Venture Studio Associate

Job Description:
There is an exciting opportunity for a Venture Studio Associate to join Onni Capital in Vancouver. Onni Capital is a new investment and company building platform within the Onni Group. Operating at the intersection of a venture studio, private equity firm, and family office, we build new companies, invest in exceptional founders, and pursue opportunities where Onni's capital, operating platform, real estate portfolio, and industry relationships create a meaningful advantage. Onni Capital is being built from the ground up with the speed, ambition, and working style of a technology company. Our team works across venture creation, technology, private investments, fund investments, and special opportunities.
This role exists to run a venture studio and write cheques, and it is one job rather than two.
Onni Studio is a twelve week programme built on the Onni brand. Founders get space, capital, operating support, shared services, and access to a real estate and operating platform that most early stage companies would never reach. In exchange, Onni takes equity. Cohorts run roughly twenty companies with cheques in the $50,000 to $100,000 range, ending in a demo day with industry guests and follow on capital.
Alongside the studio, Onni Capital writes direct venture cheques of roughly $250,000 to $2M into companies we do not operate. The mandate is broad, with a preference for proptech, construction technology, climate technology, fintech, and software where Onni's platform creates an advantage.
As Venture Studio Associate, you own the studio and you screen the direct investments. Nobody else is doing this job. You are the first hire into the Ventures pillar and you will build the programme rather than administer one that already exists.
Why Onni Capital
Most people who want to work in venture in Vancouver end up as an analyst, three layers from a decision, writing memos on companies someone else sourced. This is the opposite.
You will be the person founders deal with. You design the curriculum, choose the mentors, decide who gets into the cohort, and run the room on demo day. That is a founder facing job with a network that compounds fast.
Onni Capital invests its own capital. There is no fund clock and no external investment committee. If a studio company is working, we can keep backing it. If it is not, we can stop without a fund's optics driving the decision.
The platform behind you is genuinely unusual for an incubator. Onni owns the real estate, operates businesses across development, construction, property management, and hospitality, and can put a startup's product in front of real operators in weeks. Studio graduates can become venture investments, and standout talent can move into portfolio companies or into Onni Capital.
How We Work
Onni Capital is being designed as a high ownership, low bureaucracy team. We work in small project groups, test ideas quickly, put early products in front of users, and make decisions based on evidence rather than hierarchy. Team members are expected to:
Challenge assumptions and communicate directly
Take responsibility for outcomes, not simply produce recommendations
Use modern AI tools to work faster and produce better results
Share unfinished work early and improve it through feedback
Move comfortably between strategic analysis and hands on execution
Know when to continue investing in an idea and when to stop
Operate effectively without a detailed playbook
This is not a role for someone who wants months of consensus building, a rigid job description, or a narrowly defined set of responsibilities. It is for someone who learns quickly, takes initiative, enjoys solving ambiguous problems, and wants to help build something from the ground up.
What You Will Do
Running the studio
Design and run the twelve week programme end to end, including the week by week curriculum covering legal setup, engineering, product, marketing, and go to market
Recruit each cohort, including outreach to founders, universities, accelerators, and the local technology community, then run selection
Build and manage the mentor and industry network, including operators from Onni's businesses, external founders, investors, and service providers
Run demo day, including format, guest list, investor attendance, founder preparation, and follow on capital conversations
Negotiate and document studio investments, including equity terms, and coordinate with counsel on the standard instrument
Manage the studio space, cohort logistics, and the day to day operating rhythm of the programme
Track cohort outcomes, including product progress, revenue, follow on funding, and graduate destinations, and report on programme performance
Direct venture investments
Source direct venture opportunities through the studio, Onni's network, funds Onni backs, and the founder community
Screen opportunities and prepare investment recommendations with a clear view on team, market, product, and why Onni specifically should be on the cap table
Run diligence on direct investments, including market work, customer references, technical assessment, and financial review
Support term sheet negotiation and closing, working with counsel
Monitor the venture portfolio, maintain relationships with founders, and identify follow on opportunities
Across the pillar
Build the pipeline between studio graduates, venture investments, portfolio company roles, and Onni Capital itself
Identify where a studio company solves a problem inside Onni's operating businesses and broker that first customer relationship
Represent Onni Capital in the Vancouver founder and investor community, including events, sponsorships, and partnerships
Document processes, decisions, and operating standards so each cohort runs better than the last
Contribute to internal investment discussions, product reviews, demonstrations, and Onni Capital events
What You Bring
Two to five years in venture capital, an accelerator or venture studio, startup operations, or as a founder. What matters is that you have been close to early stage companies and have seen what makes them work and fail
Evidence of having built or run something yourself, whether a company, a product, a programme, a community, or a recurring event with real attendance
Genuine credibility with founders. This job does not work if founders do not want to talk to you
Strong commercial judgment and the ability to assess a team, a market, and a business model quickly and say what you actually think
Financial modelling capability sufficient to build a business case from a blank sheet and to read a cap table and a term sheet without help
Excellent programme and project management instincts. A twelve week cohort with twenty companies is a logistics job as much as an investment job
Demonstrated ability to use modern AI tools to research, analyse, prototype, automate, and produce high quality work
Strong written and verbal communication, including the ability to present to executives without jargon and to give a founder difficult feedback well
A bias toward action and comfort making progress with incomplete information
Comfort working in a small, fast moving team where responsibilities change as the programme develops
High personal standards for accuracy, quality, ownership, and follow through
Nice to Have
Experience running or working inside an accelerator or venture studio programme
An existing network in the Vancouver or Canadian startup ecosystem
Founder experience, including a company that did not work out
Exposure to proptech, construction technology, climate technology, fintech, or vertical software
Technical literacy sufficient to assess a product and talk credibly to engineers
Experience running events, community programmes, or investor days
Familiarity with tools such as Claude, Claude Code, Linear, Slack, or similar platforms
What Success Looks Like
Success in this role is measured by the quality of the companies brought into the studio, the strength of the investment pipeline created, and the value the programme produces for both founders and Onni.
In the first twelve months, you should be able to show:
Strong, repeatable deal flow producing high quality studio applicants and direct venture opportunities
A well run cohort of approximately twenty companies with strong founder participation and completion
Meaningful connections between studio companies and Onni operating businesses, including pilots, customer introductions, and commercial opportunities
High quality investment recommendations supported by clear diligence, financial analysis, and investment judgment
A growing pipeline of direct investments and follow on opportunities from the studio and broader founder network
A credible Demo Day that attracts relevant investors, operators, and industry partners
Measurable progress across the studio portfolio, including revenue growth, product milestones, follow on funding, and customer traction
Strong founder satisfaction and an alumni network that becomes a source of referrals, talent, investment opportunities, and future mentors
A disciplined operating system for applications, deal tracking, diligence, portfolio reporting, and cohort