VC Sourcing Skills for Crunchbase MCP (Beta)

Download: crunchbase-vc-sourcing-portable-1.0.0-rc1.zip

Use the Crunchbase VC Sourcing Skills to turn Crunchbase data into repeatable workflows for market mapping, company discovery, financing research, meeting preparation, peer comparison, and saved-list management.

These skills are designed to support investment research. They do not replace commercial, technical, legal, financial, or other investment diligence.

What’s included

The collection contains five skills:

Thesis Landscape Builder: Discovers, segments, and prioritizes private companies aligned with an investment thesis.
Funding Signals Reviewer: Reviews recent financings or potential fundraising windows against an investment mandate.
Company Brief Preparer: Produces concise, Crunchbase-grounded meeting briefs for private companies.
Funding Intensity Analyzer: Compares disclosed funding amounts and financing activity across a defined company set.
Saved Lists Manager: Inspects, creates, monitors, and safely updates Crunchbase saved lists using canonical Crunchbase records.

Note: Funding Intensity Analyzer measures disclosed financing activity. It does not measure cash burn, runway, capital deployment, or capital efficiency unless those conclusions are supported by additional data.

What you’ll need

Before installing the skills, make sure you have:

The complete Crunchbase VC Sourcing portable collection ZIP
Access to ChatGPT, Claude, Perplexity Computer, or another platform that supports portable skills
An active, authenticated Crunchbase MCP connection in that platform
Access to the Crunchbase fields required by your workflow
Permission to upload and use custom skills, if managed by a workspace administrator

The collection ZIP contains five upload-ready skill ZIPs and their supporting resources. The skills define how the agent should conduct each workflow; the Crunchbase MCP provides the underlying data. Both must be available.

Available companies, fields, saved-list operations, and historical data may vary according to your Crunchbase package and permissions.

Installation Walkthrough

ChatGPT

Claude

Prepare the files

Download the complete collection ZIP.
Extract the outer ZIP.
Open the extracted skills folder.
Keep the five skill ZIPs inside that folder compressed.
Upload each inner ZIP separately to your AI platform.

Do not extract the five individual skill ZIPs before uploading them.

Install the skills

ChatGPT

Open ChatGPT.
Select Plugins in the sidebar.
Open the Skills tab.
Select +, then Upload from your computer.
Choose one ZIP from the extracted skills folder.
Wait for it to be scanned and installed.
Repeat for the other four ZIPs.
Confirm that all five skills are available.

If uploading is unavailable, ask your workspace administrator whether skills and user-uploaded skills are enabled for your role.

For more information, see Skills in ChatGPT.

Claude

Open Claude and go to Customize → Skills.
Select Add or +.
Select Create skill, then Upload a skill.
Choose one ZIP from the extracted skills folder.
Confirm that the skill appears and is enabled.
Repeat for the other four ZIPs.

Perplexity

Open Perplexity Computer.
Go to the Skills page.
Select Create skill, then Upload a skill.
Choose one ZIP from the extracted skills folder.
Confirm that it appears under My Skills.
Repeat for the other four ZIPs.

The supplied skill ZIPs include the required SKILL.md files and supporting resources. Confirm that each file complies with the platform’s current upload-size limit.

Connect the Crunchbase MCP

Make sure the Crunchbase MCP is enabled and authenticated in the same platform where the skills are installed.

Verify your installation

Run this simple read-only test before trying the full workflows:

Use Crunchbase to verify that the MCP connection is working. Resolve Anthropic using anthropic.com and return its canonical Crunchbase name, website domain, Crunchbase identifier or profile link, and most recently announced funding round. Distinguish missing information from information reported as undisclosed.

A successful result should identify the company unambiguously and retrieve its financing data. If the agent cannot access Crunchbase or does not use the expected skill, see Troubleshooting below.

Use the skills

For more reliable routing, name both Crunchbase and the intended skill:

Use the Crunchbase Thesis Landscape Builder skill to…

When referencing known companies, provide their website domains. When timing matters, provide an absolute date.

Unless otherwise requested, outputs should:

Identify companies using their domain and canonical Crunchbase record
Distinguish retrieved facts, calculated metrics, and investment interpretation
Label missing or undisclosed values rather than estimate them
Explain important inclusion and exclusion decisions
State material data limitations
Avoid implying that results are exhaustive unless exhaustiveness was verified

Starter prompts

The following prompts test common investor workflows in a fresh session with an authenticated Crunchbase MCP connection.

