Migration Guide
You are running a venture fund in a generic database. No row-level security. No LP portal. No compliance automation. Here's how to move to a purpose-built fund platform in a day — with a simple CSV import.
Airtable and Google Sheets got you started. But they were never designed for fiduciary-grade fund operations.
In Airtable, anyone with base access can see every LP's commitment amount, every deal note, every portfolio company's financials. There is no way to restrict a team member to specific records or give an LP access to only their own data. For a GP with fiduciary responsibility for millions in LP capital, this is a material security gap. One accidental share and your entire fund's data is exposed.
Your LPs committed capital to your fund. They expect quarterly reports, capital call history, distribution records, and access to fund documents. A spreadsheet cannot provide any of this in a professional, self-serve format. You end up emailing PDFs and hoping they do not get lost in an inbox. Archstone gives every LP a branded portal with real-time access to everything they need.
Every capital call requires manually calculating pro rata allocations, drafting notice emails, tracking payments, and reconciling amounts. Quarterly reports mean copy-pasting metrics from cells into a document template. Compliance deadlines live in calendar reminders you set once and forget. With Archstone, Archie AI handles the calculations, drafts the communications, and proactively alerts you to deadlines.
When regulators or auditors ask to see the history of a transaction, a spreadsheet gives you version history at best — and nothing at worst. Who changed what, when, and why? You cannot answer that question reliably with Airtable or Google Sheets. Archstone logs every action in an immutable audit trail, automatically, with user attribution and timestamps.
Airtable automations are powerful for prototyping but fragile at scale. Rename a field and an automation breaks. Hit a rate limit and data gets dropped. Change a formula and downstream calculations go wrong without warning. You built a custom system that only you understand — and if you are unavailable, nobody can operate your fund. Purpose-built software eliminates this class of risk entirely.
When an LP logs into a professional portal with branded reporting, document access, and capital call tracking, it signals institutional quality. When they receive an email with a PDF attachment pulled from a spreadsheet, it signals a hobby fund. Institutional LPs — the ones who write bigger checks — notice this difference. The professionalism of your operations directly impacts your fundraising ceiling.
If it is in a spreadsheet, it can come into Archstone. Here is what maps.
LP investor data
Names, emails, phone numbers, organizations, commitment amounts, commitment status, LP type (individual, institution, family office), and notes. Upload as CSV — columns map to Archstone's LP fields automatically.
Deal pipeline
Company names, websites, sectors, stages, pipeline status, check sizes, valuations, scores, contact info, and notes. Everything goes into the kanban pipeline with proper stage assignments.
Portfolio companies
Company names, investment dates, investment amounts, valuations, ownership percentages, founder contacts, sector, stage, and current status. Historical metrics (ARR, headcount, runway) import into the portfolio tracker.
Fund documents
LPAs, subscription agreements, pitch decks, financial models, side letters — any files currently scattered across Google Drive, Dropbox, or email. Upload directly into Archstone's organized data room with folder structure.
Cap table records
Ownership percentages, share classes, investment rounds, and transaction history. If you tracked this in a spreadsheet, export as CSV and import into Archstone's cap table module with full audit trail.
Purpose-built fund management versus a generic database you customized yourself. The difference is structural.
Every query in Archstone is scoped to the user's fund and role through PostgreSQL row-level security policies. Team members see only what their role permits. LPs access only their own data through a dedicated portal. No more shared base access where one wrong click exposes everything.
Every LP gets a branded portal where they can view quarterly reports, capital call history, distribution records, fund documents, and co-investment opportunities. Self-serve access means fewer emails for you and a more professional experience for your investors.
Archie AI replaces the dozens of manual tasks you currently do in spreadsheets. Capital call calculations, LP letter drafts, compliance checks, deal scoring, portfolio anomaly detection — all through natural language. "Draft a capital call for $500K across all committed LPs" and it is done in seconds.
Proactive compliance calendar auto-generated based on your fund type and domicile. AML/KYC checklists, Form D tracking, blue sky requirements by state, LP accreditation management. Archie monitors deadlines and alerts you before anything is overdue — not after.
Stop chasing portfolio founders for quarterly metrics via email. Archstone generates unique portal tokens for each company — founders log in and submit ARR, burn rate, headcount, and runway directly. The data flows into your portfolio tracker and LP reports automatically.
Shareable links with per-page view tracking, time-on-page analytics, and viewer identification. Know exactly who looked at your pitch deck, which pages they studied, and when they returned for a second look. This fundraising intelligence was impossible with spreadsheets.
Purpose-built fund management versus a generic database you customized yourself.
| Feature | Archstone | Airtable / Sheets |
|---|---|---|
| Row-Level Security (RLS) | Built-in per fund | None — shared access |
| LP Portal | Branded, self-serve | Not possible |
| Data Room | Unlimited files + analytics | Attachments only |
| Deal Flow Pipeline | Kanban + AI scoring | DIY views |
| Capital Call Automation | AI-drafted, one-click | Manual calculations |
| Quarterly Reports | AI-generated + builder | Copy-paste from cells |
| Compliance Calendar | Proactive alerts | DIY reminders |
| AI Operations | Archie — full agentic AI | None |
| Cap Table Management | Purpose-built | DIY formulas |
| Portfolio Tracking | Metrics + founder portal | Manual entry |
| Document View Analytics | Per-page tracking | Not possible |
| Fundraising CRM | Built-in + drip sequences | DIY |
| E-Signatures | Built-in | Not possible |
| SOC 2 Compliance | Yes | Yes (but no fund-specific RLS) |
| Audit Trail | Automatic, immutable | Manual version history |
| Starting Price | $297/mo (full platform) | $20-45/mo (generic database) |
If your data is in a spreadsheet, you can import it. Most GPs finish in 1-2 days.
