Dealroom

Dealroom was the product of a build-a-thon I competed in during April 2025. The prompt was to address a key issue startups face on their path to success.

Our Idea: To design an investor–startup matchmaking platform that allows investors to effortlessly scroll through startups, place bids, and track opportunities while giving founders a space to pitch their startups and gain visibility.

Problem Space

Finding investment opportunities is often inefficient and biased. Investors struggle to discover unique, high-potential startups outside their networks, while founders face barriers in visibility and credibility.

Ideation

Brainstorming began with identifing pain points on both sides:

1. Founders struggle with visibility and credible exposure.

2. Investors spend too much time filtering through irrelevant startups.

Design

Visuals

Dealroom’s design draws inspiration from card dealing and auction aesthetics. The “card” metaphor represents each startup as a distinct, valuable entity in the marketplace, much like a hand of cards in a strategic game.

• Maroon conveys sophistication, reliability, and professionalism.
• Gold accents evoke value and prestige.

UX Considerations

• Card layout improves visual hierarchy, enabling investors to digest startup information quickly.
• Interactive elements are highlighted with gold to naturally draw attention.

Key Targets

• Investors value visual summaries and performance metrics over text-heavy decks.
• Founders want analytics showing engagement and investor activity.
• Personalization (based on industry, stage, and funding size) increases investor retention.

In targeting these two user groups, we needed to design two different views - the Founder side and the Investor side.

Core Features - Founders

• Simple, guided flow to upload pitch videos, funding goals, and metrics.
• Dashboard: Visual analytics for views, investor saves, and bids received.
• AI Personalization: Help founders fine tune their pitch videos to better target Investors.

Core Features - Investors

• Infinite scroll layout highlighting key startup data at a glance.
• Filter by industry, traction, or funding stage.
• Bid Interaction: Place offers or express interest with one tap.

Reflection

Working on Dealroom reinforced the importance of designing for multiple user perspectives. Balancing the needs of investors and startup founders taught me to prioritize clarity, hierarchy, and actionable insights in the interface. I learned how to translate complex workflows into an intuitive, visually engaging experience. Additionally, the designathon setting emphasized iterative problem-solving under time constraints, improving both my decision-making and collaboration skills. Overall, this project strengthened my ability to create user-centered, high-impact digital solutions that address real-world challenges.