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How to find startups
Describe your target startup market
Add your target market or funding stage, like "Series A SaaS startups with 10-100 employees." Sculptor scans Clay's company database for matches filtered by industry, headcount, and funding stage.
Sculptor builds and enriches your startup list
Sculptor assembles a filtered list from Clay's B2B company data, using industry, headcount, funding stage, and founding date to narrow results. It then waterfalls through 150+ providers to find a verified email for the target title on matched rows.
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 startups
B2B database filtered for startup profiles
Narrow Clay's B2B company database by industry, headcount, funding stage, founding date, and location to surface startups that match your ICP in minutes. Technographic filters let you add a tech stack requirement without leaving the same table.
Verified contact emails on matched rows
Get a verified work email for your target title on matched startup rows. Clay waterfalls through 150+ providers in sequence and only charges credits when one returns a hit, keeping coverage high on common B2B titles.
Claygent enriches funding and hiring signals
Get funding stage, last raise, and lead investor for each matched account. Claygent browses Crunchbase and PitchBook to pull the freshest data, and hiring signals from Clay's Find Jobs source flag startups growing fastest.
ICP score and push to your sequencer
Formula columns score each startup on funding, headcount, and tech stack so your best-fit rows surface first. Push the scored list directly to Smartlead or Instantly to trigger outreach in seconds.
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 early-stage startups?
Sculptor queries Clay's Find Companies source, filtering by industry, funding amount, headcount, and keywords to match your target criteria. It also taps the Find.ai integration, which accepts plain-language prompts like "seed-stage fintech startups in NYC" and scans millions of company profiles for matches. Once it builds the startup list, waterfall enrichment runs across 10+ contact-data providers to locate a verified founder email for each row.
How accurate are the startup results and founder emails?
Company matches draw from 100+ data providers aggregated in Clay's companies dataset, so coverage spans millions of organizations across industries and funding stages. For founder emails, waterfall enrichment pushes coverage from roughly 30% with a single provider to 80%+ by cascading through providers like Hunter, Apollo, and others. You only pay when a provider returns a verified match, which keeps cost per result low.
Can I find startups in bulk for a whole list?
Yes. The Find Companies source pulls up to 10,000 matching startups per query directly into a Clay table. You can also paste a list of domains or upload a CSV to enrich existing companies with founder contacts. When your table is ready, push the enriched rows to HubSpot, Salesforce, or Pipedrive in one step, or export as a CSV for your outreach sequence.
Is it legal to collect startup data and email founders?
In the US, CAN-SPAM permits B2B cold email as long as every message includes a valid physical address, honest subject line, and a working opt-out link you honor promptly. In the EU, GDPR Article 6(1)(f) allows outreach under legitimate interest when the message is relevant to the recipient's professional role and you provide a clear unsubscribe option. California's CCPA no longer exempts B2B contact data, so opt-out-of-sale requests must be processed within 15 business days.
Always check the rules for your jurisdiction before launching outreach, and honor every opt-out request without delay.