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I'm not affiliated with YC in any sense but trying to clarify some things: "fix the plane while it's flying". This is typically advice for startups that have
by rsp1984 10y ago
I'm not affiliated with YC in any sense but trying to clarify some things:
"fix the plane while it's flying".
This is typically advice for startups that have found product-market-fit (i.e. have a product people love) but there are a million other things broken. In that case the advice is often to fix these things "while flying", i.e. while simultaneously growing sales and the company in general.
"organizes a demo day 3 months later to help them raise money from VCs"
I understand the purpose is primarily to help companies raise seed/angel rounds, not big "institutional" rounds. And just generally make connections for later.
"The pg article even mentions growth targets during YC."
Clearly this is not applicable to all companies. E.g. what's the "growth target" for a company like Rigetti who build a quantum computer?
"One for early startups still working on product, another YC for startups working on growth"
One of the primary (if not the most important) benefits of YC is the network. You get that regardless of whether you're in product or growth stage.
"pitching VCs without growth doesn't seem to work"
Depends on what you're pitching for. Seed and Series-A are two entirely different games.
"So founders raise money by showing early "growth" without PML (product/market love), then they go back to work..."
Good investors aren't fooled by that and will ask the right questions to quickly uncover any fake metrics. Besides that a seed round is typically raised on team, talent, idea and early traction, not growth.
- qwrusz 10y agoWhat's the difference between "early traction" and "early 'growth'"?
- duncanawoods 10y ago>> Seed and Series-A are two entirely different games. Are you actually in a position to offer advice? What you say seems outdated - seeds grew to multi-million figures such that "seed is the new series A" was a thing back in 2013 - firms now offer "pre-seed" funding and "second-seeds" seem increasingly common. The assumption today seems to be that if you have no connections, you must self-fund / bootstrap / FFF your way to traction to even attract angel interest and for you, seed is for growth. However, if you have prior exits and connections then you play a different game and can probably raise a MM seed without even an idea of what your new business might be.
- rsp1984 10y agoAre you actually in a position to offer advice? Are you in a position to question that I am? I've raised a seed round for my company 3 years ago and we are now going for Series A. I feel experienced enough to share some of my thoughts. Feel free to ignore it if you disagree.
- duncanawoods 10y agoSorry I said that aggressively. I'm tired of low signal startup advice that does not address real-world complexity and it got the better of me. What would have been fascinating, practical and not have raised my doubts would be if you compared the metrics and institutions you used to raise your seed compared to what you are using for your Series A. Anyway, best of luck. Three years seems like a long time to live on a seed.
- rsp1984 10y agoThanks. We hustled to "Ramen profitability" so we don't actually need the money. We'd still very much like it though to speed some things up and to buy ourselves some ice cream to the Ramen every once in a while ;-)