How to Invest Through SunDAO: The Full Process, Explained
By Daiana Marculescu, Co-Founder of SunDAO Ventures
I get the same questions on almost every intro call. How does this actually work? When do I see deals? How do I decide whether to invest? What happens to my money after I wire it?
Fair questions. The honest answer is that most investment DAOs don’t explain their process clearly enough, and we’ve been guilty of that too. So here’s the full picture - every step, from how a deal enters our pipeline to how capital gets deployed and what happens after.
Step 1: A deal enters the pipeline
Deals come to SunDAO from three places.
From our members. This is the biggest source, and it’s what makes the model work. Our 70+ members - validators, security auditors, VCs, fund managers, protocol founders - are embedded in the blockchain ecosystems. They encounter startups through their day-to-day work: a validator notices a promising infrastructure project, an auditor meets a team building security tooling, a VC partner sees a deal outside their fund’s thesis but perfect for SunDAO. They bring it to us.
If SunDAO ends up investing, the member who sourced the deal earns a share of our carry. Real incentive, real alignment.
From our network. Chris and I have spent years in this space - ICF, BIS, Solana, Sui, Cosmos, Comets of Web3, the broader blockchain ecosystem. Founders reach out. Other investors share deal flow. Projects apply through our website.
From VC partners. We exchange deal flow with venture funds who want supplementary co-investment opportunities or have deals outside their focus area. This gives us access to pipelines we wouldn’t see otherwise.
The result: 1-2 vetted deals per month reach our members. That’s after an initial filter. We see many more than that - most don’t make it past a first look.
Step 2: Our team writes the investment memo
Before any deal reaches our members, our internal team does the heavy lifting.
We research, verify claims, and write a comprehensive investment memo covering 12 dimensions:
Problem & market - how severe is the pain, how large is the opportunity
Solution & product - core value proposition, what makes it better
Team & advisors - backgrounds, prior exits, key relationships
Traction & metrics - users, revenue, TVL, partnerships, milestones
Technology - architecture, security posture, scalability, differentiation
Competition - who else is doing this, barriers to entry, moat analysis
Tokenomics - design, distribution, incentive alignment
Investment terms - valuation, structure, other investors in the round
Exit opportunity - token launch roadmap, estimated time to liquidity
Revenue model - how the protocol generates sustainable income
Risk assessment - what could go wrong now and in the future
SunDAO participation - our proposed check size, fees, SPV structure
This is a working document designed to surface every material risk and opportunity. One of our 2025 memos identified $2.17B stolen across 225+ crypto attacks in H1 2025, which became a core part of the security infrastructure investment thesis. Another benchmarked a project’s 99.99% uptime claims against actual revenue to test whether performance was translating to paying customers.
The claims get verified and the risks get named.
The memo goes to all SunDAO members before the founder pitch.
Step 3: The startup pitches live
The founding team presents directly to the full DAO. This is a live session where our members can ask anything.
And they do. When your audience includes security auditors, validators who run infrastructure at scale, VCs who’ve seen hundreds of deals, and protocol founders who’ve built what these startups are trying to build - the questions get specific fast.
After the Q&A, the founders leave and members stay for a private discussion. This is where the real debate happens. Someone flags a technical risk. Someone else pushes back. A VC challenges the valuation. A validator who runs similar infrastructure shares operational context the rest of the room wouldn’t have.
These private discussions are some of the most valuable parts of SunDAO membership. You’re not just evaluating a deal - you’re learning how different experts think about risk.
Step 4: Members vote (transparently)
After the pitch and private discussion, members have a full week to vote.
Many use that week to do their own deeper diligence - talking to people in their network, reviewing the code, stress-testing claims from the pitch. The memo gives you the foundation. The pitch gives you the founders’ energy and conviction. The week gives you time to form your own view.
Voting is fully transparent. You can see who voted what. This matters more than it might sound - if a security auditor you trust voted no, you want to know that before you vote yes. If three VCs with deep sector experience voted yes, that’s a signal worth weighting.
Members can adjust their vote at any time during the voting window. Opinions shift as the private discussion continues throughout the week.
Step 5: The investment decision
In 2025, our members voted on all 11 deals we sourced. 4 became investments. 5 were passed. 2 received yes votes but the founders couldn’t close their rounds - a reality of early-stage fundraising that’s outside anyone’s control.
That’s a 36% conversion rate and a 64% pass rate. We’re selective, and our members expect us to be.
Step 6: Capital deploys
If we decide to invest, here’s what happens:
SPV formation. A Special Purpose Vehicle is created on our investment platform partner. This is a legal entity specifically for this investment. You’re not pooling money into a general fund - each deal has its own structure.
KYC. Every investor needs to complete the identity verification through the investment platform. This is required per investment, not just once at membership. We take compliance seriously.
