- didn't get in first time (check, different company though).
- weren't sure if good fit for b2b/ saas company (wrong).
- questioned how much value YC could provide us (many times more than expected).
for us going through YC, working with the partners, and joining the YC network were the best things we could have possibly done.
Thinking back to life pre-YC (Dec-13) to now the rate of change (progress/ growth/ knowledge) is unreal.
That is great to know. I had mistakenly assumed that it is one of the key requirements. I am in my late 30s and will be soon starting on my startup journey. Having worked with a big telecom vendor for a large part of my career, I sometimes make the mistake of finding reasons why I cannot start a venture. I suppose it is time for a real change. Whether I go for YC or not this year (I live in the UK and cannot leave in the near future for personal reasons), I am surely going to give this whole startup thing a good kick in the coming days!
I suspect it is also true that comments are more of a liability than an asset.
"He has no comments, he must have been busy doing something else interesting." vs "He has 500 comments, and shows he isn't interested in considering other approaches"
I created an HN account when we applied, because I had to. I lurked beforehand, but never commented. My cofounder had about 14 months on me account wise but he had been thinking about applying us to YC for that whole time. So I don't think it hurt us.
I think the post tries to encourage more people to start startups and to apply to YC, however, I think the way this post is formulated, it gives the impression that if you have a good idea you can simply apply, which I don't think is true at all. I think it would be really helpful to write that people should only apply to YC if they either have a track record or traction. Criterion 1 is Track record consists of these three things
1. Built/sold something impressive before
2. Worked at Facebook or Google
3. Graduated from Stanford
Criterion 2 is traction, which is either 10.000 users for consumer or $5.000 revenue for B2B after 6 months.
In summary, if the founder does not have a track record as described above or strong traction, she/he is very unlikely to get into YC. Explaining this will prevent people without a track record from thinking that they only have to have a good idea, because if you don't have a track record you need a really good idea with a huge market and traction to get in. I don't think many founders realise that.
I might be wrong, so I would love for others to critizise or add to my comment. I would love to hear about examples for instance, of a recent startup where the founders neither had a track record, nor traction.
In terms of meeting your requirements, Ryan Hoover is a perfect example. I don't believe he'd sold a startup before, he isn't an ex-Facebook or Google employee, and he didn't go to Stanford. I'd randomly found him on Twitter roughly a year ago and suddenly I read a TechCrunch article about how a product he'd made is in YC. He came out of nowhere, so to speak.
Which to me, is the most fairest way to sell your idea to YC. If you have an idea people actually want and you have some work done, sell it. But the other two are certainly true. You are from Stanford, you probably can leverage some connections outside of YC.
Good post but I wish there was more transparency in what YC was looking for (though I understand this is difficult, otherwise people would game it).
There are companies that are accepted with just an idea and companies with six figure revenues that are rejected. There are founders with bad ideas that are "funded for the pivot," and founders like Drew Houston who are rejected because their initial idea was bad.
I think a lot of it has to do with who you are and then what you have coming in (in terms of a product).
So for example. If you're a Stanford grad, have already started and exited a company and now are a part-time VC, you can probably get into YC with just an idea. (similar to Standard Treasury).
Alternatively if you've not made a name for yourself yet it's likely YC would look for something already built, with users, and possibly revenue.
(2) Dan and I are part-time angels really, with very small checks given to a very small number of companies. Also, as sama mentioned, we basically stopped investing at all once we got into YC. We still make an investment from time-to-time but mostly in people we know already. We don't have meetings, way too busy on Standard Treasury.
(3) We felt like an underdog when we applied to YC. I think we were underdogs when we applied! We didn't know them and certainly didn't have much of a reputation outside of financial technology (still don't?). We felt very fortunate when we got in. YC was amazing for us and has always been supportive of our mild madness.
I don't really want to jump into this and cast judgments on anyone because I don't know the situation. That said, if you are/were a part-time angel, you either have done quite well for yourself or come from a privileged background (or both).
I don't really want to keep writing about myself in this thread because I'm not really that interesting...
We raised the money from friends, neither Dan and I are really financially capable of making investments ourselves. So, we're both privileged in that we've hustled and got people to have faith in us; however, both of us came from humble backgrounds (my mom and dad were a waitress and a postman, respectively) and neither of us have done that well for ourselves...yet.
And my comment wasn't meant to come off as "these are exactly the things Standard Treasury did to get in". It was more of a comparison of the type of founders YC would look for in a product that is still in the initial idea phase. So thanks for clearing that up.
