{ "model": { "rank": 5113, "code": "thing-q129238", "model_id": "vr.tr.startup-company", "name": "startup company", "purpose": "Let an agent explain startups and their characteristics and life cycle, describe funding, structures and ecosystems, present research on success and failure with attribution, and support founders and students without specific legal or financial advice.", "family": "Thing Registry", "category": "Society, people and institutions", "status": "research-draft", "kind": "thing", "plane": "SOC", "domain": "SOC.ORG", "industry": "", "version": "", "url": "/models/thing/q129238/", "tier": 2, "score": 70, "payload": { "layer": "wikidata", "aliases": [ "academic spin-off", "FoodTech", "Stealth startup" ], "aliasCount": 3, "merged": 3, "knownIn": 70, "facets": null, "markers": [], "lexicalClass": "", "senseRank": null, "alsoRegisteredAs": null, "source": { "dataset": "wikidata", "item": "Q129238", "url": "https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q129238", "license": "CC0 1.0" } }, "research": { "vercy": "1.0-draft", "publication": { "status": "research-draft", "adjudicationStatus": "unreviewed", "publishableCanonical": false, "generatedAt": "2026-09-12T05:54:33Z", "providers": [ "Claude" ], "breadth": "written by Claude from model knowledge without web access - no source was read, every claim is a lead to verify", "pass": 2, "wave": 2, "engine": "claude" }, "metaModel": { "id": "THING-Q129238", "registryId": "vr.tr.startup-company", "name": "startup company", "version": "0.2.0-wave.2", "entryKind": "thing", "family": "Thing Registry", "domain": [ "SOC.ORG" ], "status": "research-draft" }, "canonicalUrl": "https://ver.cy/models/thing/q129238/", "model": { "registry_id": "vr.tr.startup-company", "name": "startup company", "purpose": "Let an agent explain startups and their characteristics and life cycle, describe funding, structures and ecosystems, present research on success and failure with attribution, and support founders and students without specific legal or financial advice.", "definition": "A young company founded to develop a new product, service or business model under conditions of uncertainty, typically seeking rapid growth and external funding from founders, angels, venture capital or grants, including academic spin-offs commercialising research, sector-focused ventures such as food technology startups, and stealth startups operating without public disclosure; startups pass through stages from idea and prototype to scaling, and most fail, making them a focus of entrepreneurship research and policy.", "what_it_is_for": "Young high-growth companies.", "affordances": [ "explain characteristics and life cycle", "describe funding and ecosystems", "present research", "support founders generally" ], "distinguishing_features": [ "Novelty and uncertainty", "Growth orientation", "External funding", "High failure rate" ], "appearance": "Not physical; companies.", "visual_identification": [ "New company seeking growth under uncertainty", "Spin-offs, sector startups, stealth startups", "Small businesses may not seek rapid growth; scale-ups are later stage" ], "physical_properties": [], "families_and_kinds": [ "technology startups", "academic spin-offs", "sector startups such as food technology", "stealth startups", "social and impact startups" ], "related_models": [ { "relation": "is a kind of", "target": "company", "why": "category" }, { "relation": "is a kind of", "target": "business", "why": "category" }, { "relation": "is related to", "target": "limited company", "why": "the legal form most startups take" }, { "relation": "is related to", "target": "trademark", "why": "brands protected by startups" } ], "identifiers": [], "standards_and_regulation": [ "Company law and securities regulation for fundraising", "Intellectual property law", "Startup support programmes and visas" ], "failure_modes_and_hazards": [ "Agents giving specific legal or financial advice", "Survivorship bias in startup stories", "Hype and unfounded valuations" ], "in_scope": [], "out_of_scope": [], "characteristics": [] }, "sources": [], "structure": { "bundles": [ { "id": "understand", "name": "Understand", "description": "What a startup is.", "rationale": "Business.", "layers": [ { "id": "concept", "name": "Concept", "description": "Concept and kinds.", "findings": [ { "id": "concept-finding", "name": "Concept", "description": "Concept.", "questions": [ { "text": "What is a startup, and how do technology startups, spin-offs, sector startups and stealth startups differ?", "kind": "definition" }, { "text": "Which kind or stage is meant?", "kind": "boundary" } ] } ] }, { "id": "lifecycle", "name": "Lifecycle", "description": "Life cycle.", "findings": [ { "id": "lifecycle-finding", "name": "Lifecycle", "description": "Lifecycle.", "questions": [ { "text": "What stages do startups pass through from idea to scaling or exit?", "kind": "definition" }, { "text": "Which entry fits a specific stage?", "kind": "action" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "build", "name": "Build", "description": "Building a startup.", "rationale": "Practice.", "layers": [ { "id": "funding", "name": "Funding", "description": "Funding.", "findings": [ { "id": "funding-finding", "name": "Funding", "description": "Funding.", "questions": [ { "text": "How do startups raise funding from founders, angels, venture capital and grants, in general terms?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Is the user asking for specific legal, tax or investment advice, which needs a professional?", "kind": "boundary" } ] } ] }, { "id": "methods", "name": "Methods", "description": "Methods.", "findings": [ { "id": "methods-finding", "name": "Methods", "description": "Methods.", "questions": [ { "text": "What methods such as lean startup and customer development are used, and what does evidence say about them, with findings attributed?