Anyone else thought that the list of failed startups starts with NerdPilots? That ad is a little misplaced.
Yeah, the ads were pretty intrusive in this article. Still got us all to engage, though! Some content marketer is happy today.
Y Combinator Failed Startups
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Re: Y Combinator Failed Startups
#22Anyone else thought that the list of failed startups starts with NerdPilots? That ad is a little misplaced.
I didn't realize it wasn't first on yhe list until I read your post! I though to myself, of course, why would YC fund a contract development shop, such a wrong model for VC no wonder they must have failed.
Ha!! This makes my day - I thought they were on the list of failed startups too, thought the way fact same thing as you and didn’t even realize they weren’t a YC company until I got here. :)
Thanks friend - I needed that chuckle today!
Re: Y Combinator Failed Startups
#23Does Theranos count?
I'd say they achieved even less than most start-ups.
Re: Y Combinator Failed Startups
#24That's not why Meta failed. Meta failed because their product was garbage.
Has any AR product not been garbage?
The HoloLens 1 does what it claims to do. It is uncomfortable, the FOV is narrow, but it's usable and there aren't any big, negative surprises. You can use it and say, "yeah, I get it, I can see where this is going".
The Magic Leap doesn't do what they claimed it would do. But it does do what the HoloLens 1 does, slightly better in some areas, slightly worse in others.
The Meta2 was fundamentally broken. Nothing on it worked correctly. Everything on it was a hack job.
Re: Y Combinator Failed Startups
#25This article says Atrium ran out of money, but I feel like Justin Kan’s blog post said they gave tens of millions back to investors when they shut down.
Re: Y Combinator Failed Startups
#26Does Theranos count? I'd say they achieved even less than most start-ups.
No, they don’t count, because they were not a Y Combinator startup.
Re: Y Combinator Failed Startups
#27Does Theranos count? I'd say they achieved even less than most start-ups.
Theranos wasn't a YC company
Re: Y Combinator Failed Startups
#28Worth noting that the proximate cause of death is often times largely uninformative as to why the startup actually failed.
Most failed startups fit into the following timeline: was burning more money than it was making => failed at raising more money => did a round of layoffs / cost cuts to get economics under control => couldn't right the ship and shut down / did a fire sale or acquihire
But, the above timeline doesn't teach you much about why the company really failed. The real answer almost always involves a multitude of contributing factors, and requires intimate knowledge of the startup's business.
For the most part, the only reliable source for this type of information is one of the founders, board members, or (sometimes but not always) c-level execs. And, even then, they have to be willing to be vulnerable (which is very rare).
If I could give some advice to Failory, it would be to think about how you can incentivize founders to share their stories. As it stands, they have little to gain and potentially a lot to lose (e.g. being labeled one of YC's "biggest failures")
Re: Y Combinator Failed Startups
#29How can you make a list of failed yc companies and not mention homejoy? $66m raised, bad operations, bas unit economics, lawsuits and an abrupt shutdown. All of that after being the calley darling for so long.
Will add it!
Re: Y Combinator Failed Startups
#30How can you make a list of failed yc companies and not mention homejoy? $66m raised, bad operations, bas unit economics, lawsuits and an abrupt shutdown. All of that after being the calley darling for so long.
Maybe because the CEO is now a YC exec