Lagos-based early-stage investment platform Microtraction has launched a bid to source more deals and identify “high-trajectory” founders.

Accel, the US venture capital (VC) giant, has launched a startup scouting program in Europe, building on the legacy of its US project. Scouts in the “Starters” program are allocated $200К each to find, invest in, and nurture European startups with growth potential.

VC review platform Landscape thinks it's come up with the scout programme to rule them all: a "scout-as-a-service" marketplace.

It started as First Round Capital’s experiment. After all, founder Josh Kopelman had started his first company, Infonautics, while he was a student at the University of Pennsylvania. Partner Hayley Barna had started Birchbox while still at Harvard Business School.

The famed scout programme from US VC firm Sequoia has launched in Europe. We meet the scouts.

Venture Capital firms, like Sequoia Capital, have been using a secretive network of so-called “scouts” to funnel money to promising start ups while avoiding the publicity that an investment from a big-name VC firm can bring, according to a report Friday in the Wall Street Journal.

Sequoia Capital has funneled millions of dollars to scores of well-connected entrepreneurs and academics, who invest and look for ideas.