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Tales from the trenches: our Y Combinator Interview Experience

tomaitch.com

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Re: Tales from the trenches: our Y Combinator Interview Experience

#11

Post by pg »

eterno wrote: post #8

Is it just me, or do real entrepreneurs need to be less excited about this YC interview thingy. If you care so much for third party approval from PG and folks (not that they are not nice/smart ppl) but then just go to a B-school dude and get that nice degree which will surrogate for your competencies in the real world. BillG didnt need no YC, neither did Google guys and neither did the ipod god - infact even PG didnt…

Actually we did have a prototype of YC: we had an angel investor, Julian Weber, who gave us our first $10k, got all our paperwork done, taught us the rudiments of business, introduced us to one of our two next investors, and let us demo to them in his NYC loft.

We were very lucky to have Julian, and we would have been even better off with YC, which is a superset. In addition to all the above, you get other startups as colleagues, and startup-specific advice.

Re: Tales from the trenches: our Y Combinator Interview Experience

#12

Post by eterno »

pg wrote: post #11
eterno wrote: post #8

Is it just me, or do real entrepreneurs need to be less excited about this YC interview thingy. If you care so much for third party approval from PG and folks (not that they are not nice/smart ppl) but then just go to a B-school dude and get that nice degree which will surrogate for your competencies in the real world. BillG didnt need no YC, neither did Google guys and neither did the ipod god - infact even PG didnt…

Actually we did have a prototype of YC: we had an angel investor, Julian Weber, who gave us our first $10k, got all our paperwork done, taught us the rudiments of business, introduced us to one of our two next investors, and let us demo to them in his NYC loft. We were very lucky to have Julian, and we would have been even better off with YC, which is a superset. In addition to all the above, you get other startups a…

Exactly, and for those guys who do not get into YC, they still have the option of getting a 'prototype of YC' - which in your own words is almost the same as YC.

I am not saying YC is bad - far from it - I am myself a big fan.

The only thing I was pointing out was that the YC interview rejection/acceptance should ideally have only as much importance as being rejected/accepted from probably another angel investor - which happens more often than not in the startup world and consequently should not be given a lot of importance.

The entrepreneurs who are in the trenches shouldnt really care as much about a rejection or two - its no big deal and even an acceptance might not be a big deal - but if you build something that people want and have something to show for it then feel free to jump over the moon.

Re: Tales from the trenches: our Y Combinator Interview Experience

#14

Post by tomaitch »

whatusername wrote: post #9

Interesting? Do YC refund/pay for flights? I'm thinking return tickets to SF, plus say 2 nights in a hotel for 2 is probably coming close to $5K(AU$). That's a pretty significant chunk of the seed funding that YC gives you. On that note though - congrats guys - always great to see some Melbournians doing great stuff on here.

We actually stayed for 11 days - we weren't going to fly all that way with the possibility of being unsuccessful, only to return immediately without having any fun.

But we did it on the cheap, and you're in the ballpark with the cost. YC reimbursed us USD $700 like everyone else.

Yep it was a big punt, but totally worth it.

Re: Tales from the trenches: our Y Combinator Interview Experience

#15

Post by tomaitch »

eterno wrote: post #8

Is it just me, or do real entrepreneurs need to be less excited about this YC interview thingy. If you care so much for third party approval from PG and folks (not that they are not nice/smart ppl) but then just go to a B-school dude and get that nice degree which will surrogate for your competencies in the real world. BillG didnt need no YC, neither did Google guys and neither did the ipod god - infact even PG didnt…

To some degree I'd agree with you more now having done YC than before.

If you live in the USA and have ways of working yourself into Silicon Valley or some other startup culture, or have some other kind of access to seed funding and mentorship, then you don't need YC to succeed.

For us here in Melbourne, it was much harder. There's a few successful tech entrepreneurs from the 80s and 90s but they don't really get the web. And the angel and VC communities are tiny and unsophisticated.

Sure we could have backed ourselves, left our Melbourne lives behind and headed for Silicon Valley in the hope of finding a way to make things work. And had there not been any other option, perhaps we might have tried that, although at our age, probably not.

