Twelve Below is a New York-based pre-seed and seed fund founded by two partners who had already co-led breakout deals like Mirror and K Health together for a decade before starting the firm, operating with an intentionally small fund size and making only 25 core investments per fund at 10-15% ownership stakes. The fund refuses the modern VC platform model by having the two founding partners handle all work directly rather than routing founders through operating staff, positioning themselves as "first true partners" who provide the very first institutional check to courageous founders with secret insights in software-enabled businesses across fintech, health, energy, and consumer sectors.