Recall Capital

# Recall Capital: Hands-On Pre-Seed Venture Capital for B2B Founders

High-Level Overview

Recall Capital is a pre-seed venture capital firm that operates with a distinctive hands-on philosophy: backing founders not just with capital, but with direct operational support to accelerate their path to product-market fit and repeatable revenue.[1][3] Founded in 2023 and based in San Francisco, the firm focuses exclusively on early-stage B2B companies across enterprise SaaS, fintech, and infrastructure sectors.[1][4]

The firm's mission centers on a fundamental belief that pre-seed founders need more than money—they need tactical execution support, go-to-market (GTM) guidance, and access to networks of experienced operators. Rather than adopting a passive capital allocation model, Recall Capital positions itself as an active partner that "rolls up its sleeves" to help founders refine messaging, generate pipeline, and unblock deals from day zero.[3] This operating-first approach reflects a recognition that the gap between having a product and achieving repeatable revenue is where most early-stage companies struggle most acutely.

Origin Story

Recall Capital was founded in 2023 by Sarah and Somrat Niyogi, two entrepreneurs with deep experience in early-stage scaling and revenue operations.[1] Somrat's background is particularly instructive: he has worked at six companies where he authored the first sales pitch deck, built two startups as CEO and co-founder, and held executive roles at high-growth companies including Salesforce, Clari, and Gusto.[4] This résumé reveals the firm's founding DNA—operators who have lived through the messy, non-linear journey of taking a product from zero to market fit.

The Niyogis' decision to launch a pre-seed fund rather than start another company reflects a deliberate pivot toward force-multiplying their expertise across a portfolio of founders. Having personally experienced the friction points that derail early-stage companies, they built Recall Capital to systematically address those pain points for others. The firm invests between $300K and $1M per company at the pre-seed stage, positioning itself as a meaningful first institutional check that comes with genuine operational partnership.[4]

Core Differentiators

Hands-On GTM Execution Model

Unlike traditional venture firms that provide quarterly check-ins and introductions, Recall Capital operates a structured GTM support program. The firm runs demand generation initiatives, hosts buyer dinners, generates warm leads, and provides personalized coaching on messaging refinement and deal execution.[3] This is not advisory work—it is direct execution alongside founders, which materially accelerates early traction.

Specialized Network of Operators

The firm has deliberately built a network of expert operators and founders across sales, marketing, and revenue operations who actively advise portfolio companies.[3] This network serves as a competitive moat; founders gain access not just to capital but to a curated group of practitioners who have solved similar problems at scale.

Focus on Revenue Fundamentals

While many pre-seed investors chase product innovation or technology differentiation, Recall Capital's thesis centers on revenue mechanics. The firm explicitly targets companies that can demonstrate customer empathy, product evangelism, and execution traction—the unglamorous but essential ingredients of sustainable growth.[2] This focus on repeatable revenue streams over vanity metrics reflects a mature understanding of what actually predicts startup success.

Concentrated Sector Expertise

By limiting investment to B2B enterprise SaaS, fintech, and infrastructure, the firm develops deep pattern recognition within these verticals. This specialization allows the partners to provide more targeted GTM advice and leverage their networks more effectively than generalist investors.[4]

Role in the Broader Tech Landscape

Recall Capital arrives at a critical inflection point in venture capital. The 2020s have witnessed a consolidation of capital at the Series A stage and beyond, leaving a funding gap for pre-seed companies that have product-market signals but lack repeatable revenue. Traditional angel investors often lack the operational bandwidth to help; traditional VCs view pre-seed as too early and too risky.

Recall Capital fills this gap by recognizing that pre-seed is not a capital problem—it is an execution problem. The firm is riding the broader trend toward "operator-led" venture capital, where LPs increasingly value fund managers who can actively contribute to portfolio company success rather than passively allocate capital. This shift reflects hard lessons from the 2022 downturn, when many companies with strong capital raises but weak GTM fundamentals collapsed.

The firm's emphasis on B2B SaaS and fintech also positions it at the intersection of two powerful trends: the ongoing enterprise software consolidation (where vertical SaaS and specialized tools continue to displace legacy platforms) and the fintech revolution (where regulatory clarity and API-first infrastructure are enabling new financial services companies to scale rapidly).

By demonstrating that pre-seed founders can achieve meaningful traction with the right operational support, Recall Capital influences how the broader ecosystem thinks about early-stage value creation. The firm's portfolio—which includes companies like Relay (modern banking for small businesses), Finch (unified payroll API), and Contextual AI (enterprise RAG platform)—reflects bets on infrastructure and vertical solutions that will likely define the next generation of B2B software.[5]

Quick Take & Future Outlook

Recall Capital is well-positioned to become a recognizable brand in pre-seed venture capital, particularly among founders who value execution support over passive capital. The firm's track record—seven investments as of April 2025, with recent checks into companies like TeamOhana—suggests a disciplined deployment strategy and the ability to source quality deal flow.[2]

Looking forward, the firm's influence will likely expand in two directions. First, as portfolio companies mature and achieve Series A funding, Recall Capital will build a track record of successful exits and follow-on investments, which will attract higher-quality founders and stronger LPs. Second, the firm's GTM playbook may become a template that other pre-seed investors adopt, effectively raising the bar for what founders should expect from their early institutional backers.

The broader question is whether Recall Capital's model—intensive operational support at the pre-seed stage—can scale without diluting the quality of partnership. If the firm can maintain its hands-on approach while growing its portfolio, it will have cracked a code that many venture firms have struggled with: how to be both a meaningful operator and a disciplined capital allocator. If the model breaks under scale, the firm will face pressure to either raise smaller funds or hire additional operating partners. Either way, Recall Capital's existence signals a market shift: the era of passive pre-seed capital is ending, and founders increasingly expect their investors to be co-builders in the journey to product-market fit and repeatable revenue.