BASE ONE / FOUNDER RESOURCES

Define the next milestone before fundraising

A practical milestone worksheet for early-stage founders. Connect the next business question to an outcome, budget and review date.

By Base One · 5 October 2026

Start with the uncertainty

Before deciding how to describe a funding ask, identify the business question you need to answer next. It might be whether a pilot customer will renew, whether a production version is reliable, or whether a second customer segment needs the product.

A milestone is an observable outcome. Hiring a salesperson is an activity; finding out whether a repeatable sales process works is an outcome. Name the evidence that would change your view.

Build a plan that can be reviewed

List the work, who owns it and the cost. Keep committed spending separate from optional experiments. Use your actual costs rather than a generic startup budget; state the currency, assumptions and date.

Question: what uncertainty are we reducing?
Outcome: what evidence would indicate progress?
Date: when will we review the result?
Resources: what work, people and cash are required?
Fallback: what changes if the test disappoints?

Explain what capital changes

Describe what your existing resources can achieve and which additional work depends on funding. If a customer can pay for a pilot, include that option in the plan. An investor should be able to see the connection between the money and the evidence it helps create.

For a Thailand-based team considering ASEAN expansion, a bounded customer test in one additional market can be easier to assess than a broad regional launch. State which market, why it is relevant and what result would justify expanding further. This worksheet is a planning aid, not a valuation or funding recommendation.

One-page milestone worksheet

Copy this into your own document and adapt it to your business.

Business question: [uncertainty]
Next milestone: [observable outcome]
Evidence: [how we will measure it]
Review date: [date]
Work and owner: [tasks / names]
Cost and currency: [amount / currency / assumptions]
Already available: [resources]
Additional funding would enable: [specific work]
If the result is weak: [what we change]

These guides help founders present evidence for a potential private-company investment. They are general preparation tools. They are not investment terms or a promise of funding.