Data room for venture debt.
A venture debt data room shows a lender that the loan will be repaid: recent equity raised and investor support, monthly cash burn and runway, revenue and collections, existing debt and liens, and the cap table for warrant coverage. Lenders underwrite the company's ability to raise again as much as its current cash flow.
Venture debt room
- 01 Company overview
- 02 Equity history
- 03 Financials
- 04 Cash and runway
- 05 Revenue quality
- 06 Existing debt and liens
- 07 Capitalization
How it works for a startup.
Venture debt is usually a term loan or growth line from a bank or specialist lender to a venture-backed company, often arranged soon after an equity round. It is commonly sized as a fraction of the last equity raise, comes with warrants for the lender, and has an interest-only period before amortisation.
Underwriting looks different from equity diligence. Lenders ask how many months of runway the company has, whether existing investors will support future rounds, how predictable revenue is, and which assets secure the loan. Banks often require the company to keep its operating accounts with them.
Read the covenants as closely as the rate. Financial covenants, material adverse change clauses and investor abandonment clauses decide how much control the lender has when things go wrong. Keep the term sheet negotiations and the signed loan documents in the room so the board can review them.
Top 10 data rooms for this job.
Our five measures, re-weighted for venture debt. Places 11 to 17 are listed below the cards.
- Setup speed 21%
- Investor experience 14%
- Access control 26%
- Diligence tools 19%
- Startup pricing 19%
- 1 9.4/10First-rate
- $149 monthly
- 14-day free trial
- 8/12 feature checks
- Investor Q&A
- NDA e-signing
- Dynamic watermarks
- View-only and download control
- SOC 2 (hosting)
- 2 8.3/10Strong pick
- Quote only
- Free trial offered
- 9/12 feature checks
- Investor Q&A
- Dynamic watermarks
- View-only and download control
- Viewer activity log
- SOC 2
- ISO 27001
- GDPR
- 3 8.1/10Strong pick
- $250 monthly
- Free trial offered
- 8/12 feature checks
- Investor Q&A
- NDA e-signing
- Dynamic watermarks
- View-only and download control
- SOC 2
- 4 8.1/10Strong pick
- Quote only
- Free trial offered
- 7/12 feature checks
- Investor Q&A
- Dynamic watermarks
- View-only and download control
- Viewer activity log
- SOC 2
- ISO 27001
- 5 8.1/10Strong pick
- Quote only
- Free trial offered
- 8/12 feature checks
- Investor Q&A
- Dynamic watermarks
- View-only and download control
- Viewer activity log
- SOC 2
- ISO 27001
- 6 8.0/10Strong pick
- Quote only
- Demo, no trial
- 10/12 feature checks
- Investor Q&A
- Dynamic watermarks
- View-only and download control
- Viewer activity log
- SOC 2
- ISO 27001
- GDPR
- 7 7.8/10Strong pick
- $299 monthly
- Free trial offered
- 7/12 feature checks
- Investor Q&A
- Dynamic watermarks
- View-only and download control
- Viewer activity log
- SOC 2
- 8 7.8/10Strong pick
- $55 monthly
- Free trial offered
- 9/12 feature checks
- NDA e-signing
- Dynamic watermarks
- View-only and download control
- Viewer activity log
- SOC 2
- ISO 27001
- HIPAA
- 9 7.7/10Good option
- Quote only
- Demo, no trial
- 8/12 feature checks
- Investor Q&A
- Dynamic watermarks
- View-only and download control
- Viewer activity log
- SOC 2
- ISO 27001
- 10 7.7/10Good option
- Quote only
- Demo, no trial
- 8/12 feature checks
- Investor Q&A
- Dynamic watermarks
- View-only and download control
- Viewer activity log
- SOC 2
- ISO 27001
- GDPR
Show places 11 to 17
- SmartRoom 7.6
- DealRoom 7.5
- Onehub 7.2
- ShareVault 7.2
- Digify 6.9
- DocSend 6.7
- Venue by DFIN 6.6
Folder index.
A starting structure for this room. Rename folders to fit your company and keep the numbers.
Deck, latest board deck, business plan.
Financing documents for the last round, investor list, investor support letter if offered.
Monthly statements for 12 to 24 months, budget, audited statements if available.
Monthly cash forecast with and without the loan, bank statements.
ARR or revenue by customer, accounts receivable aging, collections history.
Current loans, UCC lien search results, leases, guarantees.
Cap table for warrant calculation, option pool.
IP schedule, list of assets that will secure the loan.
Lender proposals, comparison table, final loan and security agreement.
Need every file by stage? Use the startup data room checklist.
Must-have features.
| Provider | Viewer activity log | Dynamic watermarks | View-only and download control | Investor Q&A |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ellty | ||||
| iDeals | ||||
| SecureDocs | ||||
| Firmex | ||||
| Ansarada | ||||
| Datasite | ||||
| CapLinked | ||||
| Citrix ShareFile | ||||
| Intralinks | ||||
| Drooms |
- Viewer activity log
- Shows which investor opened which file, for how long and when, and exports the record.
- Dynamic watermarks
- Stamps the viewer email and the time across every page, so a forwarded screenshot points back to its source.
- View-only and download control
- Set each file to view only, print or download, and change it later without resending anything.
- Investor Q&A
- Funds and buyers ask questions against a file; you assign, answer and publish replies, and the thread stays on record.
Set up the room in 5 steps.
- 1
Talk to lenders soon after an equity round
Lenders are most comfortable when fresh equity is in the bank. Open the room while the round is recent.
- 2
Run a lien search
Order a UCC search so you know what lenders will see, and clear old liens from paid-off loans.
- 3
Show runway clearly
Model cash with and without the loan, including the repayment schedule after the interest-only period.
- 4
Compare term sheets in a table
Put rate, fees, warrant coverage, covenants, MAC and investor abandonment clauses side by side for the board.
- 5
Keep a separate group per lender
Each lender sees its own Q&A and documents, so proposals stay independent.
Common mistakes.
- Comparing lenders only on headline rate and ignoring covenants and warrant coverage.
- Drawing the full loan without a plan for the amortisation period.
- Old liens from a repaid equipment loan still on file at signing.