The angel thing is actually interesting to me. You don't think that had any weight on YC's decision to admit you guys? To me it would seem like someone who could clearly support themselves financially enough to be an angel would be an ideal candidate as a founder...but I'm not an investor so I have no idea if these things are good or bad.
As sama answered above (below?) Angel investing is likely not going to help your cause. If you are already successful to the point that you have enough financial viability, then it's a lot easier to walk away from something that isn't working. Which is bad for YC. Scrappy founders will work their butt off before hanging it up. That said. Financially successful or not, great founders (2nd time, 3rd time) and a great product/company, is what will likely get you in.
if you are a part-time VC, we are very unlikely to fund you unless you agree to quit in the interview. it's hard to start a startup no matter what, but much more so with a part-time job on the side.
Drew originally applied with an SAT test prep company. He's lucky that he was rejected, otherwise he may have spent years working on that instead of starting DropBox.
I think people say they are "too early" because they feel that don't have the resume to get accepted. They feel like if they could only get user traction before applying you might over look our mediocre grades, work history, and personal projects. We've evaluated our own YC resumes and found they come up short. I don't think there are too many people out there who have a killer project and/or super smart founders that are hesitant to apply because they genuinely think their company is in too early of a stage.
Paul Buchheit: "We definitely fund [solo founders], but you have to be about 4 times as good. I think Instacart was a solo founder, and that's a great company. We're very happy to fund single founders; it's really more for your benefit. If you can possibly find someone, it really does help."
As a solo founder from the w14 batch: I can tell you it feels more difficult to do everything yourself. I'd recommend if you can organically find someone to work with on the company, you should.
Happy to answer any solo founder related questions, if you have them.
Yea, I know that it's much better if you have cofounder (there are so many tasks to do), but I believe it should be the right person, and wrong person can make much more damage then help.
As a solo founder, how did you improve your productivity on early stage: what kind of tasks you usually delegated to someone else (like freelancer) if you did.
I had a cofounder who split about 3 months before, but he wasn't full-time and hadn't contributed any code in the months leading up to it.
I had hired a sales guy right before yc, which helped somewhat. During yc, I basically bounced between growth tasks which was really difficult. I'm still figuring it out tbh.
We now have a larger team which helps a lot... But I still often miss the camaraderie of having someone who 100% has your back.
The other thing is a sense of impostor syndrome to fight against... I feel like I don't have anyone who will see a bigger picture totally, so I find myself doubting my decisions much more frequently.
So glad you're open to solo-founder questions, thank a bunch. In your experience, do you think that you might just have unreasonably high standards for partners compared to people who have successfully matched with cofounders?
Would love to share the climb with a co-founder. Outreach efforts have put me in touch with smart, creative, educated people in the Bay Area. But to my surprise, I just haven't met a truly gritty, determined person yet. Started projects with the people I found anyways. It always feels like playing tea party with stuffed animals. Not a good experience for them, or me.
These lovely people live pleasant, balanced, healthy, entertaining, lives. Bless them. Nothing wrong with that! But they don't have crazy drive. Don't wanna run circles around a partner in any project. Want a cofounder to be my equal or superior in energy and persistence, that we can chase each other's effort, enhance each other's growth/success, and the project's growth/success.
I don't want a pampered, entertaining life. I want to struggle, grow, learn, achieve. Not sure how to find partners to share those values with. Should I make sure that partners share those values, or are these criteria unreasonable/misguided?
Flying solo for now. Later, maybe self-made success on a larger scale/stage may draw special people to me, so I don't have to actively search. A co-founder isn't a necessity for me, just a highly desired and recommended luxury, if I can reasonably get one. When a commenter above said, in paraphrase, "Going solo isn't impossible, you just need to be four times better", I just think "Fine, I'll work to get there."
Am I doing it wrong? Right? Sound familiar or was your co-founder-less situation different?
IMHO I think the chances are perhaps based on how competitive the batch is. Also are you a technical or non-technical founder. Also is it a sole founder + CTO/hires or just only 1 founder. From their point of view, they probably can consider the merits of your skill but the likelyhood is if you desire to scale (which YC can help with) it will require more than 1 person. It can be done by one person but im sure it can certainly can be overwhelming for one person and scaling a business as it can require sometimes more than only 1 person.
In general, there aren't any differences. We're looking for people who can create something that people will want. For hardware companies, that will likely require some hardware skills, so show us that you have what it takes to ship whatever it is that you are building. You should also have a good understanding of how much capital will be required to ship your v1, as that will often be an issue if you're actually manufacturing something.
