Research a deal's market and claims
Run a research brief on a deal to size the market bottom up, map competitors, check why now, buyers, pricing and public traction, with dated sources.
The Research tab on a deal checks the company against public sources: how big the market is, who else serves it, why now, who buys and at what price, and what the company has published about itself. Each finding cites dated sources you can open. It is research for your team to review. A person at your fund decides what it means.
Run a brief
- Open the deal, choose Diligence, then Research.
- Under Topics, tick what to cover. All five are ticked by default:
- Market sizing: bottom up where possible, number of buyers times price. Top-down TAM figures are flagged.
- Competitors and substitutes: a market map of direct competitors, adjacent players and incumbents, with their funding stage where a source states it.
- Why now: what changed recently that makes this possible or urgent.
- Buyer segments and pricing: who buys, who owns the budget, what comparable products charge.
- Milestones and public traction: launches, hiring, press and customer logos the company published, checked against the founder's claims.
- Choose Run research.
While it runs you see Researching this company with the steps Queued, Searching the web, Writing the brief and Ready. Updates on its own means you don't need to refresh. When it ends you see Research brief ready. or The research brief failed.
Anyone who can open the deal can run a brief. Only one brief runs per deal at a time.
What is sent outside your fund
Searches run through your AI provider's own web search (Claude's, with the same account that writes the brief), or through Tavily if Delsivo's admin set that up instead. Every source in a brief is a page the search actually returned, and its snippet is text quoted from that page. The brief shows Web search when the searches ran. They contain only the company name, the website's domain, the sector, stage and geography on file, and the text of the founder's own claims with any email addresses, phone numbers and links removed. Deck pages, data room documents, interview transcripts and founder contact details are never sent. The Searches tab shows the exact searches for each brief.
Web pages are treated as data. Text on a page that tries to give instructions is ignored.
Read the brief
Brief at a glance is written for a partner with two minutes:
| Part | What it shows |
|---|---|
| Summary | Two to four sentences on what the public record says |
| Supporting | The three strongest supporting points, each with its sources |
| Counterpoints | The three strongest points against |
| Open questions | What the research couldn't settle, with the diligence workstream |
| What this means for the thesis | A short reading for the investment case |
Below it, the tabs:
- Findings: every finding, grouped by kind. Filter with All, Supporting, Counter, Open question or Unsupported.
- Questions for diligence: open questions by workstream (Market, Product and technology, Customers, Financials, Team, Legal), then Founder claims to verify.
- Market: the bottom-up sizing, any Top-down claim flagged with why it is weak, and the Market map by Direct, Adjacent and Incumbent.
- Sources: each source with its publisher, published date and the date it was fetched.
- Searches: the exact searches sent.
Labels on a finding
| Kind | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Supporting | A dated public source backs the case |
| Counter | A dated public source cuts against the case or a claim |
| Open question | Something to take into diligence |
| Unsupported | A founder claim no public source confirms yet. Not a contradiction |
| Evidence label | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Public | From a public source, not checked by your team yet |
| Founder reported | What the founder says, with no independent source |
| Analyst verified | Someone on your team checked the source and accepted it |
Open questions are things to find out, not evidence, so they carry no evidence label.
Supporting and counter findings always cite at least one source. A source chip such as S2 shows the page's title, publisher and dates when you hover or focus it, and opens the page in a new tab. A source published more than 18 months before it was fetched is marked Stale; one with no date is marked Undated.
Review findings
- Accept marks the finding Analyst verified. Do this once you have opened the source and agree with it.
- Dismiss hides it. Tick Show dismissed to see it again, and Restore to bring it back.
- Each change shows a toast with Undo.
- Attach to claim adds the finding to one of the deal's claims as research evidence, with the source link and dates. Pick the claim, then Supports the claim or Contradicts the claim. Contradicting marks the claim Disputed, keeps both sources and opens one verification task. Attaching needs edit access to the deal. See The claim tracker.
- Add as claim makes the finding a new claim to track, with the finding as its source. Edit the wording, then click Add claim. The claim starts as Founder reported; research counts as an independent source, so your team can then mark it Corroborated. The finding is accepted and linked to the claim. Undo removes the claim.
Turn questions into diligence work
On Questions for diligence, each open question has three buttons. Each one accepts the question, shows a message with Undo, and needs edit access to the deal:
| Button | What it does |
|---|---|
| Make task | A task on the deal's Tasks tab with the question as its title, for the deal owner (or you when the deal has none), due in a week. The note names the brief and workstream. Undo cancels the task |
| Add to request | Adds the question to your newest draft request on the deal, or starts a draft called "Follow-up questions" due in two weeks with weekly reminders. Nothing goes to the founder until a partner sends it from Requests. Undo removes the question, and an emptied draft is deleted |
| Add to checklist | Adds the question as an item on the deal's data room checklist, in the folder of its workstream when there is one the founder can see (never a team-only folder). The deal needs a data room first. Undo deletes the item |
A question already in your draft can't be added twice. On a passed or closed deal, Add to request is refused, since nothing more goes to the founder.
Accepted findings are the ones committee memos and Ask This Deal can use.
Run again, history and failures
- Run research again makes a new brief. The earlier one is kept as it was, with its reviews, under Brief history. Choose it to read it; Open the current brief takes you back.
- If a brief fails, the tab says why and offers Retry, which starts a new brief with the same topics. The failed one stays in the history as Failed, retried.
- If no web search is set up, the brief says No web search ran. Its sources are samples on example.com, no model writes it, and it lists questions only. Run it again once web search is set up.
- If no AI model is set up, the brief runs in Offline mode: it collects sources and lists questions only.
Research across your deals
Research in the sidebar lists the briefs on the deals you can see, newest first, and Recent findings across them. Analysts see their own deals; partners and admins see every deal. Committee members see packets instead.
Frequently asked questions
Does research change a deal's stage or contact the founder?
No. A brief only adds findings for your team to review. Stage changes, requests and messages are always made by a person. Add to request saves a draft only; a partner sends it.
Can I send a founder's deck to the research provider?
No. Research never sends deck pages, data room files, transcripts or contact details. To check a document, use Ask This Deal, which reads only what you can access inside Delsivo.
Why is a source marked Stale?
It was published more than 18 months before the brief fetched it. Markets move; look for something newer before relying on it.
Something unclear or missing? Tell us