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Investing & Deal Sourcing
Series-A Inflection Detector
Find startups hiring their first GTM/finance exec — the classic post-Series-A scaling tell.
Run this skill with your agent
1. Connect the MCP server
https://apidirect.io/mcp?token=YOUR_API_KEY
2. Then just say to your agent
Find startups that just posted their first VP Sales or Head of Finance role and look recently funded.
In clients that support MCP prompts (Claude Desktop, Claude Code, Cursor) this skill appears as a prompt named
series-a-inflection-detector.
Any agent can also call get_skill(skill_id="series-a-inflection-detector") to pull these steps on demand.
What it does
The first 'VP Sales' or 'Head of Finance' req is a reliable signal a startup just raised and is scaling. This finds those roles, then confirms the company is young and small.
Who it's for: VCs, growth investors and vendors who sell into newly-scaling startups.
Inputs
| Input | Required | Description | Example |
|---|---|---|---|
first_exec_roles |
No | The first-exec titles that signal scaling. | "VP Sales" OR "Head of Finance" OR "first sales hire" |
location |
No | Geo to scope to (resolve a location_id). | San Francisco Bay Area |
How your agent runs it
-
1
search_linkedin_jobs(query="{first_exec_roles}", posted_ago="30d", location_id=<location_id>, sort_by=most_recent)Find recent first-exec postings. Collect each company_id and company_url.
-
2
linkedin_company_details(url=<company_url>)Keep only young, small companies (low employee count, recent founded_year) — that's the post-Series-A profile.
-
3
linkedin_company_posts(url=<company_url>)Skim recent company posts to confirm momentum / a funding mention.
Delivers: A shortlist of likely just-raised startups with the role that flagged them and quick firmographics.
Tools used
The full playbook
This is exactly what the MCP returns to your agent (via the series-a-inflection-detector prompt or get_skill tool), with your inputs filled in.
SKILL: Series-A Inflection Detector
The first 'VP Sales' or 'Head of Finance' req is a reliable signal a startup just raised and is scaling. This finds those roles, then confirms the company is young and small.
You are running this skill on API Direct via its MCP tools. Execute the steps below yourself by calling the named tools in order — values in <angle brackets> come from a previous step. Then deliver the result described at the end.
INPUTS:
- first_exec_roles (optional): (optional — e.g. "VP Sales" OR "Head of Finance" OR "first sales hire")
- location (optional): (optional — e.g. San Francisco Bay Area)
STEPS:
1. Tool `search_linkedin_jobs` — search_linkedin_jobs(query="<first_exec_roles>", posted_ago="30d", location_id=<location_id>, sort_by=most_recent)
Find recent first-exec postings. Collect each company_id and company_url.
2. Tool `linkedin_company_details` — linkedin_company_details(url=<company_url>)
Keep only young, small companies (low employee count, recent founded_year) — that's the post-Series-A profile.
3. Tool `linkedin_company_posts` — linkedin_company_posts(url=<company_url>)
Skim recent company posts to confirm momentum / a funding mention.
DELIVER: A shortlist of likely just-raised startups with the role that flagged them and quick firmographics.
Note: each underlying tool call is billed at its normal endpoint price; get_sentiment adds a small per-page surcharge. Page through results as needed but stop once you have enough to deliver the outcome.