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Y Combinator’s European founder intake continues to grow

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Re: Y Combinator’s European founder intake continues to grow

#111

Post by streamofdigits »

There are cultural and political barriers that segment the European landscape like cracks in dry desert soil. From miserly jealousy to parochialism, to excessive (and in parts corrupt) bureaucracy, to very preliminary economic / financial / legal integration, to (justified) lack of trust between European states and long-held rivalries, its all here in abundance.

Maybe YC can see past all that malaise into a brighter European future where startups scale and change the world :-)

... or maybe its just funny money that is being spend on a deep out of the money option.

Re: Y Combinator’s European founder intake continues to grow

#112

Post by qwerty456127 »

gyulai wrote: post #104
qwerty456127 wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If you speak the right incantations at the counter, invoking the relevant legal reference What are these? > There's also nothing stopping them from making that bank account the least attractive bank account you've ever heard of Why would they want to? What do they actually risk? > restricting you to just a few machines in a restricted geographical area. Officially area-specific or just through the specific kind of…

> > If you speak the right incantations at the counter, invoking the relevant legal reference > What are these? "Basiskonto nach § 31 Zahlungskontengesetz" [1], and tell them that you are aware that the regulator BaFin has a specific process in place for complaints about banks who refuse an application for a basic account [2] > > There's also nothing stopping them from making that bank account the least attractive ba…

Very informative. Thank you.

Re: Y Combinator’s European founder intake continues to grow

#113

Post by NicoJuicy »

Cthulhu_ wrote: post #79
pjc50 wrote: post #7

Payflow: https://www.payflow.es/ (surprisingly, no english version) This is a fantastic innovation if it takes off and if the charges aren't prohibitive; it has the potential to obliterate predatory payday lending. In a world of free instant automatic electronic payments, there's no good reason to delay salary payments until the end of the month.

While I agree that it's a good innovation, it's fighting the symptoms of low wages and high cost; people living paycheck to paycheck. Wages should go up and cost of living should go down; people should be entitled to having financial reserves, to not be afraid of not making it to payday.

People mostly don't live paycheck to paycheck in Europe.

In Belgium, we're record savings holders.

I thought that was more in the US.

Re: Y Combinator’s European founder intake continues to grow

#114

Post by ToJans »

stevoski wrote: post #106
ToJans wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We're probably about the same age, so let me ask you this: have you ever heard or seen a European person (who failed a business he or she depended on) carrying his or her failure like a badge of honor? In my experience with job interviews (from both sides of the table) people tend to be ashamed, or they assume you should be ashamed about it. As for me personally, I like sharing both my failures and my successes, and…

> We're probably about the same age, so let me ask you this: have you ever heard or seen a European person (who failed a business he or she depended on) carrying his or her failure like a badge of honor? Yes, I have.

Ok; point taken. Would you tend to agree that the majority is or expects you to be ashamed about it, or is that not what you experience?

Re: Y Combinator’s European founder intake continues to grow

#115

Post by IAmEveryone »

ToJans wrote: post #82

In my experience (Belgian guy that dabbled a bit with EU VCs for my SaaS) Europe is very risk-adverse, and you either have to give up ridiculous amounts of equity for a little amount (i.e. 50k€ for a 25% to +50% stake) when not established yet, or have a recurring revenue of at least 50k€/month to get reasonable propositions. Also, European culture is slightly different: most people consider a startup failure as some…

Let's not overlook that about 98% of US states have also been trying to replicate the success of California, with decidedly mixed results. And the successes are all connected to giant economies like New York or research clusters as in MA.

Re: Y Combinator’s European founder intake continues to grow

#116

Post by _qsgk »

I am an American founder that accidentally built a company in Europe.

I hired my first person there, and through the path of least resistance, most of our 45 person team is based in Europe.

I believe I am playing 'business' on easy mode compared to European founders.

As an American founder it's pretty easy for my US company to pay my European team as contractors.

European founders have to comply with European employment law.

In the country a lot of my team resides, here are the rules:

1. ~50% tax on W2 employees (we pay none)

2. Ability to take 1 year of maternity leave, available on day 1 of joining a company. Up to 2 years if there are complications.

3. 32 days of PTO standard for entry level roles

Here were my rules as an American founder / company hiring in Europe:

1. No employment tax because everyone is hired as a contractor

2. Today we have a 2 month paid policy after 2 years in our org. We're hoping to improve this as our company becomes more financially secure, but the liability at this stage of our organization is significant.

3. We offer 38 days of PTO today, but for the first year we didn't have an official PTO policy.

Building a startup in Europe as a European founder is very, very hard due to the above compliance requirements.

Re: Y Combinator’s European founder intake continues to grow

#117

Post by Grustaf »

scrollaway wrote: post #62
Grustaf wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The solution to that is not to live even closer to the edge.

"Thanks I'm cured" What's your revolutionary idea there? People wouldn't be poor if only they had more money?

It's not very revolutionary but making it easier for people to save is a better long term solution than making it easier to get into debt.

Remember that we are discussing this on a solutions level, not an individual level.

Re: Y Combinator’s European founder intake continues to grow

#118

Post by lrem »

maeln wrote: post #58
oblio wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You wouldn't even be able to open a checking account, never mention any credit again. Is this just hearsay? It seems extreme, even for French levels of bureaucracy.

I think he is confusing "interdit bancaire" and bankruptcy. If you end up being put in the interdit bancaire file, yeah life pretty much sucks and most bank will refuse to do business with you. But having a company that go bankrupt doesn't mean you will be put in the file. You usually need to do things like stop paying your loan to be put on this file.

I likely am. The idea to try a startup in France was very short lived for me. Every card was stacked against me (many particuarly against me/my ideas, not everything is a reflection on society), so I moved on after just a few conversations.

Re: Y Combinator’s European founder intake continues to grow

#119

Post by Grustaf »

pjc50 wrote: post #61
Grustaf wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The solution to that is not to live even closer to the edge.

The solution to being poor is to have more money, yes. (You're going to reply to this with "just cut expenses", to which I can pre-emptively reply that some of the people in this situation are already choosing between food and heating. I'm going to pre-emptively cite the link from the other branch of the thread, https://www.fca.org.uk/news/news-stories/tougher-rules-payda... > We found some firms were using [continuo…

Even if you assume that their income is entirely fixed, I don't think you believe that all of them live exactly as cheaply as they possibly can.

I'd say if you can possibly survive without the heating, then it's better to do that for a while than borrowing money and end up even more dependent on your salary, being a week away from ruin rather than a month.

In short, payday lending is a short term solution that make things worse in the long term, even when it is free of interest.

Re: Y Combinator’s European founder intake continues to grow

#120

Post by tluyben2 »

stevoski wrote: post #88
ToJans wrote: post #82

In my experience (Belgian guy that dabbled a bit with EU VCs for my SaaS) Europe is very risk-adverse, and you either have to give up ridiculous amounts of equity for a little amount (i.e. 50k€ for a 25% to +50% stake) when not established yet, or have a recurring revenue of at least 50k€/month to get reasonable propositions. Also, European culture is slightly different: most people consider a startup failure as some…

> “European culture is slightly different: most people consider a startup failure as something bad that you drag along for the rest of your career.” I hear this over and over, but in my 20 years of living in Europe, I haven’t found this to be the case. Perhaps it is only in some European countries or cultures?

Not my experience either; I see it usually met with 'at least they tried while I did nothing'. But may depend where in the EU you ask.
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