Formula Insight

What do they actually do

Formula Insight provides a platform for institutional investors to centralize their Excel models, index them down to individual cells, and query them in plain English. Analysts can quickly find specific numbers or formulas across many spreadsheets and see the exact cells those answers came from YC American Bazaar.

The product links model values to external sources such as SEC filings, earnings transcripts, and consensus estimates, so users can verify provenance and compare their projections against market benchmarks. It also supports plotting and benchmarking within the same workspace, emphasizes traceability and security, and is live with sign‑ups and demos available YC American Bazaar Fondo.

Who are their target customer(s)

• Hedge-fund equity analyst building and updating Excel models: Spends hours hunting for the right cell or formula across many spreadsheets and needs fast retrieval with clear provenance. Cell-level indexing and links to filings/transcripts surface the number and its source.
• Portfolio manager reviewing analyst forecasts across a team: Cannot easily compare different analysts’ forecasts or see who changed assumptions, leading to inconsistent inputs to decisions. Benchmarking and projection-tracking make comparisons and change history visible.
• Small/boutique research team without formal data ops: Key models live on desktops and knowledge walks out the door, slowing onboarding and reuse. A centralized model repository and labeled cell database capture and preserve firm knowledge.
• Research-ops or data-engineering owner for model QA: Time is spent finding broken formulas, inconsistent assumptions, and reconciling spreadsheets to market data. Automated indexing and planned QA tooling reduce manual reconciliation and surface inconsistencies.
• Compliance or model-risk reviewer at an investment firm: Needs auditable evidence linking reported numbers back to filings/transcripts; manual tracing is slow and error-prone. The platform emphasizes traceability and secure handling of sensitive models.

How would they acquire their first 10, 50, and 100 customers

• First 10: Use founders’ Citadel/YC networks for warm introductions to 10 hedge-fund or asset‑manager research teams and run short pilots on 2–3 core models, capturing time saved, errors found, and written testimonials/case studies.
• First 50: Launch a referral program from early pilots and run targeted LinkedIn/email outreach to similar teams with a standardized evaluation package, ROI playbook, and security/compliance packet; add a senior sales/CS lead to convert and document repeatable wins.
• First 100: Publish case studies, run short webinars showing cell-level search and traceability, and add two channel partners (a market‑data vendor listing and a boutique research/consulting partner). Offer a low‑touch self‑service pilot for boutiques with standard legal/SLA and automated demo/report packs.

What is the rough total addressable market

Top-down context:

In the U.S., there are about 15,870 SEC‑registered investment advisers and roughly 3,700 hedge‑fund businesses, indicating a base of buy‑side accounts that maintain models IAA IBISWorld. Hedge‑fund AUM is ~$4.9T, and the broader analyst labor pool is large (U.S. financial analysts ≈ 429k), showing capacity and willingness to pay for time‑saving tools Preqin BLS.

Bottom-up calculation:

Model revenue as accounts × seats/account × ACV. Use adviser and hedge‑fund counts as the U.S. account base, then choose a realistic average of Excel‑heavy seats per firm (a subset of the BLS analyst pool) and multiply by planned seat pricing to get TAM IAA IBISWorld BLS.

Assumptions:

• Focus on buy‑side teams that actively build and maintain Excel models.
• SEC‑registered advisers are a proxy for U.S. account count; some entities overlap or are subsidiaries.
• Only a subset of the BLS ‘financial analysts’ category are target seats (equity analysts, PMs, research ops, compliance).

Who are some of their notable competitors

• FactSet: Enterprise data/analytics platform with spreadsheet integrations and consensus estimates; overlaps on benchmarking against market data and model-to-data connectivity for buy‑side teams.
• Visible Alpha: Provides standardized broker/consensus models and Excel integrations; addresses the ‘compare vs consensus’ use case many equity teams need.
• AlphaSense (incl. Sentieo): Financial research platform for document search across filings, transcripts, and research; complements/competes on linking numbers to primary sources.
• Workiva: Controls and compliance platform for financial reporting with spreadsheet traceability and audit trails; relevant where governance and auditability are key.
• Mitratech ClusterSeven: Spreadsheet risk management and discovery used in financial services to inventory and control critical spreadsheets; overlaps on governance and audit needs for Excel estates.