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Which entry fits entrepreneurship?", "kind": "action" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "ecosystem", "name": "Ecosystem", "description": "Ecosystems and research.", "rationale": "Attribution.", "layers": [ { "id": "ecosystems", "name": "Ecosystems", "description": "Ecosystems and policy.", "findings": [ { "id": "ecosystems-finding", "name": "Ecosystems", "description": "Ecosystems.", "questions": [ { "text": "How do startup ecosystems, incubators and public policy support startups, and what debates exist, with positions attributed?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Is the presentation neutral?", "kind": "boundary" } ] } ] }, { "id": "failure", "name": "Failure", "description": "Success and failure.", "findings": [ { "id": "failure-finding", "name": "Failure", "description": "Failure.", "questions": [ { "text": "What does research say about why startups succeed or fail, and how does survivorship bias distort lessons?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Which findings are contested?", "kind": "boundary" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "learn", "name": "Learn", "description": "History and teaching.", "rationale": "Education.", "layers": [ { "id": "history", "name": "History", "description": "History.", "findings": [ { "id": "history-finding", "name": "History", "description": "History.", "questions": [ { "text": "How did the modern startup model develop, from garages to venture-backed technology firms?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Which references are standard?", "kind": "provenance" } ] } ] }, { "id": "teach", "name": "Teach", "description": "Teaching.", "findings": [ { "id": "teach-finding", "name": "Teach", "description": "Teaching.", "questions": [ { "text": "How can entrepreneurship be taught with realism?", "kind": "action" }, { "text": "Which misconceptions arise?", "kind": "provenance" } ] } ] } ] } ] }, "openQuestions": [ "Should venture capital be a separate entry?", "How should ecosystem data be linked?", "How should research literature be linked?" ], "statistics": { "bundles": 4, "layers": 8, "findings": 8, "questions": 16 } }, "draft": { "generator": "vr.draft.v3", "status": "draft-generated", "researched": false, "archetype": "organisation or institution", "method": "Written from the archetype playbook - what this kind of thing needs beyond identity and provenance - and from the structure that recurred across 6,333 models already researched by two engines. Applied to this entry by rule. No source was read for this thing and no claim here is researched. This entry carries no facets of its own, so they were inferred from its domain - a guess about a whole domain applied to one thing.", "facetsInferred": true, "nextPass": "A researcher replaces this draft with a sourced specification. Treat every sentence below as a proposal to argue with.", "purpose": "Give an agent a durable, checkable way to recognise a startup company, record what state it is in, and decide what may be done with it.", "whatItIs": "Let an agent explain startups and their characteristics and life cycle, describe funding, structures and ecosystems, present research on success and failure with attribution, and support founders and students without specific legal or financial advice.", "characteristics": { "substance": "social", "origin": "conceptual", "agency": "collective" }, "whatYouCanDoWithIt": [ "observed and measured" ], "distinguishingFeatures": [ "Names folded into this entry, which a task may need to split apart again: academic spin-off, FoodTech, Stealth startup.", "3 finer distinctions are held as aliases rather than separate entries, because telling them apart needs a task that asks for it.", "Described in 70 Wikipedia languages, which is a measure of how widely the thing is known, not of how important it is." ], "openQuestionsForResearch": [ "Which of the bundles below does a real task actually need, and which are ceremony?", "What does this thing have that the facets do not capture at all?", "Which neighbouring kind is most often confused with a startup company, and on what evidence are they told apart?" ], "whatItIsMadeOf": "a social arrangement between people", "physicalCharacter": [ "Acts through people, and only through them.", "These come from the domain this entry sits in rather than from the entry itself, so treat them as a first guess about the whole domain applied to one thing." ], "whatCanBeDoneWithIt": [ "observe it, measure it, record its state" ], "howItIsRecognised": [ "Nothing to see. Recognised by name, register entry and the people acting in its name, and those change while it stays the same body." ], "relatedModels": [ { "relation": "covers", "note": "Finer kinds folded into this entry because telling them apart needs a task that asks for it. Each is a model waiting to be split out when one does.", "targets": [ "academic spin-off", "FoodTech", "Stealth startup" ] } ], "standing": "Described in 70 Wikipedia languages, which measures how widely it is written about rather than how important or how common it is. 3 finer distinctions are held inside this entry as names rather than as separate models.", "structure": { "bundles": [ { "id": "identity-and-classification", "name": "Identity, naming and classification", "description": "How an agent tells one startup company from another, and a startup company from things that resemble it.", "rationale": "Recognition comes before every other claim. Without stable identity nothing else in the model can be trusted to be about the same thing twice.", "layers": [ { "id": "naming-and-identifiers", "name": "Names and identifiers", "description": "The names this thing goes by and the identifiers that survive translation and time.", "findings": [ { "id": "preferred-name-and-aliases", "name": "Preferred name, aliases and local names", "description": "Which name to use, which names mean the same thing, and which merely sound similar.", "questions": [ { "id": "preferred-name-and-aliases-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes the name of a startup company, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "preferred-name-and-aliases-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about the name of a startup company, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "preferred-name-and-aliases-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once the name of a startup company is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] }, { "id": "stable-identifiers", "name": "Stable identifiers and external keys", "description": "Identifiers that keep pointing at this kind of thing across systems and languages.", "questions": [ { "id": "stable-identifiers-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes an identifier for a startup company, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "stable-identifiers-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about an identifier for a startup company, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "stable-identifiers-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once an identifier for a startup company is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "classification-and-granularity", "name": "Classification and granularity", "description": "Where a startup company sits among kinds, and how finely a task needs to cut it.", "findings": [ { "id": "kind-and-parents", "name": "Kind, parents and neighbouring kinds", "description": "The classes this thing belongs to and the ones it is next to.", "questions": [ { "id": "kind-and-parents-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes the kind of a startup company, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "kind-and-parents-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about the kind of a startup company, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "kind-and-parents-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once the kind of a startup company is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] }, { "id": "distinguishing-features", "name": "Distinguishing features", "description": "What separates a startup company from the things most often confused with it.", "questions": [ { "id": "distinguishing-features-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes what distinguishes a startup company, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "distinguishing-features-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about what distinguishes a startup company, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "distinguishing-features-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once what distinguishes a startup company is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "state-and-lifecycle", "name": "State and lifecycle", "description": "The states a startup company passes through and the events that move it between them.", "rationale": "Most decisions about a thing depend on what state it is in now, which is a claim with a time on it, not a property.", "layers": [ { "id": "lifecycle-stages", "name": "Lifecycle stages", "description": "From coming into existence to ceasing to be one of these.", "findings": [ { "id": "stages-and-transitions", "name": "Stages and transitions", "description": "The stages worth naming and what moves a startup company between them.", "questions": [ { "id": "stages-and-transitions-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes the lifecycle of a startup company, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "stages-and-transitions-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about the lifecycle of a startup company, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "stages-and-transitions-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once the lifecycle of a startup company is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "observations-and-status", "name": "Observations and current status", "description": "What is observed about a startup company, how often and by whom.", "findings": [ { "id": "observation-record", "name": "Observation record", "description": "How an observation of a startup company is recorded so that it can be superseded rather than overwritten.", "questions": [ { "id": "observation-record-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes an observation of a startup company, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "observation-record-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about an observation of a startup company, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "observation-record-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once an observation of a startup company is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "people-and-responsibility", "name": "People, roles and responsibility", "description": "Who stands in what relation to a startup company.", "rationale": "Social things are defined by the relations people hold to them, and those relations change without the thing changing.", "layers": [ { "id": "roles-and-parties", "name": "Roles and parties", "description": "The roles that exist around a startup company and who fills them.", "findings": [ { "id": "role-assignments", "name": "Role assignments and their validity", "description": "Who holds which role over a startup company, from when, and on whose authority.", "questions": [ { "id": "role-assignments-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes a role over a startup company, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "role-assignments-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about a role over a startup company, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "role-assignments-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once a role over a startup company is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "ownership-and-accountability", "name": "Ownership and accountability", "description": "Who