You find companies that just raised funding in three places: SEC Form D filings (free, filed within 15 days of the first sale), funding announcements on press wires, and funding databases such as Crunchbase. Scalelist does not sell a funding feed.
The company list comes from those sources; the part that wins the deal is reaching the one person who owns your problem, with a verified email and a mobile number, in the weeks after the round.
This guide shows where each signal comes from, how to qualify a round, who to contact at each company size, and the Lead Finder sentence to copy at the end.
Where do you find companies that just raised funding?
Companies that just raised funding show up first in regulatory filings, then in announcements, then in databases that collect both. In the US, the filing is SEC Form D, which a company raising under Regulation D must file within 15 days after the first sale of securities.
Announcements and databases add what the filing lacks: the round name (seed, Series A), the investors and what the money is for. Use the filing to be early and the announcement to be relevant. Funding is one of several sales trigger events; it is the one with the clearest date.
Where to find recently funded startups: 3 sources
A recently funded startups list is only as good as its source. Here is what each one gives you and what it misses.
SEC Form D filings (free, US)
Form D is a short notice filed on the SEC’s EDGAR system. It lists the company, its address, the names of its executive officers and directors, an industry group, the date of the first sale and the total amount sold (SEC Form D).
Two ways to search it for free:
- EDGAR full-text search: pick the form type D and a date range such as the last 30 days, then add a keyword such as “software” or a city (EDGAR full-text search FAQ).
- EDGAR latest filings: the running list of new filings, which you can narrow to form type D and read daily (SEC latest Form D filings).
Funding announcements and press releases
Search the newswires (PR Newswire, Business Wire, GlobeNewswire) and news for phrases like “raises” plus “Series A” plus your industry. The announcement usually names the investors and often says what the money is for, such as “to expand its sales team”. That sentence is your opening line.
Crunchbase and other funding databases
Crunchbase collects rounds into one searchable list. Paid Crunchbase customers can search funding rounds by funding type, money raised, announced date, the company’s industry and location, and investors (Crunchbase funding round definitions). Use it when you want to find funded startups by stage and investor. For how it compares with a contact database, see ZoomInfo vs Crunchbase.
How to read a Form D in two minutes
A Form D answers four questions: is this a real operating company, who runs it, when did the round start, and how big is it. Everything else you can ignore.
- Item 3, related persons: the executive officers and directors by name. At a startup under 20 people, the first executive officer is usually the founder you want.
- Item 4, industry group: skip “Pooled Investment Fund”. Those are investors raising money, not companies spending it.
- Item 7, type of filing: a new notice is a new round. An amendment (D/A) updates an old one.
- Item 13, amount sold: the round size so far. Form D has no “Series A” label, so read size and headcount together.
In the 70 Form D and D/A filings posted on EDGAR on 25 September 2026, 50 claimed an Investment Company Act Section 3(c) exclusion, which means funds, feeder vehicles and special purpose vehicles, and 29 were amendments (our count from the SEC feed). Skim before you import anything: most of the feed is not a lead.
How to qualify a company that just raised
Qualify a funded company on fit first and money second. A round at a company outside your ideal customer profile is noise with a press release.
Check five things before it goes on your list:
- Fit: industry, size and location match the customers you already win.
- Round size against your price: a 1.5 million USD seed round will not fund a 60,000 USD annual contract.
- Use of funds: the announcement quote and the careers page. Nine open sales roles tell you more than the press release. For that signal on its own, see how to find companies that are hiring.
- Recency: a first sale or announcement in the last 30 to 60 days. Older rounds are often already spoken for.
- Reachability: a working website and domain. No domain, no verified email.
Who to contact at a company that just raised
The right contact depends on company size, not on the round. Pick one primary contact and one backup per company.
- Under about 20 employees: the founder or CEO. They sign everything, and Form D usually names them.
- About 20 to 100 employees: the head of the function you sell into (VP of Sales, Head of Marketing, Head of People, VP of Engineering). They own the new budget line.
- Over 100 employees: the director who owns the problem day to day, with the VP as the backup.
If the round brings a new executive, wait for them; new leaders set their plans early. See how to find new executives in their first 90 days.
How to turn funded companies into people you can call
A company list becomes a call list in four steps. Scalelist handles steps 2 and 3 and charges only for what it finds.
1. Put every round in one sheet
One row per company: name, website domain, city, date of first sale or announcement, amount, and the executive officers from Form D.
2. Find emails and mobiles for the names you already have
Upload the names and company domains to the Scalelist Email Finder for verified work emails, then to the Mobile Finder for mobile numbers. Each email comes back Valid, Risky or Not found.
3. Find the person for each role you still need
When you need a VP of Sales and the filing only names the CEO, find the role. In Claude, the Scalelist MCP server takes the company names and the title and returns the people. To work a whole segment instead of one week’s rounds, describe it in Scalelist Lead Finder: it shows what it understood and how many people match before you spend a credit.
4. Reach out within the first weeks
Email and call the same day. The mobile number is what separates you from the other vendors who only have the email.