Thesis Landscape Builder

Use this skill to discover, segment, and prioritize private companies matching an investment thesis.

Use the Crunchbase Thesis Landscape skill to identify up to 25 US seed and Series A companies providing software to independent dental practices. Segment the companies by primary workflow and identify the five strongest matches.

Use the Crunchbase Thesis Landscape skill to identify private European companies founded since 2020 that provide AI software to banks and insurers and have raised no more than $30 million. Organize the companies by use case and identify the five strongest matches.

Funding Signals Reviewer

Use this skill to review financing activity and prioritize companies against an investment mandate.

Use the Crunchbase Funding Signals skill to review US seed rounds announced from August 4 through September 3, 2026 for cybersecurity companies serving mid-market businesses. Prioritize rounds below $12 million and rank the companies by relevance.

Use the Crunchbase Funding Signals skill to identify US seed and Series A cybersecurity companies that last raised funding from March 3, 2024 through September 3, 2025 and have raised no more than $25 million in total. Rank the companies for investor review.

Use the Crunchbase Funding Signals skill to review Series A and Series B rounds announced from June 5 through September 3, 2026 for European climate-software companies. Rank the companies against an enterprise-software investment mandate.

Company Brief Preparer

Use this skill to prepare for meetings with private companies. Include the company’s website domain to resolve the correct Crunchbase record.

Use the Crunchbase Company Brief skill and only Crunchbase to prepare a concise pre-meeting brief on Contextual AI, using contextual.ai to resolve the company. Cover its business, financing history, leadership, peers, risks, and questions to discuss during the meeting.

Use the Crunchbase Company Brief skill and only Crunchbase to prepare an investment-partner briefing on Reka AI, using reka.ai to resolve the company. Cover its positioning, funding history, investors, leadership, acquisitions, and competitors.

Use the Crunchbase Company Brief skill and only Crunchbase to prepare a follow-up meeting brief on Encord, using encord.com to resolve the company. Focus on its financing history, leadership, market categories, and peers. End with five questions for the next meeting.

Capital Intensity Analyzer

Use this skill to compare funding and financing activity across a confirmed set of private companies.

Use the Crunchbase Capital Intensity skill to compare funding activity across Together AI (together.ai), Fireworks AI (fireworks.ai), and Baseten (baseten.co). Compare the 12 months ending September 1, 2026 with the preceding 12 months.

Use the Crunchbase Capital Intensity skill to compare Poolside (poolside.ai), Contextual AI (contextual.ai), Reka AI (reka.ai), and Unstructured Technologies (unstructured.io). Compare total funding, financing cadence, median round size, and capital raised during the 24 months ending September 1, 2026.

Understanding the results

Results may differ between runs or change over time because Crunchbase records are continually updated.

For reproducible analysis:

Use an explicit as-of date
Define exact date windows
Specify whether limits apply to disclosed funding only
State how undisclosed rounds and missing values should be treated
Request a fixed maximum result count
Ask whether the result is exhaustive or a ranked sample

A company absent from the results does not necessarily fail the thesis. It may be missing data, classified differently, outside the user’s entitlements, or excluded by the requested criteria.

Troubleshooting

The agent does not use the expected skill

Confirm that the skill is installed and enabled. Name it directly:

Use the Crunchbase Thesis Landscape Builder skill to…

If the agent still selects the wrong workflow, start a fresh session and retry with the explicit skill name.

The agent cannot resolve a company

Provide both the company name and its website domain. Do not ask the agent to infer or invent a domain.

For ambiguous matches, ask the agent to show the candidates and wait for your selection before continuing.

The agent cannot access Crunchbase

Confirm that:

The MCP is enabled in the current platform
Authentication is complete
The MCP and skills are available to the same agent or workspace
Your account includes access to the requested fields
Your administrator has enabled the relevant capabilities

The workflow returns no companies

Ask the agent to report which filter removed candidates and whether the result was caused by:

No matching Crunchbase records
Missing or undisclosed data
Classification differences
Account entitlements
A tool or query limitation

Do not automatically broaden the thesis without user approval.

Results differ over time

Crunchbase records, funding events, categories, leadership information, and saved-list membership may change.

The output overstates its conclusions

Ask the agent to separate:

Retrieved Crunchbase facts
Metrics calculated from those facts
Investment interpretations or hypotheses
Questions requiring additional diligence