Apify investor database
Skill johnisanerd/claude-skill-investor-database/apify-investor-database
Search a curated investor database of 10,469 firms with the Apify Startup Investors Data Scraper (johnvc/startup-investors-data-scraper). Filter by firm type (VC, angel, private equity, family office, accelerator, venture debt and more), industry focus, investment stage, country, and keyword, and get one row per firm with name, description, city, country, website, LinkedIn URL, AUM, stages, and focus areas, plus profile extras like Crunchbase and social links when on file, and partner contacts with job titles and check sizes when requested. Use when the user wants an investor database, a venture capital database, a list of venture capital firms, an angel investors list, a private equity firms list, or a Crunchbase or PitchBook alternative for investor data. Pay-per-firm billing, MCP-ready for Claude and other AI agents.From its SKILL.md
npx -y skills add johnisanerd/claude-skill-investor-database --skill apify-investor-databaseAssembled from the repository path, not quoted from the project. Check it against their README if it does not work.
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SKILL.md
6.7 KB, ~1.5k tokens by cl100k_base, as published. Nobody here has run it
Investor Database: Filterable Firm and Contact Data
Search an investor database of 10,469 firms as structured data. Filter by firm type, industry focus, stage, and country; get one row per firm with profile links, AUM, and focus areas, and add partner contacts when you need outreach data.
When to use this skill
- The user wants an "investor database" or "venture capital database" they can query and export.
- They want a list of venture capital firms, angel investors, private equity firms, family offices, accelerators, or venture debt firms.
- They want investor data with firm profiles and contact details for research or outreach.
- They ask for a Crunchbase alternative or PitchBook alternative for investor lists.
Not for: city-level or US-state filtering (the database filters by country only), startup or company data (this is the investor side), or personalized investment advice.
What you get (one row per firm)
Always present: firm_name, firm_id, firm_type_id, firm_description, firm_city, firm_country, firm_website, firm_linkedin_url, firm_stages, firm_aum, firm_focus, industry_names, plus created_at, updated_at, and last_checked timestamps. Profile extras such as crunchbase_url, twitter_url, facebook_url, firm_phone, and firm_state appear when the database has them on file. With Include_Contacts true, each firm adds an investor_contacts array (empty for firms with no contacts on file): name, job_title, email when available, linkedin_url, and minimum, maximum, and target check sizes.
Prerequisites
- Apify account (sign up at https://apify.com?fpr=9n7kx3&fp_sid=skillrepo).
- Authentication via
apify login, or anAPIFY_TOKENenvironment variable (Apify Console, Settings, Integrations).
The Actor
- Store page: https://apify.com/johnvc/startup-investors-data-scraper?fpr=9n7kx3&fp_sid=skillrepo
- Actor ID:
johnvc/startup-investors-data-scraper - Pricing: pay per firm returned, plus per contact when contacts are on (see
references/gotchas.md).
Run it with the Apify CLI
Venture capital firms focused on fintech, 25 rows:
apify actors call "johnvc/startup-investors-data-scraper" -i '{"Firm_Types":["Venture Capital Investor"],"Focus_Areas":["Fintech"],"Max_Results":25}' \
--json \
--user-agent apify-awesome-skills/apify-investor-database \
2>/dev/null
Private equity firms in the United Kingdom with partner contacts:
apify actors call "johnvc/startup-investors-data-scraper" -i '{"Firm_Types":["Private Equity"],"Countries":["United Kingdom"],"Include_Contacts":true,"Max_Results":20}' \
--json \
--user-agent apify-awesome-skills/apify-investor-database \
2>/dev/null
Every call carries the three flags this repo expects: --json, --user-agent apify-awesome-skills/apify-investor-database, and 2>/dev/null.
Run it from Claude or another AI agent (MCP)
The Actor is MCP-ready. Add the hosted server URL:
https://mcp.apify.com/?tools=actors,docs,johnvc/startup-investors-data-scraper
Then ask, for example: "Pull 25 climate-focused venture capital firms in Germany from the investor database and export them as CSV." MCP setup docs: https://docs.apify.com/platform/integrations/mcp
Workflow
- Translate the ask into filters.
