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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

#221

Post by daanlo »

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…

Founder from Berlin here. €50k for 25% is really off-market, even if you are a first time founder (at least in Berlin, Paris, London and hopefully all across Europe). And IMHO having worked in a startup (even if you aren‘t the founder) is seen as a BIG career plus if you join any corporate afterwards. I would say we have a thriving eco-system across Europe. Not at the level of SV, but still many big and meaningful companies with global foot prints being built every year.

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

#222

Post by scrollaway »

Grustaf wrote: post #117
scrollaway wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"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.

Yeah, you don't have a solution, you're just using the opportunity to complain about "the poor" (cf your other post specifically).

"The solution is not to live this close to the edge" is akin to "the solution to car accidents is to not get into car accidents".

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

#223

Post by dcolkitt »

bluecalm wrote: post #187
euorme wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're cheating the system, though. The system exists in order to support the way of life in these countries, by bringing your American employment attitudes to Europe you're not really building a company in Europe by any measure: you're building an American company. Your company is benefitting from the robust systems in Europe, without contributing. There are people you want to hire in Europe _because of people payin…

You have to admit though that maternity leave from day one which often comes with obligations like keeping the position open (so you have to fire someone who has already being doing the job for a year+ if the mother comes back) is a ridiculous requirement. Sure, it makes sense for a huge employer where those things are just cost of doing business and you can afford to hire enough people to cover for that. It absolute…

The problem (and this extends to many policies in the US as well) is that it’s deceptively easy to offload the cost of welfare benefits to employers. Paid maternity leave is just welfare for new mothers. I’m not saying that’s a bad thing, but it is what it is. But paying someone not to work is welfare.

However the government handing out welfare checks is not very popular. Even taking welfare brings up images of government cheese. Often middle class people won’t avail themselves of these programs even if they qualify.

So from a policy perspective we solve this by making the employer administer the welfare program and call it an “employment benefit”. Now it goes from a source of shame to a marker of status. Benefits are something enjoyed by middle-class professionals.

This all works out fine for large companies, where the law of large numbers makes these costs statistically predictable and easy to hedge. But it’s a huge unmanageable risk for small business. If you’re in a four person startup and one person goes on paid maternity leave for a year, your company is pretty much dead.

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

#224

Post by Grustaf »

scrollaway wrote: post #222
Grustaf wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Yeah, you don't have a solution, you're just using the opportunity to complain about "the poor" (cf your other post specifically). "The solution is not to live this close to the edge" is akin to "the solution to car accidents is to not get into car accidents".

I wonder if you actually read what I wrote. I haven't written a single word of complaint about the poor. I am complaining about payday loans, I don't think it's a good idea, even when they are interest free. The long term effect is likely to be mostly harmful.

I haven't claimed to have a solution, what I am saying is that ideas that increase saving are better.

I did not saying anything like "the solution is to not live this close to the edge." That is the intended effect, not the path there.

But if I were to invest in a startup in this space it would be one that helped people save. Some random ideas that I think are all better than payday loans: gamifying micro saving, lowering food costs by selling simple staple foods in bulk, access to discounts on soon-to-perish food.

Also: financial literacy education. This is a problem even in well off countries, it's just that people are doing fine anyway because the bottom tier is still quite ok here.

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

#225

Post by peoplefromibiza »

filoleg wrote: post #213
peoplefromibiza wrote: post #196

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The majority of them have experienced failure, just like everybody else. What they are (require to be) ashamed of is tricking the system or running illegal businesses that lead to the aforementioned failure.

> What they are (require to be) ashamed of is tricking the system or running illegal businesses that lead to the aforementioned failure. Are you trying to say that most startup failures are due to their illegal nature? If that's the case for majority of failed startups in Europe that you are familiar with, that's kind of telling (whether it is in regards to startups in Europe in general or just the European startups…

No, you got it completely backwards.

I'm trying to say that people are not ashamed of failure in Europe and that the only kind of failure that is a shame is using illegal/unethical tactics.

In several European countries what Uber and Airbnb did to local markets is considered shameful.

Also the term disruption is considered a bad thing.

To put it in more simple terms for you: people are more important than profit.

That's why, generally speaking, quality of life is better than US average, despite lower average salaries.

Also Europe is not a monolith, so whoever talks about Europe as a single entity is probably wrong.

Barcelona, for example, has a very active startup scene and it's 10 times better than any city in the US.

There is also a tendency is the US to consider a success becoming a monopolist or a unicorn, that's not what many startups here aim for.

There is also a huge language barrier, Americans usually show no or little interest foe anything that is not in English.

It's highly probable you don't have frequent contacts with people speaking (only or mainly) French, Spanish, Danish, Hungarian, Italian , German, Dutch etc. etc. but most Europeans do or know someone that can work as a trait d'union.

there are many startups working in the green economy here that are doing great things, by working together instead of fighting each other.

Fintech is also better in Europe than in US.