You decide your check size. Individual members invest $2,500 to $25,000 per deal. Institutional members can go up to $100,000. Nobody is required to invest in every deal. You see the memo, attend the pitch, participate in the discussion, and decide for yourself.
Capital wires. You send funds through the investment platform. Legal documentation - subscription agreements, SPV terms - is handled for you.
You own shares directly. This is important. You’re not buying a token that represents a claim on a fund. You own actual shares in the company through the SPV. Your ownership is direct and legally documented.
The timeline from deal presentation to capital deployed is typically 2-3 weeks.
What happens after you invest
This part gets overlooked and it shouldn’t.
For every SunDAO portfolio company, we set up a dedicated communication group with the founders and all investors in that deal. You get direct access to the people building what you invested in.
Founders share updates. Members ask questions. When a portfolio company hits a milestone, raises a follow-on round, or runs into challenges, you hear about it in real time - not in a quarterly PDF.
The fees
Transparency on costs, since this comes up on every call:
Membership fee: Participation in SunDAO implys an annual fee. This gives you access to all deal flow, all memos, all pitches, all votes, and the exclusive expert community.
Per-investment fees: Each deal has a management and legal fee covering SPV creation, legal structure, investment platform costs, and ongoing administration. SunDAO also takes a percentage of carry on profits, which varies by deal.
Deal sourcing reward: If you’re a member who brings a deal that SunDAO invests in, you earn part of the carry pool from that investment. Your network is an asset here - and you’re compensated for it.
What membership actually looks like month to month
I want to set realistic expectations. Here’s what a typical month looks like as a SunDAO member:
Week 1-2: You receive an investment memo for a high potential pre-vetted deal. You read it, review the data, form initial questions.
Week 2-3: The startup pitches live. You attend (or watch the recording if timing doesn’t work). You participate in the private DAO member discussion after.
Week 3-4: Voting is open. You do your own diligence, talk to SunDAO members and people in your network, watch how other members vote, and cast your own vote.
Ongoing: Portfolio company updates come through dedicated communication groups. Community discussions happen around market developments, emerging sectors, and upcoming deals.
The cadence is 1-2 per month, which means you’re never overwhelmed but always engaged.
Who this is for (and who it isn’t)
SunDAO works well for:
People who are already active in blockchain - validators, auditors, developers, fund managers and analysts, protocol founders, operators - who want to invest in early-stage projects alongside other experts. You should be comfortable with the risk profile of pre-seed and seed investments, able to deploy $2,500+ per deal, and interested in contributing your expertise to the evaluation process.
Angel investors and funds making their first moves in blockchain. Early-stage crypto is unforgiving - bad deals look identical to good ones without deep technical context. SunDAO gives you a protective environment where 70+ experts are vetting every opportunity before you deploy a dollar. You benefit from collective knowledge that would take years to build on your own.
High-profile web3 leaders and executives from the traditional world who want to stay at the frontier. Membership puts you in direct contact with protocol founders, infrastructure builders, and the investors backing them. If you’re looking to expand your network and get early exposure to what’s actually being built - not what’s being hyped on Twitter - this is where you should be.
Service providers - auditors, legal firms, infrastructure companies, dev shops and others - who want access to promising startups. Our portfolio companies need services. Our members need partners. Being inside SunDAO means you’re meeting founders at the earliest stage, before they’ve chosen their vendors, while also co-investing alongside them. It’s a way to grow both your investment portfolio and your client base.
SunDAO is probably not for you if:
You’re looking for passive exposure to crypto. We’re not a fund - you make individual investment decisions on each deal. If you want a “set it and forget it” approach, an index or a managed fund is a better fit.
You’re expecting guaranteed returns. Early-stage investing is high-risk. We’ve had one portfolio company fail in our first year. That’s normal. We’re transparent about it because we think you should know what you’re getting into.
Getting started
Three paths:
If you’re ready to join: Go to sundao.ventures and click “Join SunDAO.” You can complete membership in minutes.
If you want to talk first: Book a 30-minute call with me. I’ll walk you through current deal flow, answer questions, and we’ll both figure out if it’s a good fit. I’m not going to hard-sell you - if SunDAO isn’t right for you, I’d rather tell you that upfront.
If you want to follow along first: Subscribe to this newsletter. We publish deal reviews, pass reasons, portfolio updates, and how we think about early-stage blockchain investing. It’s free and it’s the best way to see how we operate before committing.
SunDAO Ventures is an investment DAO where 70+ blockchain experts collaborate on due diligence and co-invest in frontier blockchain infrastructure. Founded by former ICF Ecosystem Lead Daiana Marculescu and ICF Technical Director & BIS Managing Architect Chris Zhong.
This post is for informational purposes only and does not constitute investment advice.