I've got a startup with an almost ready product, a team that has started businesses before, and is bootstrapped with our own money. I'd love to give a presentation, but I'm based in Europe. Does YC do Europe? (I'm more than happy to fly. Question is whether you care where a firm is based.)
There's a FAQ-section you might want to read, as it specifically mentions location. They don't care where you're based, but you do have to follow the YC program in the US. After YC, you could return to Europe, but it's probably a good idea to stick around. Provided you get a suitable visa, of course...
http://www.ycombinator.com/faq/
We have some very successful single-founder companies, such as Instacart. We suggest finding a cofounder not for our benefit, but for your own. Startups are hard, and doing it alone makes it even harder.
pg has said multiple times that a major downfall of a lot of companies is that the two founders have a dispute. What is the major downfall of companies with single founders?
Single founder can work but it's usually not ideal. For one thing, it demonstrates that you can't find or persuade even a single other person interested enough in you and your idea to join up.
Is it a negative signal if you're older but still only find one or two things you feel are 'impressive'? One of the things I noticed is that older founders I've met wouldn't bother with YC because it's for 'young folks'.
I seem to answer the age question every application period....[1]. That said. We were 36 & 37. Not the oldest they'd ever seen, but one of the oldest in our batch. But there were a few of us over 35...
I did think of applying at some point but I actually thought of i may be too late since i already have a product and growing revenue. I was under the impression YC was just a seed accelerator. Thanks for clearing that up and encouraging us to take a look again.
The application process (like the thiel fellowship) itself teaches you a ton about yourself and your business. Although we weren't accepted to either, I came out a more insightful person (let's go round 2!).
I think it takes a certain degree of courageousness to pursue entrepreneurship in the first place, and that shouldn't get dwindled down when applying to YC as you have everything to gain and nothing to lose.
sama, I'm curious about how it works when YC invests in a company with "millions of dollars raised"; do you still take 7% and if so how do you avoid the appearance of a down round?
Someone looking at the investment history of a company isn't going to blindly look at the number and say "down round"; they're going to look at the name "Y Combinator".
Correct me if I am wrong, but isn't YC for the Ivy League class type? The "I dropped out cause I am smart" type? The "I wrote a book on _____" type? "I worked at Google or Facebook" type? What about the regular type that doesn't have much to show, but wants to do great things?
Basically, I feel like the YC application is a pissing match of who can piss the farthest shown on paper not outside. haha :)
I have realized I don't fit the YC type.. so I won't apply.
> What about the regular type that doesn't have much to show, but wants to do great things?
People who want to do great things, and who have the right combination of talent and drive to actually do them, have usually done great things already. Perhaps not in the same sphere, and perhaps not as great as they aim in the future, but still great.
If you don't have much to show, why should you expect to be regarded favorably in any competitive endeavor? Evaluating people based on what they have demonstrated is by far the fairest method, and I can't really imagine what you would propose to replace it with.
If you don't have much to show now, you have the opportunity to see to it that you will in a few months. Just because some doors are closed to you now doesn't mean they will be forever.
>> Evaluating people based on what they have demonstrated is by far the fairest method, and I can't really imagine what you would propose to replace it with.
Sounds like a great way to discriminate against those who are brilliant but have not been given the opportunity (through a certain type of upbringing, e.g. race, gender, income, nationality, etc.) to demonstrate it.
I don't have a solution, but I do think that by relying too much on someone's track record, it's easy to miss other types of people who can be equally successful given the chance.
I understand that everyone starts from a different place, and degrees of privilege certainly vary.
However, the ability to create success in the face of failure is a core property of most successful entrepreneurs. People who stand around waiting for someone to "give them a chance" are rarely the ones who materially impact the world.
Edit: lest somebody take the below comment negatively, I'd submit that one doesn't have much to lose by simply applying to YC, so I'm not sure I understand why there'd be any hesitation even by people who are very unlikely to get in.
The evidence by an overwhelming margin indicates that being born into privilege is one of the most significant indicators of future success. In fact, in the world of entrepreneurs, "being given a chance" is hardly necessary for the overwhelming majority of success cases, because by accident of their birth they had such a head start. In fact, most people who "materially impact the world", by a big, big, big margin, were people who were born into privilege.
So I don't think that it's a negative indicator if somebody is particularly skeptical of their chances of getting accepted by YC for not fitting into a certain mold. In fact, it strikes me as being incredibly rational.