answers for a startup company and who may decide about it.", "findings": [ { "id": "accountability", "name": "Accountability and decision rights", "description": "Where responsibility for a startup company sits when something goes wrong.", "questions": [ { "id": "accountability-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes responsibility for a startup company, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "accountability-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about responsibility for a startup company, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "accountability-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once responsibility for a startup company is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "legal-identity", "name": "Legal identity and mandate", "description": "What startup company is in law and what it exists to do.", "rationale": "Legal identity survives changes of name, address, staff and premises, which is exactly why it must be recorded separately from all of them.", "layers": [ { "id": "registration", "name": "Legal form and registration", "description": "Form, register, identifiers and jurisdiction.", "findings": [ { "id": "registration-record", "name": "Registration and identifiers", "description": "What names this body unambiguously in law.", "questions": [ { "id": "registration-record-q01", "text": "What legal form does startup company take, in which register, under which identifier?", "kind": "definition" }, { "id": "registration-record-q02", "text": "What survives a rename, a merger or a move of premises, and what does not?", "kind": "boundary" } ] } ] }, { "id": "mandate", "name": "Mandate and governing instrument", "description": "The purpose it is bound to and the document that binds it.", "findings": [ { "id": "mandate-record", "name": "Mandate and its source", "description": "What it may do, and the instrument that says so.", "questions": [ { "id": "mandate-record-q01", "text": "What is the mandate of startup company, and which founding or governing instrument grants it?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "id": "mandate-record-q02", "text": "What lies outside the mandate, and what should an agent do when asked for it?", "kind": "action" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "governance-and-membership", "name": "Governance, membership and decision rights", "description": "Who decides in startup company and who belongs to it.", "rationale": "Authority inside an organisation is held by roles, not people, and an agent needs to know which role can commit it.", "layers": [ { "id": "decision-rights", "name": "Decision rights", "description": "Bodies, offices and what each may bind.", "findings": [ { "id": "authority-map", "name": "Who may bind the organisation", "description": "The offices that can commit it and their limits.", "questions": [ { "id": "authority-map-q01", "text": "Which bodies or offices of startup company may take which decisions, and up to what limit?", "kind": "definition" }, { "id": "authority-map-q02", "text": "What evidence shows that a given person currently holds that office?", "kind": "provenance" } ] } ] }, { "id": "membership", "name": "Membership and affiliation", "description": "Who counts as part of it and on what terms.", "findings": [ { "id": "membership-rules", "name": "Membership and its evidence", "description": "Classes of member, how membership starts and ends.", "questions": [ { "id": "membership-rules-q01", "text": "What kinds of membership or affiliation does startup company have, and how does each begin and end?", "kind": "definition" }, { "id": "membership-rules-q02", "text": "What may a member do in its name, and what may they not?", "kind": "action" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "provenance-and-evidence", "name": "Provenance, evidence and time", "description": "Where every claim about a startup company came from and when it held.", "rationale": "A claim without a source and a time cannot be superseded, only overwritten, and an agent that overwrites loses the ability to explain itself.", "layers": [ { "id": "source-and-authority", "name": "Source and authority", "description": "Who said it, on what evidence, and how strongly.", "findings": [ { "id": "claim-provenance", "name": "Claim provenance and confidence", "description": "The authority behind each claim about a startup company and how confident it is.", "questions": [ { "id": "claim-provenance-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes a claim about a startup company, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "claim-provenance-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about a claim about a startup company, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "claim-provenance-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once a claim about a startup company is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "time-and-versions", "name": "Time, versions and supersession", "description": "When a claim was true, when it was learnt, and what replaced it.", "findings": [ { "id": "validity-and-supersession", "name": "Validity period and supersession", "description": "How an old claim about a startup company is retired without being erased.", "questions": [ { "id": "validity-and-supersession-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes the validity of a claim about a startup company, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "validity-and-supersession-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about the validity of a claim about a startup company, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "validity-and-supersession-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once the validity of a claim about a startup company is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] } ] } ] }, "statistics": { "bundles": 6, "layers": 12, "findings": 14, "questions": 38 } } } }