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Frontrun stealth builders: startups flagged before they announced a raise

Companies Frontrun VC flagged before their funding was public, crypto first and then all sectors, with how many days early each was flagged, smart-follow counts, and how to pull the list from the Recent Funding API.

Cover image: Frontrun stealth builders: startups flagged before they announced a raise
ByRecent Funding
Published
Data snapshot
Tagscryptofrontrunstealthsmart followsapi

Frontrun VC watches which investors and founders follow new accounts on X, and flags startups before they announce a round. Recent Funding imports Frontrun's records alongside its crypto fundraising sources, and the API now returns Frontrun's signals on every company. This post covers what those signals are, which companies have them in the snapshot of September 26, 2026, and how to query them.

The short version on coverage: 112 of 1575 companies have a days_early figure, but only 4 of the 553 crypto companies do. Crypto comes first below, but 4 companies are a list, not a trend, so the post also covers all sectors.

What "flagged" and "smart follows" mean

Every number here is Frontrun's. Recent Funding stores it as Frontrun reported it and does not recompute it.

FieldMeaning
flagged_atThe earliest date Frontrun flagged the company
days_earlyDays between Frontrun's flag and the raise becoming public
smart_followsHow many of the investors and founders Frontrun tracks follow the company's X account
new_follows_7dNew follows from those tracked accounts in the last 7 days
trending_rankPosition in Frontrun's trending list, when the company is on it (1 is the top)

You can check days_early against the rest of the record. For 107 of the 112 companies, it equals the number of days from flagged_at to the date of the company's latest round on Recent Funding. The rest are Aalo Atomics, Liquid Compute, Ouinex, Project Eleven and StableStock. For these, Recent Funding's latest round is probably a different round or date from the one Frontrun measured. Use /api/v1/companies/{slug} to see every round.

Where the fields come from matters for coverage. In this snapshot, every company with days_early came from Frontrun's site feed (the frontrun-site source), and every company with smart_follows came from Frontrun's startup database (frontrun-startupdb). Most crypto companies on Recent Funding come from Dropstab, CoinCarp and Crypto-Fundraising.info instead, and those sources carry no Frontrun signals. That is why crypto coverage is thin:

SourceCompanies
Dropstab (dropstab)181
accel:mvb (accel:mvb)178
accel:longhashx (accel:longhashx)49
accel:xrpl (accel:xrpl)49
CoinCarp (coincarp)37
accel-watch:orange (accel-watch:orange)22
accel:superteam-usa (accel:superteam-usa)21
accel:antler (accel:antler)18
Crypto-Fundraising.info (crypto-fundraising)17
Frontrun VC startup database (frontrun-startupdb)13
accel:base-batches (accel:base-batches)8
accel:seedcamp (accel:seedcamp)7
pipeline (pipeline)7
Frontrun VC on X (frontrun-tweet)5
Frontrun VC site (frontrun-site)4
accel-watch:pnp (accel-watch:pnp)3
accel-watch:superteam-black (accel-watch:superteam-black)3
accel:skydeck (accel:skydeck)2
accel-watch:colosseum (accel-watch:colosseum)1
accel-watch:solana-incubator (accel-watch:solana-incubator)1
accel-watch:superteam-usa (accel-watch:superteam-usa)1
accel:pear (accel:pear)1

Crypto companies Frontrun flagged

14 crypto companies have a Frontrun flag date. 4 of them also have a days_early figure, and 13 have a smart-follow count. Here is every one, most days early first:

#CompanyIndustryFlaggedDays earlySmart followsLatest roundAnnounced
1Sapiomai-agents18051$35M
2Cari Networkdefi168n/a$32.5M
3MNXinfra-devtools15320$6.4M
4River Marketstrading-markets11724$8.5M
5BlockRunAIdefin/a15n/an/a
6EQX Labstrading-marketsn/a11n/an/a
7Nesaain/a11n/an/a
8nightowlai_ai-agentsn/a6n/an/a
9Orbioinfra-devtoolsn/a38$21M
10Sugarfintechn/a18n/a
11Tenordefin/a17$2.5M
12USD.AIpayments-stablecoinsn/a64$40M
13Vangridinfra-devtoolsn/a10$9M
14Yotta Labsinfra-devtoolsn/a9n/an/a

Sapiom was flagged 180 days before its round was public, the longest lead among crypto companies. Cari Network follows at 168 days, then MNX at 153 and River Markets at 117. USD.AI has the most smart follows among crypto companies (64) but no days_early figure.