That being said, if one doesn't try, one will never know for sure. That doesn't mean one should apply, either, and expect anything if one isn't already wealthy or connected.
Everyone has opportunities, just of different natures.
If, for example, someone had gotten a 3.5 GPA at a state university while working 40 hours a week and caring for an aging parent, I would judge that they had done something extraordinarily impressive. Whereas just the bare 3.5 GPA wouldn't impress me all that much.
Like many others that have commented, all of our founders graduated from non-Ivys, have not worked at Google or Facebook, and have definitely not written anything you'd pay for.
YC is not for regular people that just want to do great things, but for those that are actually working hard to do them. Traction is important, showing that you have the ability to produce great results is equally important. However, in the absence of traction or an actual product, graduating from an Ivy with a challenging major, writing a book, working at Google / Facebook are suitable proxies, as they are in themselves challenging achievements that not many can claim.
I think you're placing too much importance on "getting in" to YC. YC spots may be a limited commodity, but startups aren't. It's true that YC provides a great network, a media boost, and money, but...those are neither necessary nor sufficient for success.
Save your money, make a product, get people to pay you for it. When they say "No," ask them why not.
That's it. A lot of work. It probably won't make you famous. If it's fame you want, start a Youtube channel.
If YC partner selection is anything like YC founder selection the data says YC is for white and asian men who went to Stanford or Harvard, with few exceptions. YC partners, being only human, will tend to be biased in favor of people who are like them.
I'm pretty sure YC has not published any background diversity numbers. It would be good for the world if you did but I doubt you would find it flattering. I think this issue is just an understandable blind spot for you.
(TLDR; YC has published diversity numbers - see references. It might be useful for you to read some of the YC essays to understand what they look for.)
Note that originally YC was based around the idea of funding college students to try a startup instead of an internship over their semester break. At that point it was physically based near MIT & Harvard, with a winter (?) campus near Stanford.
As you'd expect, early intakes were dominated by people from those places (ie, mostly white and asian males who attended MIT, Harvard and Stanford). Also as you'd expect, success takes time, and so we are seeing those early successes moving into roles within YC.
I agree that increasing diversity of the YC partners, but it is important to understand the reasons why it is like that currently.
I think it is excellent that YC is aware of this problem, and is taking steps to correct it amongst the companies they fund[1][2].
I don't see it as a "look at the data" thing I see it as a human behavior thing.
I think it's actually a decent barrier which may correctly hold back people who are easily scared off (or who read situations wrong) at what appears to be a challenge that they don't or aren't able to face. In that case it's probably a good thing, not a bad thing. [1]
The "take your jack and shove it" parable applies here:
From my personal experience I've had cases where people have spammed me and I've ended up selling them things. (In one case in particular, a $160,000 sale...)
[1] In old school business these people were sometimes called "triflers". In ads people selling things would put in "no triflers" or "serious inquiries only" or "if you don't know what a junket is don't bother to even call". A person with (for lack of a better way to put it) "balls" would not be deterred by that at all.
Maybe, by no means am I referring to my past rejections, I know I lacked a team or maybe project idea itself. But look around the room next meetup, its lacking something.
What gives you this impression? From what I can tell (from the outside) YC is a pretty diverse crowd and I believe PG once said that academic background doesn't much matter. Grit (aka resilience, determination, relentlessness, etc) is more important.
In fact, there's nothing in the application form that even asks about education (there used to be but maybe it moved to the additional founder info - i.e it doesn't seem important at all).
I think this impression is pervasive (at least amongst my friends). It would be great to highlight founders who have gotten into YC who don't "fit the mold" so to speak. Most, if not all, of the "check out my winning YC application" posts have multiple Ivy League/Stanford founders, advantageous childhoods, etc. Add to that the same posts have "multiple people who are YC alums read, edited, and/or vetted our application" and you can see how that impression can spread.
I think one of the critical skills for a startup founder is to ignore the general impression and find out yourself what the actual reality is.
Another critical skill is the ability, when somebody else is confused by their general preconceptions, to point out why your special case is different and why they should abandon their general theories for the specific opportunity in front of them.
YC might very well do the highlighting you mention - it's to their advantage to draw as diverse an applicant pool as possible. However, in some ways this misses the point. It doesn't disqualify you if you didn't get into Stanford, Google, the Ivy League, etc. It does disqualify you if you think this is important enough to disqualify you.
