Brian Nichols is the co-founder of Angel Squad, a community where you’ll learn how to angel invest and get a chance to invest as little as $1k into Hustle Fund's top performing early-stage startups

Your local angel group probably meets monthly at a hotel conference room. Someone presents their investment thesis over lukewarm coffee. A founder pitches. Everyone asks the same surface-level questions they've been asking since 2010. Maybe you invest, maybe you don't.

That model is dying.

Not because local communities are bad, but because global startup investing communities offer something fundamentally better: access to deals that don't care where you live.

The Geography Tax Is Dead

Ten years ago, if you wanted to invest in tech startups, you lived in San Francisco, New York, or maybe Boston. The best deals happened in person. Angel groups were local because startup investing was local.

That world is gone.

Shiyan Koh, co-founder and General Partner at Hustle Fund and former VP of Business Operations at NerdWallet, watches this shift from Singapore. "Great founders can look like anyone and come from anywhere," she emphasizes. Angel Squad has members across 40+ countries, all accessing the same deal flow Hustle Fund sees.

The pandemic accelerated what was already happening: remote rounds, Zoom diligence, DocSend pitch decks. A founder in Jakarta can raise from investors in Stockholm without anyone buying a plane ticket.

Local angel groups are still operating like it's 2015. Global communities are built for how startup investing actually works now.

Deal Flow Volume Changes Everything

Your local angel group might see 30-40 deals per year. That sounds like a lot until you realize you need to see 100+ deals to develop real pattern recognition.

Elizabeth Yin, co-founder and General Partner at Hustle Fund who previously ran the 500 Startups accelerator, knows this math intimately. "One of the biggest mistakes new investors make is thinking they can really pick well & putting a big chunk of cash on 1 co. Don't try to pick a co. Select a portfolio."

Global communities aggregate deal flow from everywhere. Angel Squad members see deals from Hustle Fund's pipeline of 1,000+ monthly applications. That's not 1,000 investments, but 1,000 companies being evaluated by experienced VCs who've backed over 600 startups.

Your local group shows you what comes through their network. Global communities show you what's actually getting funded.

The Education Gap

Most local angel groups feature the same five people presenting at every meeting. Their expertise gets stale. The advice becomes recycled. Nobody's learning anything new.

Global communities can bring in different speakers every week. Angel Squad hosts virtual events twice weekly with guests ranging from established VCs to founders who just raised Series A. The content stays fresh because the community isn't limited by who lives within driving distance.

One Angel Squad member built a reputation as the go-to expert on climate tech just by consistently showing up to virtual events and sharing insights in the chat. As one Hustle Fund GP noted, "We'll make sure he's able to make it" to relevant deal reviews because his expertise exceeds theirs in that sector.

That doesn't happen in local groups where the same 20 people see each other every month.

Lower Minimums, Better Portfolio Construction

Local angel groups typically have $25,000-$50,000 minimums. That's a barrier for most people who want to start angel investing.

Global communities can offer lower minimums because they have more members. Angel Squad's $1,000-$5,000 per deal structure makes sense when you have 2,000+ members. The fund still gets meaningful capital, but individual investors can build diversified portfolios.

Eric Bahn, co-founder and General Partner at Hustle Fund who previously founded Beat the GMAT, helped design this structure intentionally. Smaller checks mean newer investors can make 10-20 investments instead of 2-3. That diversification is critical when most startups fail.

Local groups can't offer those economics. They don't have the scale.

The Diversity Advantage

Local angel groups tend to be homogeneous. Same backgrounds, same perspectives, same biases. They invest in founders who look like them, building businesses they understand.

Global communities are diverse by default. When your members span 40+ countries, you see opportunities in markets local groups ignore. You hear perspectives that challenge assumptions. You invest in founders solving problems you didn't know existed.

This isn't just feel-good talk. It's better investing. Some of the best outcomes in venture capital came from backing founders "overlooked" because they were "too early" or had the "wrong resume" or were in the "wrong location," as Elizabeth Yin points out.

Global communities are structurally positioned to catch what local groups miss.

When Local Still Wins

Local angel groups aren't obsolete. They win on relationship depth.

If you want to co-invest with the same people repeatedly, build real friendships, and have dinners where everyone actually shows up, local works better. The social aspect of angel investing matters, and Zoom happy hours aren't the same as real ones.

Local groups also excel when you're investing in companies in your region. If you're in Austin backing Austin startups, the local knowledge and connections matter. You can make warm intros to potential customers, hire executives from your network, and show up at the office when things go sideways.

But for most angel investors, especially those starting out, the advantages of global communities outweigh local groups' benefits.

The Hybrid Future

The smartest investors do both. Join a global community for deal flow, education, and portfolio construction. Participate in local groups for relationships and regional opportunities.

Angel Squad members often maintain local connections while leveraging the global community for most of their investing activity. You get the best of both worlds: depth locally, breadth globally.

The question isn't whether to go global or stay local. It's recognizing that in 2025, geography is a choice, not a constraint. The investors who thrive will be the ones who stop letting their zip code determine their opportunities.