Credit math for 40 funded companies with 2 contacts each: 80 leads (80 credits), 80 emails at most (80 credits) and 80 mobiles at most (1,600 credits), so 1,760 credits in the worst case. Misses cost 0, so the real number is lower. That fits the Scaler 2K plan at 89 USD a month (Scalelist pricing).
Upload the founders from this week’s Form D filings and get their verified emails and mobiles.
Find your first 20 contactsExample: an email and a call opener for a funded startup
Here is a real-feeling example. Ledgerline, a fractional finance firm in Denver, sells to startups that just raised. Brightline Robotics in Austin filed a Form D for 12 million USD and lists 9 open roles. Both companies are fictional.
Hi Maya,
Saw Brightline closed a 12M USD round this month and has 9 roles open. At that hiring pace, payroll and the month-end close tend to land on the CEO's desk.
Ledgerline runs finance for robotics and hardware startups in Texas. We take the close, payroll and the board pack off the founder within 30 days.
Worth 15 minutes on Tuesday or Wednesday?
Jordan Hale, Ledgerline
Why it works: it names what the money is for (hiring), not the money itself, and it asks a yes or no question. For more openers, see our cold call opening lines.
Common challenges with funding signals (and the fix)
The feed is mostly funds
Fix: ignore the “Pooled Investment Fund” industry group and names with “Fund”, “LP”, “SPV” or “a series of”. What is left is short enough to read.
Everyone pitches the same founder the same week
Fix: skip the congratulations. Lead with one specific use of the money you can see (open roles, a new office, a product launch) and call as well as email.
The announcement never comes
Fix: many companies never announce. Form D and the careers page tell you the round happened, and that is enough to start.
The round is old news
Fix: work from the date of first sale or the announced date, and drop anything older than about 60 days unless the company is hiring into your area.
What to look for in a tool for this workflow
The signal source and the contact data are two different jobs. For the contact side, look for a tool that:
- Finds mobile numbers, not only emails, because founders of small companies answer their mobile.
- Verifies every email and shows a status before you send.
- Charges only when it finds something, so a list of 40 companies does not cost you 40 misses.
- Understands a role in plain English, including company size and industry.
For how funding compares with other signals by shelf life, see buying signals data and the full list of B2B buying signals.
How Scalelist helps
Scalelist, an AI Lead Finder, turns a list of funded companies into people with verified work emails and mobile numbers. It finds and verifies contact details on demand rather than serving a pre-compiled list.
Your Lead Finder sentence
Lead Finder does not know who raised money last week; your Form D list does. What Lead Finder does is size and pull the segment where your funded accounts live, so you know the ceiling before you spend a credit.
On 27 September 2026, Scalelist matched over 22,000 founders and CEOs at US software companies with 11 to 50 employees. Only a small slice of them raised money this month. The filing tells you which.
Heads of Sales at US fintech companies with 20 to 100 employees
VPs of Engineering at US healthcare technology companies with 50 to 200 employees
Paste one of these sentences into Lead Finder and see the count before you spend a credit.
Describe your buyer in one sentenceFAQ
How do I find companies that just raised funding for free?
Use SEC EDGAR. Companies raising under Regulation D must file a Form D within 15 days after the first sale, and EDGAR full-text search lets you pick form type D and a date range for free. Add newswire searches for “raises” plus “Series A” to catch the announcements and the investors.
Does every funded startup file a Form D?
No. Form D covers offerings under Regulation D, so a company that raises under another exemption will not appear, and some file late. Rounds raised entirely outside the US do not show up either. Treat Form D as the earliest free source, then fill gaps with announcements and a funding database such as Crunchbase.
Is there a free recently funded startups list?
The closest thing is the SEC’s own list of new Form D filings, which is free but mixed with investment funds. Newswires are free to search. Structured databases such as Crunchbase give full funding-round search to paid customers. Whichever you use, add a date column and drop rounds older than about 60 days.
Who should I contact at a company that just raised?
Contact the founder or CEO at companies under about 20 employees, and the head of the function you sell into above that. At companies over 100 people, start with the director who owns the problem and keep the VP as the backup. Form D lists the executive officers by name, which covers the smallest companies.
How soon should I reach out after a funding round?
Within the first two to four weeks is a good target. The company is planning how to spend the money and has not signed every vendor yet. Rounds older than about 60 days are usually committed, unless the company is hiring into the area you sell to.
Does Scalelist sell a list of funded companies?
No. Scalelist does not sell funding, hiring or leadership-change feeds. You bring the company list from Form D, announcements or a funding database, and Scalelist finds the right people with verified work emails and mobile numbers: 1 credit per email found, 20 per mobile found, nothing for a miss.
Sources
- SEC: Filing a Form D notice
- SEC: Form D and item-by-item instructions (PDF)
- SEC: EDGAR full-text search FAQ
- SEC: EDGAR latest filings, form type D
- Crunchbase Knowledge Center: Funding Rounds definitions
- Scalelist people count (POST /api/v1/people/count), queried 27 September 2026, 0 credits.