That's true, and that's why I said YC may very well want to highlight such founders from disadvantaged backgrounds, if only for their own benefit.
However, I'm assuming that the YC partners are not going to be taking advice from me just because I post on Hacker News. People thinking of applying to YC might (hell, I might). They can control their actions, they can't control YC's actions. Why not focus on what you can control? That's another critical startup skill.
"It would be great to highlight founders who have gotten into YC who don't "fit the mold" so to speak. "
My personal feeling (per my other comment below) is that weeding out people that are easily scared off (or need super special encouragement) might be a good thing and not a bad thing.
Not having a halo doesn't mean "don't bother to even try" or "non starter". It just means work harder and figure out an angle that makes you unique and sell yourself. It can actually be an advantage rather than someone who thinks they can just phone it in.
For the record this was the attitude that got me into an Ivy League business school with no family connections, no family money and what had to be the lowest SAT scores in the class as well as my high school telling me not to even bother applying that "I wasn't the right material for that school".
I am not just talking about education. Trust me, look up the founders, its the same type. If I walked into a YC dinner I would probably stand out, not for lack of education, but something would not be mixed up right.
If you're ruling yourself out before you've even begun, then I find it difficult to have any sympathy. If the 'type' you're referring to is 'young, white male' then there are many aspects of life where you might be in the minority (I say that as someone who fails to tick two of those boxes).
YC could do more to highlight its existing diversity but I'm not simply going to take your word for it (you still haven't explained what you mean).
I'll reiterate something YC partners have said. If you're working on a startup, even if you don't apply, completing the application is a great way to clarify your idea and focus on what's important moving forward.
If you don't have much to show yet, don't sweat it. Just get started, and work on your ideas with whatever time you can afford. Some applicants will have accomplished more, but some may have started with huge disadvantages and overcame far more adversity to achieve a much less impressive track record. Regardless of not being the type that seemingly has an advantage, if you're going to build a successful startup, then go build it.
I just returned from meeting with the CEO of the only YC company based in my state. He's an awesome guy, and I'm very grateful he took the time to meet with me and offer his advice. Throughout the meeting, it seemed like he had the impression that I had no idea how much work I had ahead of me and how hard it actually is to get into YC. Being underestimated like that is so thrilling; I love it! It means he'll be that much more impressed when I accomplish what I plan to do whether I get into YC or not.
What a sad, self defeatist attitude. You just knocked yourself down before anyone else did. It seems you're afraid of trying because you're afraid of failure.
You're the type of person that probably won't get accepted. Because if this is your attitude now, who knows what your mood's going to be like when your startup goes through turbulence.
You're searching for a reason not to apply. To keep failure at bay. To keep pain from the ego.
I'm the type of person that doesn't care to be accepted and rather put energy into my own startup. I will be successful regardless, it's not saying I am afraid to fail. Failure and success have nothing to do with being accepted or rejected from YC. I think YC would be great and what they do is great, my hats off to the whole place, but people like you talk like YC is the win all.
Like I said above... Look up the majority of founders and they all fall into a category type. Not saying it's a bad thing, but it's a type.
Yea I did say that, but you are talking about success and failure like that has anything to do with applying or not. If you think I wont have success because I don't apply I feel bad for that thinking.
He's not saying that not applying causes not succeeding, but that the reasons you give for not applying cause not succeeding. That is, correlation, not causation.
I have a friend who is a YC alum and he is definitely hispanic. Not going to call him out, and of course that is only one person, but I don't feel that being a minority is going to hurt you. YC has made a lot of effort to address diversity: http://blog.ycombinator.com/diversity-and-startups
Your generalizations don't hold IMHO. What the accelerators I've been through select for is generally a tenacious personality, strength of the team, and something worth showing as a project or previous experience.
I am not saying selecting a type of group of people is wrong, but YC does have a type they only choose. If you disagree look up any founder and they will fall into a category type.
Ask yourself... How many woman accepted and not in recent years. How many Mexicans? How many african americans? How many regular guys that just had a prototype but no background to back it up. It's ok, I just don't know why YC acts like they are so diverse when clearly they aren't.
Then you probably don't fit either. And it's really not about trying to fit. It's about having good ideas, executing well, being resourceful, being persuasive, etc. I think you're missing the point if you think it's about "fitting in".
for us going through YC, working with the partners, and joining the YC network were the best things we could have possibly done.
Thinking back to life pre-YC (Dec-13) to now the rate of change (progress/ growth/ knowledge) is unreal.