A missing days_early does not mean Frontrun was late. It means Frontrun's record for the company has no such figure.

All sectors: how early were companies flagged?

Across all 112 companies with a figure, days_early ranges from 7 to 225 days.

days earlyCompanies
0–2921
30–5925
60–8916
90–11916
120–14911
150–17915
180–2096
210+2

This counts only companies whose raise became public. A company Frontrun flagged that never announced a round has no days_early, so the table says nothing about how often a flag leads to a raise.

The largest leads

#CompanyCryptoIndustryFlaggedDays earlySmart followsLatest roundAnnounced
1QFEXnotrading-markets225n/a$9.5M
2Orthogonal (YC W26)noai21325$4.3M
3Gonkanogaming20618$50M
4Outcomenofintech19925n/a
5ZeroDriftnosecurity-privacy199n/a$10M
6Starcloudnoinfra-devtools184n/a$250M
7MatXnotrading-markets183n/a$500M
8Sapiomyesai-agents18051$35M
9Previewnoconsumer-social17517$12M
10Glintnodata-analytics172n/a$580K
11Cari Networkyesdefi168n/a$32.5M
12Crebitnofintech168n/a$4M
13frontrunnotrading-markets166106$18.5M
14sazabinogaming166n/a$8M
15Ornnnogaming16261$33M
16Smack Technologiesnoother162n/a$61M
17naturalpaynopayments-stablecoins159n/a$30M
18pumpcadenogaming156n/a$5M
19Humanoidnorobotics-hardware155n/a$152M
20Gimlet Labsnoai15327$300M
21MNXyesinfra-devtools15320$6.4M
22Weave Roboticsnorobotics-hardware153n/an/a
23smallest.ainoai1505$13M
24kashnopayments-stablecoins149n/a$2M
25Andon Labsnoai14737$500K

QFEX leads at 225 days, followed by Orthogonal (YC W26) at 213 and Gonka at 206.

Two things to keep in mind when reading this list:

Smart follows

742 companies have a smart-follow count, from 3 to 196 tracked accounts. Only 13 of them are crypto companies. 42 companies have both a smart-follow count and a days_early figure.

smart followsCompanies
0–436
5–9314
10–24261
25–4997
50–9928
100+6

The most-followed companies:

#CompanyCryptoIndustryFlaggedDays earlySmart followsLatest roundAnnounced
1TypeSafe AInoain/a196n/an/a
2Pearl Research Labsnoain/a169n/an/a
3Discovery Loopnoain/a136n/an/a
4entropy.ionoinfra-devtools98132$14M
5frontrunnotrading-markets166106$18.5M
6worldnotrading-marketsn/a104$52.5M
7Open Standardnopayments-stablecoinsn/a92n/an/a
8Honenoain/a74n/an/a
9Parallel Web Systemsnoain/a73$100M
10Sail Researchnodata-analytics6272$80M
11Pluralis Researchnoain/a70n/an/a
12rialtonodefin/a69n/an/a
13Silicon Datanoinfra-devtoolsn/a68$30.5M
14Wafernoai13867$40M
15Prime Intellectnoain/a65$130M

A high count shows that many of the accounts Frontrun tracks follow a company. It does not show why they follow it, and following is not investing. 15 companies have a trending_rank and a 7-day follow count (15 with new_follows_7d). Of those, 1 is crypto: Tare.

Pull this from the API

The API sorts by the new fields, with companies that lack a value last. It has no "has a value" filter, so stop reading when the field turns null.

Crypto companies, most days early first. The first record, trimmed to the signal fields:

curl "https://recentfunding.com/api/v1/companies?crypto=true&sort=days_early&limit=20"
{
  "slug": "sapiom",
  "flagged_at": "2026-02-06",
  "days_early": 180,
  "smart_follows": 51,
  "new_follows_7d": null,
  "trending_rank": null
}

All sectors, most days early first. Page with offset for more than 200:

curl "https://recentfunding.com/api/v1/companies?sort=days_early&limit=200"

Most smart follows, crypto only, then all sectors:

curl "https://recentfunding.com/api/v1/companies?crypto=true&sort=smart_follows&limit=20"
curl "https://recentfunding.com/api/v1/companies?sort=smart_follows&limit=50"

In JavaScript, keep only rows with a value:

const res = await fetch("https://recentfunding.com/api/v1/companies?sort=days_early&limit=200");
const { companies } = await res.json();
const flagged = companies.filter(c => c.days_early != null);

The API docs list every field and sort, and The crypto startup API walks through the other crypto endpoints.