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How to find startup companies
Describe your target startup market
Add your target market or industry and the title you want to reach. Sculptor scans Clay's company database for matching startups.
Sculptor builds and enriches your startup list
Sculptor assembles a list of startups filtered by industry, headcount, and founding date, then waterfalls through 150+ providers to find a verified email for the title you specified. Matched rows get an email appended.
Get your startup list with verified contact emails
The finished table has company name and a verified contact email for matched rows. Push to Smartlead, Instantly, or your sequencer to trigger a campaign the moment a row lands.
Why Clay for finding startup companies
Filter startups from Clay's B2B company database
Pull startups matching your ICP from Clay's B2B company database using filters like industry, headcount, founding date, location, and description keywords. No manual list building, no third-party exports required before you start enriching.
Waterfall enrichment for verified contact emails
Get a verified email for matched startup rows. Clay waterfalls through 150+ providers in sequence, charging credits only when a provider returns a hit, so you pay for results rather than attempts.
Claygent layers funding and hiring signals
Know which startups are in-market right now. Claygent browses each company's site and public sources to surface signals like recent funding, aggressive hiring patterns, and new GTM hires, then scores rows automatically.
Auto-sync enriched rows to HubSpot or Salesforce
Finished rows push directly to HubSpot or Salesforce via bidirectional sync, updating existing records or creating new ones. Segment membership and enriched fields map to CRM fields automatically, keeping your pipeline current.
Our most successful campaigns are built on data that doesn’t exist in off-the-shelf tools. Clay helps us find those signals — and transform ambitious ideas into executable, high-performing campaigns.
Frequently asked questions
How does Sculptor find startup companies by industry or funding stage?
Sculptor queries Clay's dataset of 100+ company data providers, filtering by your chosen industry, founding date, headcount, or funding stage to build a matching startup list instantly. It then runs a waterfall across providers like Dealroom, Harmonic, and PitchBook to confirm each company's funding stage, and chains 10+ email providers to return a verified founder email per row.
How accurate are the startup lists and founder emails Clay returns?
Clay's 2025 work email benchmark shows a single provider covers only 50 to 90% of contacts, while a three-provider waterfall reaches 90 to 95% coverage. For founder emails specifically, Clay chains providers like Hunter, Findymail, and Wiza in sequence, refunding credits automatically when a provider misses. Company data pulls from 100+ sources, so funding stage and firmographic fields carry cross-verified accuracy.
Can I find startup companies in bulk for a whole list at once?
Yes. Type your criteria into Sculptor and it generates a full table of matching startups in one step. You can also paste a list of company names or upload a CSV, then run waterfall enrichment across every row simultaneously. Push the enriched list directly into HubSpot or Salesforce with duplicate-prevention logic, or export as a CSV for lighter-weight handoff.
Is it legal to collect and email startup founder contact data?
In the US, the CAN-SPAM Act allows unsolicited B2B email as long as you include a valid postal address, honest subject lines, and a working unsubscribe link. Penalties reach over $50,000 per non-compliant message. In the EU, GDPR permits B2B outreach under the legitimate interest basis when the message is relevant to the recipient's professional role and you offer a clear opt-out.
State-level laws like CCPA may add disclosure requirements for California contacts. Always check the rules for your jurisdiction before launching outreach.