Export each table or sheet from your Airtable base or Google Sheets workbook. You will typically have separate exports for LPs (names, emails, commitments), deals (company names, stages, notes), portfolio companies (metrics, investment amounts), and any other tracking sheets. Label each file clearly. Most GPs have 3-6 CSV files to export — this takes about 10 minutes.
Sign up for Archstone (14-day free trial, no credit card required) and launch the onboarding wizard. Upload each CSV — the import system maps your columns to Archstone's structured fields. LP names, emails, and commitment amounts go into the LP module. Deal company names, stages, and notes go into the pipeline. Portfolio metrics go into the tracker. Archie flags any rows that need manual attention.
Gather the documents currently scattered across Google Drive, Dropbox, or email attachments — your LPA, subscription agreements, pitch deck, financial models, side letters. Upload them into Archstone's organized data room with folder structure. This is the step where most GPs realize how much time they wasted managing files across five different locations. Set up shareable links with per-page view analytics for fundraising materials.
Set up your compliance calendar — Archstone auto-generates items based on your fund type and domicile. Configure your LP portal so investors can self-serve their own reports, capital call history, and documents. Enable founder portal tokens so portfolio companies submit metrics directly instead of you chasing them via email. This is the infrastructure your spreadsheet could never provide.
Once everything is imported and verified, you are live. Archive your Airtable base and spreadsheets for historical reference, but stop updating them. Every piece of fund data now lives in one secure, purpose-built system with row-level security, audit trails, and AI operations. Most GPs complete the full migration in 1-2 days.
Airtable seems cheap at $20-45/mo. But factor in the tools you need to bolt on and the hours you spend maintaining it.
Airtable is a powerful general-purpose database, but it was not built for fund management. It lacks row-level security (anyone with base access can see all data), has no LP portal, no compliance automation, no capital call workflows, no document analytics, and no AI operations. You end up building a fragile custom system that only you understand — and when something breaks or you need to onboard a team member, the technical debt is overwhelming. Archstone is purpose-built for VC fund operations, so every workflow is designed for how GPs actually work.
The biggest risk is the lack of row-level security. In Airtable, anyone with access to your base can see all LP information, all deal data, and all financial records. There is no way to give an LP access to only their own data, or to restrict a team member to specific deals. Archstone uses Supabase PostgreSQL with row-level security policies — every query is scoped to the user's fund and role. LP data is isolated, team access is role-based, and every action is logged in an immutable audit trail. For a GP with fiduciary responsibility, this is not optional.
Most GPs complete the full migration in 1-2 days. Exporting CSVs from Airtable takes 10-15 minutes. Importing into Archstone takes another 20-30 minutes per data type (LPs, deals, portfolio companies). Setting up the data room, compliance calendar, and LP portal takes another hour or two. The total effort is roughly a half-day of active work, spread across a day or two to allow for verification. Compare that to the hundreds of hours you will spend maintaining spreadsheets over the next three years.
Yes. The process is identical — export each sheet as CSV and upload into Archstone's import wizard. Google Sheets, Excel, Airtable, Notion databases, and any other tool that exports CSV are all supported. The import wizard automatically maps column headers to Archstone fields, and Archie flags any rows that need manual review. If your column names are non-standard, you can manually map them in the wizard.
Yes, and more reliably. Airtable automations are fragile — they break when you rename a field, reorder columns, or hit rate limits. Archstone's workflows are built into the platform: capital call calculations are automatic, compliance reminders are proactive, founder metric collection happens through dedicated portals, and Archie AI handles multi-step operations through natural language. Instead of maintaining a web of Airtable automations you built six months ago and barely remember, you get purpose-built workflows that just work.
Airtable costs $20-45/mo for a generic database. But to replicate what Archstone does, you also need DocSend ($45/mo), Visible or Carta ($149-600/mo), a CRM ($50-75/mo), compliance tracking (your time), and the ongoing maintenance cost of keeping your custom Airtable system running. The real cost of the Airtable approach is $300-800/mo in tools plus 5-10 hours per month of manual data management. Archstone at $297/mo replaces all of it with zero maintenance overhead.
That is actually a sign you should switch sooner rather than later. The more customized your Airtable base, the more fragile it is — and the harder it becomes for anyone else to understand or maintain. Archstone provides structured, purpose-built modules for every aspect of fund management. You trade customization for reliability. If there is truly unique data that does not fit standard fund fields, Archstone's notes and custom metadata fields can accommodate it, and Archie AI can query across all of it.
14-day free trial. No credit card required. Import your CSV files and see what purpose-built fund management looks like.
Start your free trialOr see the full Archstone vs Spreadsheets comparison for more detail.