Immigrant founders have built some of the world’s most valuable companies, but many still face barriers that make it harder to get a startup off the ground. Visa restrictions, limited access to friends-and-family capital, shallow networks, and a venture industry built around pattern matching can keep promising founders from getting funded before they have a chance to prove themselves.
In this episode of Build Mode, host Isabelle Johannessen sits down with Manan Mehta, co-founder and managing partner of Unshackled Ventures, to talk about why he believes immigrant founders represent one of venture capital’s biggest overlooked opportunities. Manan breaks down how Unshackled built an investment model designed to help founders navigate immigration barriers, why traditional VC pattern matching causes investors to miss potential outliers, and how his team evaluates founders at day zero — often before they have a product, customers, or traction. He also explains why the structural gaps that make some founders harder to fund may be exactly where investors should be looking for outsized returns.
They get into:
- The four structural barriers immigrant founders face when starting companies in the U.S.
- How Unshackled Ventures helps founders navigate visas while building their startups.
- Why VCs’ reliance on pattern matching can cause investors to miss outlier founders.
- How Manan evaluates founders before they have a product, customers, or traction.
- The IQ, AQ, EQ, and SQ framework Unshackled uses to evaluate founder potential.
- Why resilience, lived experience, and a founder’s relationship to the problem can matter more than a polished pitch.
- Why structural gaps can create some of the biggest opportunities for investors.
- How founders without traditional networks can find alternative paths to early capital.
- Why founders should understand their personal “why” instead of trying to fit the traditional VC mold.
