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This was an attempt to describe everything we do, so if there's anything I didn't cover, please let me know. (Sorry it's so long. I was surprised myself how long it turned out, but we do a lot.)
This is very interesting, but the topics covered make it seem like YC is only focused on advising companies how to raise more money.
Hrm, that's not good. Most of the convos are actually about the product. We only switch to talking about investors towards the end of the 3 months, and even then we talk more about the product. Maybe it seems that way because this talks about all the stuff that's common to all the startups, and the things to do with the product are usually more startup-specific than those to do with investors.
I'm the last person to give you writing advice, but maybe some examples would help.
How much larger can Y Combinator get? 36 start ups is already a huge number.
I don't know. One of our general principles with YC is to apply software techniques to startup funding. So we approach scaling YC the way you'd approach scaling software: we scale up till we hit a bottleneck, then we remove that bottleneck and keep going. Funding 36 startups at a time would have seemed impossible back when we were doing 8. And in fact it would have been impossible to do 36 the way we operated then. S…
This was an attempt to describe everything we do, so if there's anything I didn't cover, please let me know. (Sorry it's so long. I was surprised myself how long it turned out, but we do a lot.)
This is very interesting, but the topics covered make it seem like YC is only focused on advising companies how to raise more money.
I'd also say that even the fundraising stuff isn't just about raising money. Having a smart angel investor give you feedback on your startup isn't just about raising money; it's also about building a product, a team, and a company.
This is very interesting, but the topics covered make it seem like YC is only focused on advising companies how to raise more money.
Most of the dinners and office hours are focused on building a great startup, not raising money. There is structure around raising money (angel day, demo day, sequoia, etc.), but it's definitely a minority of the focus. I'd also say that even the fundraising stuff isn't just about raising money. Having a smart angel investor give you feedback on your startup isn't just about raising money; it's also about building a…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't know. One of our general principles with YC is to apply software techniques to startup funding. So we approach scaling YC the way you'd approach scaling software: we scale up till we hit a bottleneck, then we remove that bottleneck and keep going. Funding 36 startups at a time would have seemed impossible back when we were doing 8. And in fact it would have been impossible to do 36 the way we operated then. S…
I'm curious whether, and how, you're going to start pulling in alumni to scale it up, and how that will turn out.
This is very interesting, but the topics covered make it seem like YC is only focused on advising companies how to raise more money.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm curious whether, and how, you're going to start pulling in alumni to scale it up, and how that will turn out.
Yes, in several ways. We hired Harj and Alexis, who are alums. We have some of the alumni read the applications, in case we overlook any good ones. And the alumni who come in to give advice about funding are fabulous.