Artifact
Artifact was a five-week program run by Founders, Inc. from January 12 to February 13, 2026, at the firm's 42,000-square-foot campus at Fort Mason in San Francisco.1 It was the largest program f.inc had operated to that point: 200 founders accepted, $2 million allocated to top teams, and a closing public event — the Artifact Festival — that drew an estimated 4,000 attendees to watch 120 demo teams present working products alongside live DJ sets, food trucks, and interactive games.346 The program was succeeded by Canopy, which consolidated f.inc's various cohort formats into a single five-week cycle running four times per year.13
The name
Hubert Thieblot and the f.inc team named the program after the physical objects that famous founders kept long after their companies succeeded.1 The announcement video cited Phil Knight's waffle iron (the one Bill Bowerman poured rubber into to prototype running shoes), Sergey Brin and Larry Page's first Google server encased in Lego bricks, Hayao Miyazaki's early pencil boards, and Steve Wozniak's first circuit board.3 The point was that these objects had no monetary value but became the proof that the founder had made the first thing — and that the first thing is what everything else grew from.1 "Not a promise. A receipt. Proof the idea left the head and hit reality," the program page read.1
Program structure
Artifact required full-time, in-person commitment at Fort Mason for all five weeks.2 Applicants did not need a polished idea, but they needed "a direction you're willing to build immediately."2 The stated goal was for every participant to leave with an artifact: "a prototype, a link, a demo. Something that lives outside your head and can be used and critiqued without you in the room."2 Solo founders and co-founder teams could both apply.2
The weekly structure followed the same cadence used across all f.inc programs: goals set on Monday, building through the week, and Ship-it demos every Friday where founders showed working progress to the rest of the cohort.11 The f.inc team and outside investors evaluated teams throughout the program, not only at the final event.10
Applications closed December 31, 2025, with early decisions beginning December 20 and final decisions going out January 6, 2026.2 The Artifact details page at one point displayed "98/100 spots left" on its counter, suggesting the program opened with roughly 100 in-person slots despite the 200-founder figure in the announcement.23
Investment
Founders, Inc. described the investment pool as "$2 million to top teams," with historical checks ranging from $100,000 to $250,000 for 4–7% equity.3210 The firm stated it had historically invested in roughly the top 10% of program participants.2 Teams that received a check earned permanent access to the Fort Mason lab; founders who did not receive immediate investment but demonstrated progress often had their campus access extended.2
The Artifact Festival
The Artifact Festival took place on the final day of the program, February 13, 2026, from 4 PM to 8 PM at 2 Marina Blvd, Building B300 — the Fort Mason campus.67 Admission was free but required an RSVP through Luma, where 2,908 people registered as "went."7 F.inc separately estimated 4,000 total attendees.4
The Luma event page separated registration into four ticket types: Builder/Founder, Investor (requiring accredited-investor verification), Media/Press, and General Admission.7 Hosted by Stavan Patel, Furqan Rydhan, Hubert Thieblot, Adrianna Lakatos, Dante Lentini, Aiden Blumenstein, Ruslan, and Mike Shin, the event was billed as "the BIGGEST FOUNDER FESTIVAL of the year."47
One hundred and twenty teams showed working products in a science-fair-style layout where attendees walked the floor, tried the products firsthand, and spoke directly to the builders.6 The event listing described the demos as "AI cameras. Voice agents. Facade-cleaning robots. World models that run on your laptop. And 100+ more."6 Beyond the demo floor, the festival included live DJ sets, food and refreshments, and interactive games.6
Founders, Inc. livestreamed the event on YouTube; the recording ran 3 hours and 49 minutes and had accumulated 768 views by April 2026.8 Attendee Audrey Aui Yong described the event on LinkedIn as "unhinged in the best way possible," noting that "founders [were] shipping on the spot" and that OpenClaw, an AI project, drew the most attention on the demo floor.9
Teams
Adrianna Lakatos published the full Artifact team list on LinkedIn after the festival, listing 150 founders across roughly 80 named teams plus "dozens more."5 The projects spanned AI software, hardware robotics, fintech, health tech, and consumer products.5
Selected teams from the published directory:5
- VitroBot — autonomous robot that cleans building facades
- PieLine — voice AI for restaurant orders
- Marketrix — AI-native software support (also demoed live to 2,000+ people on the festival floor)12
- HOVER — a functional hoverboard
- Synthrails — humanoid robots for warehouse labor
- Narsil — security robots
- Municipal Robotics — sidewalk-cleaning robots
- Zodiac — portable navigator for the visually impaired
- PureFi — stablecoin neobank offering 6% yield
- Trace — PCB design tool modeled on Cursor's interface
- Daymaker — cake-as-a-service delivery
- Minds AI — AI that can simulate anyone
- Satori — token-reduction system achieving 83% fewer tokens with equivalent AI output
- Milq — "Lovable for iOS" built in Swift
- Avera Robotics — VR-controlled robots
- Devol Robots — world models for robotic manipulation
- Beni AI — AI companion with FaceTime-style video calling
- Rhinovate — 3D modeling for surgical visualization
F.inc's summary of the cohort output: "a hoverboard. a robot that cleans skyscrapers. cake. as. a. service. an AI that can simulate anyone. a navigator for the visually impaired. a stablecoin bank with 6% yield. humanoids for warehouse labor."5
Context in f.inc's program history
Artifact was the fourth cohort program f.inc had run, following Ship It (February–March 2025, 60+ teams), Off Season (summer 2025, 48 teams), and Blueprint (fall 2025, 50 hardware builders).11413 Each program had grown in scale: Ship It started with 60 builders over four weeks; Artifact accepted 200 founders over five.3
The Artifact Festival was also the largest public event in f.inc's history.4 The previous cohort-ending event, the Blueprint Festival in November 2025, had been described as "a music festival, but for hardware" and featured 50 teams — less than half the Artifact cohort's 120-team demo floor.14
After Artifact, f.inc announced Canopy as its successor program in March 2026, consolidating the various program formats into a single five-week cohort running four times per year and adding an online track for the first time.13 By that point, Hubert Thieblot reported that f.inc had funded 55 startups in the preceding year, produced its first unicorn, doubled the campus footprint, quadrupled deployed capital, and brought over 1,000 founders to San Francisco through its programs.13