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

#226

Post by ukez »

dcolkitt wrote: post #219
DandyDev wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And what kind of person you think we are talking about here for 60k in Amsterdam? Is that a senior Software Engineer? Or even an engineering lead (responsible for a bunch of other SEs)? Because 60k per year in Amsterdam equates around 4.6k per month + holiday pay. I can hire at most a medior - senior SE for that in AMS (let's say 4-5 years of experience) and I really don't believe a person with that kind of experienc…

> I really don't believe a person with that kind of experience would earn 300k a year in SV. I just spoke with someone two years out of CS undergrad who’s starting at $350k TC at one of the big SV unicorns.

I'm 3.5 years out of CS undergrad, successful in my niche, receive good reviews at work. Graduated top 10% of my class and was hired before I ever graduated.

I make 78k in a medium cost of living US city where a 3 bedroom 2 bath house costs $450,000 1 hour away from work. The same home costs $700,000 within 20-30min of work.

Something overlooked a little bit is student loan debt many American devs start with. I have $50k in student loan debt myself.

We make more than in Europe, but most of us aren't drowning in money like people from SV would make you think.

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

#227

Post by bluecalm »

dcolkitt wrote: post #223
bluecalm wrote: post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You have to admit though that maternity leave from day one which often comes with obligations like keeping the position open (so you have to fire someone who has already being doing the job for a year+ if the mother comes back) is a ridiculous requirement. Sure, it makes sense for a huge employer where those things are just cost of doing business and you can afford to hire enough people to cover for that. It absolute…

The problem (and this extends to many policies in the US as well) is that it’s deceptively easy to offload the cost of welfare benefits to employers. Paid maternity leave is just welfare for new mothers. I’m not saying that’s a bad thing, but it is what it is. But paying someone not to work is welfare. However the government handing out welfare checks is not very popular. Even taking welfare brings up images of gover…

Well, in Europe you don't pay the whole salary during the leave (details depend on the country but it's something like you pay for one month and then the government pays from social security fund) you just have obligations like keeping the position open.

This has many problems though anyway as it just offloads most of the financial burden but doesn't offload the organizational one. It also doesn't make any sense to make the employer responsible for maternity leave as it doesn't make sense to make them responsible for healthcare (which Europe gets right). If you're someone who wants to pay above market rates then you're a target as maternity leave depends on your salary. The problem is difficult because we need a system in which having children at young age isn't a career suicide. Maternity leave as implemented in Europe is definitely not it as the incentives are to first get to a decent salary and only then have children.

One idea which I think makes sense is to allow children to have % of their taxes to go to their parents directly. Allow children to opt out to punish especially shitty parents. This I think aligns the incentives pretty well (to have children while young, to take good care of them, to educate them etc.)

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

#228

Post by tohmasu »

filoleg wrote: post #211
missedthecue wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Say I want to buy information about you. How would I go about doing that? Where to I put in my credit card details? Facebook doesn't sell data. They sell advertising space. They're a billboard company.

Agreed. "Selling user data" is just a nice catchphrase thrown around by people who didn't look into how FB ads really makes money and how they really work. Just at a cursory evaluation, it makes no sense, because if Facebook sold the data directly, why would advertisers even need Facebook after that? All of those questions can be answered by simply playing around with FB Advertising UI for less than an hour. But hati…

Hey guys, I just wanted to say that it looks completely natural that a short sarcastic post about social media in general gets followed by two suppressing posts that very specifically defend Facebook, completely have each others backs and also delivers a little ad hominem.

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

#229

Post by ranguna »

j7ake wrote: post #175
pembrook wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If we’re talking Zurich specifically, the difference would probably only be 2-3X less than FANMAG/ETC. London salaries are high too (not Zurich levels from what I’ve seen), but that market is now separate from the EU. But most places in Europe with tech scenes and outsized VC investment, eg. helsinki, stockholm, berlin, amsterdam, etc you’re talking 5X less salary than in Silicon Valley. Given the tech talent in thos…

Is it fair to compare salaries in one specific place in USA versus the average European city ? Seems like you are comparing max salary in USA vs average salary in Europe. Seems fair to consider max salary in Europe when comparing with SV. There should also be arbitrage opportunities for cities outside of SV in USA.

Yep, doesn't make sense to make this comparison.

Specially since EU has a (mostly) functional social security system, which the US doesn't. It takes money to run that system and I'll happily take a pay cut to the gov if people in need are getting "my" money.

My grandfather pays 0€ in insulin, compared to the 100s$ in the US thanks to all the kids who don't want to share their money with people that actually need it to survive.

But now I'm comparing economic systems (more community driven vs full capitalist), and this discussion can go on forever, so I'll just end it here.

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

#230

Post by biztos »

mod50ack wrote: post #209
biztos wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> or traveling to visit it Except during Covid, which might last forever. > No currency conversion needed either Except when you need to transact literally anything outside of the SEPA system, and then you have conversations and bank fees and very little control over either.

Travelling within the EU during Covid is very easy. Just be vaccinated and there are virtually zero barriers.

Sorry, no. Source: American traveling around Europe right now with my American vaccination papers. Getting Yet Another PCR test tomorrow, thank you very much.
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