O'Shaughnessy Ventures (OSV)

Choose the right route

• Working on a project of your own, as an individual: the O'Shaughnessy Fellowship.
• Funding for a project of your own, as the sister programme to the fellowship: O'Shaughnessy Grants.
• Already started a startup, or planning to raise outside investment to build a venture-scale company: Infinite Adventures, the venture arm. Its pages direct those founders there rather than to the fellowship.

How applications work

• The 2026 intake for the fellowships and grants closed on 30 April 2026.
• The three pages about that intake do not agree on its status. The fellowship site says applications are closed. The main site's fellowship page still shows an apply button against the same date. The application form itself now asks for a password. Treat the window as closed.
• Its pages do not say when the next window opens.
• The published timeline for the 2026 intake already slipped once: one page gives a closing date for the final conversations with the team, and notes on the same page that it is running past an earlier target date.

How selection works

• Applications were submitted through an online form on the fellowship site.
• The pages we read describe conversations with the OSV team as part of the process, and the 2026 timeline shows several rounds of them.

What reviewers look for

• The pages disagree on what to submit. One asks for a strong portfolio of proof of work. The help pages state no portfolio requirement and say the fellowship is open to adults worldwide regardless of background.
• Both funding programmes are open to adults worldwide. There is no residency or nationality rule on the pages we read.
• The fellowship is aimed primarily at individuals working on a project, not at companies raising outside investment.

Know the terms before you commit

• The fellowship funding is equity-free.
• Its pages give different sizes for the award, so confirm what the award currently covers with the team before you plan a year around it.
• The funding is described as supporting a year of work on your project, covering reasonable living and other expenses as long as they help with the work.

O'Shaughnessy Ventures, also known as OSV, is a family office investment and holding company. Its own site describes it as Jim O'Shaughnessy's family office. It gives funding to individuals working on a project of their own through a one-year fellowship and a sister grant programme, and it invests in companies through a venture arm called Infinite Adventures. Both funding programmes are open to adults anywhere in the world, and the fellowship runs fully remotely.

How programmes work

OSV runs two funding routes for people rather than companies, and a third route for companies.

The O'Shaughnessy Fellowship is a one-year programme. Fellows work from anywhere in the world. The funding is equity-free, and it is meant to support a year of work on the fellow's project; its pages describe it as covering reasonable living and other expenses as long as these help with the work. Its pages give different sizes for the award, so no amount is printed here.

O'Shaughnessy Grants is described as a sister programme to the Fellowships. Grantees receive funding to work on their project. Its pages say the plan is to award up to 20 grants a year in addition to the fellowships.

Infinite Adventures is OSV's venture capital arm. It invests in companies rather than funding a person's project. It is for founders who have already started a startup, or who plan to raise outside investment to build a venture-scale company.

The three routes are not interchangeable. The fellowship and the grants are for individuals, and the fellowship takes no equity. The venture arm is for companies that intend to raise outside investment.

The 2026 intake for the fellowship and grant programmes closed on 30 April 2026. One page still shows that date with an apply button, while the fellowship site says applications are closed and the application form now asks for a password. Its pages do not say when the next window opens.

Who can apply

Both funding programmes are open to adults worldwide, regardless of their background. The pages we read state no nationality, residency or location rule. Applicants from India have been funded: the winners page lists a 2025 grantee based in India, Chandhana Sathishkumar.

The help pages describe the fellowship as aimed primarily at individuals working on a project, rather than at companies. Founders who have already started a startup or plan to raise outside investment to build a venture-scale company are directed to Infinite Adventures instead.

The pages disagree on what an application has to show. One asks for a strong portfolio of proof of work. The help pages say the fellowship is open to adults worldwide regardless of their background, and state no portfolio requirement. Both readings sit on live pages, so decide what to submit only after you have read both.

Scale

These are OSV's own figures and they do not all agree. The fellowship site counts 11,813 applicants in the 2026 window. A help article describes the volume as a couple of thousand applications a year for a couple of dozen fellowships. Read the applicant count as an order of magnitude rather than a settled number.

The same site says that over three years it has searched in more than 160 countries and funded more than 75 individuals. The winners page names 13 fellows for 2026. Elsewhere the site says up to 20 fellowships are awarded each year, while the help pages describe an intended intake of about 10 fellows and 20 grantees a year. None of these is an audited count.

Who runs it

The legal name on the site is O'Shaughnessy Ventures, L.L.C. The site describes OSV as Jim O'Shaughnessy's family office investment and holding company. Alongside the funding programmes and the venture arm, it also carries books, films and media work.

Its pages do not state when the organisation was founded. A footer line carries a copyright year of 2023, and the privacy policy takes effect in December 2022. The pages we read give no street address, city or country for the organisation. The only email address published is for privacy requests, and there is no general contact inbox. Founders apply through the programme's own online form, and those interested in Infinite Adventures are pointed to the contact form on the main site.