Undercover VC |🦄 The Unicorns

Plus: 🚨 Why 78% of SaaS Reps Missed Quota in H1

Author

Rafe Houston
July 09, 2025

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Welcome to Undercover VC — your inside track on how today’s top investors and operators are building high-performance, venture-backed businesses. Each edition delivers sharp, actionable insights on GTM strategy, capital efficiency, and portfolio execution across B2B SaaS, fintech, and AI. Built for VCs, operating partners, and scale-stage founders who want to win smarter — not just bigger.

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TODAY’S PICK 🎯

A Q&A on What Broke in H1 and How a Sales Operating System Can Fix It in H2

Nearly 50% of SaaS companies missed revenue targets in Q1 2025. And 78% of reps missed quota.

That’s not a rough patch. It’s a system failure. In this Q&A, we unpack:

  • Why data alone isn’t enough to drive action

  • What happens when strategy has no execution layer

  • How companies like Fospha are turning it around with a Sales Operating System

If you’re relying on dashboards and headcount to fix performance, H2 will look like H1.

📣LEADING VOICES 

AI Is A Great Leveller But Only If We Let It Be

Age, race, background, fancy titles.... AI should remove the gatekeepers. The only real barrier I’ve felt? ⏱️ Time

As a CEO, mum of three, mid-renovation and recovering from a health scare, I’ve had to be deliberate about not getting left behind. Here’s how I’m staying in the game (and hopefully ahead of it):

💡 1. Mindset reset
This isn’t a side project. It’s business critical: I block time weekly to experiment with MCP and push myself to apply AI across every part of my role from board prep to sales coaching.
🧠 2. Make it visible: We hold weekly stand-ups where the team shares how they’re using AI from product builds to day-to-day work hacks. We learn faster when we learn together.
 🚀 3. Build in public: Every time I test a prompt, get an output that saves me time, or I hit a wall, I share it with the team. Transparency creates momentum. It also makes it okay to fail fast. 📈 4. Start with the job to be done

There’s too much AI for AI’s sake. I focus on jobs I already do, building decks, researching prospects, coaching reps and ask: how could AI do 80% of this?

If you lead a team, the pace you move is the pace they move. Don’t watch from the side lines. Get your hands dirty.

INDUSTRY NEWS 🌐

PitchBook's unicorn tracker identifies venture-backed companies valued at over $1 billion. As of July 2025, there are 1,489 active unicorns worldwide, with the US leading in count. This tool aids investors in understanding market dynamics and potential high-yield opportunities. Press on the caption above to see the full list.

Surge AI, a competitor to Scale AI, is raising up to $1 billion to expand its premium data-labeling services. It aims for a $15 billion valuation, seizing opportunities from Scale AI's customer losses. Major clients like Google and OpenAI are drawn to its sophisticated offerings.

Reuters

Blockchain and AI developments fuel the crypto industry's $136.8M venture funding despite market challenges. Notable investments in decentralized finance and payment services highlight blockchain's potential in bridging digital and traditional finance sectors. Companies like Rails and Beam are focusing on hybrid models and compliance to enhance industry functionality and global expansion.

AI startups in the UK secured $2.4bn in venture capital in early 2025, comprising 30% of all VC deals, a record for the sector. This significant funding highlights the growing importance and impact of AI innovations across fields like medicine and logistics, bolstering the UK's tech leadership in Europe. By focusing on numerous sectors and geographical areas, the diversity of the UK's AI ecosystem is broadening, offering promising opportunities for future growth.

UKTN

CRED, an AI-powered predictive intelligence platform, secured $15 million in seed funding to enhance its product and expand operations. The funding, led by defy.vc, will support CRED's aim to provide real-time insights and personalized recommendations, crucial for enhancing enterprise productivity.