YC allowed us to fast-track the whole process. In the space of 5 months we went from just another unknown little startup from Melbourne to demoing our product to some of the world's most astute tech investors and being acclaimed by fellow startup founders and high-profile Valley identities alike.

That's not to say we've succeeded... we have a huge task ahead of us. But YC has helped us do in a few short months what might have taken us years any other way.

Re: Tales from the trenches: our Y Combinator Interview Experience

#16

Post by tomaitch »

tomaitch wrote: post #15
eterno wrote: post #8

Is it just me, or do real entrepreneurs need to be less excited about this YC interview thingy. If you care so much for third party approval from PG and folks (not that they are not nice/smart ppl) but then just go to a B-school dude and get that nice degree which will surrogate for your competencies in the real world. BillG didnt need no YC, neither did Google guys and neither did the ipod god - infact even PG didnt…

To some degree I'd agree with you more now having done YC than before. If you live in the USA and have ways of working yourself into Silicon Valley or some other startup culture, or have some other kind of access to seed funding and mentorship, then you don't need YC to succeed. For us here in Melbourne, it was much harder. There's a few successful tech entrepreneurs from the 80s and 90s but they don't really get the…

I should add that what we gained from YC more than anything else was confidence.

With what we know now, we realise we possibly could have come to Silicon Valley and successfully launched our startup without YC-backing, although it still would have taken much longer.

But we didn't know anyone who could introduce us into the culture, and we had no way of knowing how much potential we had and how reasonable it was to believe we could succeed. We weren't even convinced that our idea was a good one until YC backed it.

So I guess, if you're already confident, you don't need YC.

Re: Tales from the trenches: our Y Combinator Interview Experience

#17

Post by axod »

tomaitch wrote: post #16
tomaitch wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To some degree I'd agree with you more now having done YC than before. If you live in the USA and have ways of working yourself into Silicon Valley or some other startup culture, or have some other kind of access to seed funding and mentorship, then you don't need YC to succeed. For us here in Melbourne, it was much harder. There's a few successful tech entrepreneurs from the 80s and 90s but they don't really get the…

I should add that what we gained from YC more than anything else was confidence. With what we know now, we realise we possibly could have come to Silicon Valley and successfully launched our startup without YC-backing, although it still would have taken much longer. But we didn't know anyone who could introduce us into the culture, and we had no way of knowing how much potential we had and how reasonable it was to be…

Why do you feel you need Silicon Valley / culture / mentorship etc?

If you have a good idea, just do it. Doesn't really matter where you are if you have the determination to succeed.

Re: Tales from the trenches: our Y Combinator Interview Experience

#19

Post by henryl »

zhyder wrote: post #6
henryl wrote: post #2

What happens if you're building an extremely complicated product (not web app)? Is a demo still required?

Nothing is _required_ but lack of a demo will make it much harder to convince an investor that your team gets the market and can build the right product, especially in 10 minutes. You'll have to compensate for that somehow. If it's a hardware gadget, can you produce renders of the device and mockups of the UI? How have you been able to convince others so far?

We had an old demo but we have since revamped the entire architecture. Would a video suffice?

Re: Tales from the trenches: our Y Combinator Interview Experience

#20

Post by david927 »

axod wrote: post #17
tomaitch wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I should add that what we gained from YC more than anything else was confidence. With what we know now, we realise we possibly could have come to Silicon Valley and successfully launched our startup without YC-backing, although it still would have taken much longer. But we didn't know anyone who could introduce us into the culture, and we had no way of knowing how much potential we had and how reasonable it was to be…

Why do you feel you need Silicon Valley / culture / mentorship etc? If you have a good idea, just do it. Doesn't really matter where you are if you have the determination to succeed.

I live in Europe and there's not much in the way of concept level funding here. I completely understand the OP -- having any help, let alone a few months of funding, the mentorship and Demo Day is definitely worth getting excited about, especially if you're not already in a hub area.

On a funny note: We just had TechCrunch party here in Prague over the weekend, and it was like an AA meeting. No investors, just startups pitching to themselves and consoling themselves. When you're starting you take all the help you can get. So don't tell me about it doesn't matter where you are -- it matters.

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