, and lay the groundwork for a strong seed round.

Our hands-on model means we provide consistent, strategic support throughout the early journey. This reduces costly missteps, shortens time to market, and improves execution quality.

By the time our LPs come in, they’re backing startups that are market-ready, founder-aligned, and guided by a team that knows them intimately, not just from afar.

This approach doesn’t just improve outcomes for our startups – it reduces risk for our LPs and increases the likelihood of scalable success, as demonstrated by our track record.

Horizon Capital is known for having early and consistent access to Israel’s most promising early-stage startups.

In the past year alone, we reviewed over 400 startup opportunities in a market where approximately 600 new tech ventures were founded in Israel. This puts us in direct contact with the vast majority of relevant deal flow at the pre-seed and seed stages.

We achieve this through:

– Deep founder networks: including repeat founders, alumni of elite military units, and top accelerators

– Strong visibility in the ecosystem: through mentoring professional meetups, podcasts, entrepreneurship programs, academia hubs, and pre-accelerator involvement.

– A hands-on, reputation-driven approach: founders actively seek us out thanks to our close involvement and strong post-investment support

Because of our early presence and selective model, we often see opportunities before they reach the broader VC market, and many of our investments begin with relationships built long before the fundraising round.

This unique access to early-stage innovation allows us to be selective and gives our LPs exposure to high-quality companies before anyone else.

Yes. Horizon Capital actively welcomes co-investment opportunities with LPs, strategic partners, and leading VCs from around the world.

We typically lead the rounds we participate in, but we often syndicate with other top-tier early-stage investors who bring strategic value to our portfolio companies.

Our strong position within the Israeli startup ecosystem gives us close ties with nearly all the leading early-stage funds, accelerators, and institutional investors in the region.

We view co-investment as a way to:
– Bring additional value to founders
– Strengthen our cap tables
– Expand investor access to high-potential early-stage deals

To see examples of our co-investors, visit our Funding page and explore the companies we’ve backed alongside exceptional partners.

Horizon Capital is currently raising its fourth early-stage fund, which is dedicated to investing in exceptional Israeli founders from pre-seed through scale.

If you’re an accredited investor or institutional LP seeking exposure to top-tier early-stage deal flow in Israel, this is a unique opportunity to join one of the most active and founder-centric VC funds in the ecosystem.

Interested in learning more?
Reach out to us at contact@horizoncap.vc or connect via LinkedIn.