David Cohen

David G. Cohen was born in 1968 in DeLand, Florida, and began his career as a software engineer, serving as Director of Development at Automated Dispatch Services from 1991 to 1994. In 1993 he co-founded Pinpoint Technologies, a public-safety/EMS dispatch software company where he was CTO and VP of R&D; the company was acquired by Zoll Medical Corporation in 1999, and Cohen remained until 2004. He later founded the music service earFeeder.com (acquired by SonicSwap in 2006) and the mobile social-networking venture iContact.com, establishing himself as a serial founder before turning to investing.

In 2006, Cohen co-founded Techstars in Boulder alongside Brad Feld, Jared Polis, and David Brown, launching its first mentorship-driven accelerator program in 2007. His explicit goal was to "improve the existing system of angel investing and to provide more support to startups." Under his leadership Techstars grew into one of the world's largest and most active early-stage investors, having backed more than 4,000–4,900 startups across 89 countries, helping create 16–20+ unicorns and tens of billions of dollars in lifetime funding and over $200B in aggregate enterprise value.

Cohen has led or co-led Techstars for the majority of its existence and served as Chairman for several years. After CEO Maëlle Gavet stepped down at the end of May 2024 for health reasons, Cohen returned as sole CEO — emphasizing it was not an interim role but a long-term, "indefinite" commitment focused on quality and creativity over growth-for-growth's-sake. He co-authored *Do More Faster: Techstars Lessons to Accelerate Your Startup* with Brad Feld, and serves as a founding board member of Endeavor Colorado, co-founder and advisory board member of the Techstars Foundation, and advisory board member of the Silicon Flatirons Center at the University of Colorado. He lives in Boulder, is married with three children, and lists reading non-fiction and tennis among his interests.

• "Give First." Cohen's defining philosophy: *"Give first, help entrepreneurs, and the rest will work out. I've seen first-hand how giving without expecting any direct benefit pays back in spades."* This ethos of helping founders without expectation of return is the cultural backbone of Techstars.
• Invests only through Techstars. He states plainly: *"I do not make direct angel investments outside of Techstars."* 100% of his initial investments flow through Techstars accelerator programs.
• First-round / pre-seed checks around $120,000 per company, in exchange for a small equity stake plus a convertible note.
• Highly selective: Techstars accepts roughly 1% of applicants into its programs.
• Backs mentorable founders and world-changing ideas across SaaS, AI, fintech, consumer, and developer/enterprise software — *"That's what I love about startups — they can change the world."*
• Mentorship-driven model: the value proposition is access to a dense mentor and alumni network, not just capital.