Firm_Typestakes exact enum values (17 types: "Venture Capital Investor", "Angel Investor", "Private Equity", "Single Family Office", "Multi Family Office", "Accelerator", "Incubator", "Corporate Venture Capital Investor", "Venture Debt", "Hedge Fund", and more);Focus_Areas(about 48 industries),Investment_Stages(Pre-Seed through IPO),Countries(full English names),Keywordfor free-text narrowing. - Bound the volume.
Max_Resultsis the cost cap; start at 20 to 50 rows.OffsetplusOrder_Bypage through larger pulls. - Decide on contacts.
Include_Contactstrue adds partner rows and per-contact billing; leave it off for firm-only research. - Estimate cost, then confirm with the user. Firms bill per row; see
references/gotchas.md. - Run the Actor and read the dataset. Deliver JSON or CSV, or hand back the dataset link. For outreach lists, flatten
investor_contactsinto one row per contact.
Inputs
Firm_Types(enum, 17 values),Focus_Areas(enum, about 48),Investment_Stages(text, Pre-Seed to IPO)Countries(full English country names; no city or state filter exists)Keyword(free text),Max_Results,Offset,Order_ByInclude_Contacts(boolean, adds per-contact billing)
Cost
Billing is per firm returned (plus per contact when contacts are on), so Max_Results is the direct cost lever. A 25-firm pull costs about a dollar; contacts add more. Live prices and thresholds are in references/gotchas.md.
Honest limits
- Country filtering only: there is no city or US-state input, so "VC firms in New York" cannot be pre-filtered (filter
firm_cityclient-side after a country pull). - Contact emails exist "when available"; not every contact carries one.
- The database is curated and finite (10,469 firms); it is investor-side data, not startup funding-round data.
Troubleshooting
- Zero rows: loosen filters one at a time;
Focus_AreasandFirm_Typescombined can over-constrain. - Country returns nothing: use the full English name ("United Kingdom", not "UK").
- Bigger list needed: page with
Offsetwhile keepingMax_Resultsbounded per run.
See references/gotchas.md for cost guardrails and error recovery, and references/actor-index.md for the Actor routing table.
Related company-data Actors
- Crunchbase Company API: https://apify.com/johnvc/crunchbase-company-api?fpr=9n7kx3&fp_sid=skillrepo
- PitchBook Company API: https://apify.com/johnvc/pitchbook-company-api?fpr=9n7kx3&fp_sid=skillrepo
- LinkedIn Company API: https://apify.com/johnvc/linkedin-company-api?fpr=9n7kx3&fp_sid=skillrepo
What ships with it: 2 files
4.0 KB alongside SKILL.md
references/
- actor-index.md1.5 KB
- gotchas.md2.5 KB
Gives 0 of the 12 instructions most databases sql skills give in ~1.5k tokens
Counted across 589 of the 662 authors here whose files we hold, read 2026-08-07
- Use parameterized queriesin 37 of 589, across 34 files
- Use timestamptz for timestampsin 30 of 589, across 14 files
- Index foreign keysin 29 of 589, across 18 files
- Create indexes concurrentlyin 29 of 589, across 24 files
- Use numeric type for moneyin 25 of 589, across 8 files
- Use cursor pagination instead of offsetin 24 of 589, across 17 files
- Select only required columnsin 24 of 589, across 20 files
- Add indexes manually on foreign key columnsin 22 of 589, across 12 files
- Normalize to third normal formin 19 of 589, across 10 files
- Configure connection poolingin 19 of 589, across 17 files
- Put equality columns before range columns in indexesin 18 of 589, across 10 files
- Read individual rule files for detailed explanationsin 18 of 589, across 4 files
Said here and by no other author read
- translate the ask into exact enum filters
- set max_results to bound result volume
- set include_contacts true for partner contact data
- estimate cost and confirm with the user
- run the actor and read the dataset
- deliver output as json or csv
Grouped from the skills themselves: near-identical wordings counted once, and counted by distinct author, so one author publishing three of these counts once. Length counted with cl100k_base; the agent that loads this file may tokenize it differently.