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Yes it's the right word. Stripe is a startup "A startup is a company designed to grow fast. Being newly founded does not in itself make a company a startup. No
by paulsutter 8y ago
Yes it's the right word. Stripe is a startup
"A startup is a company designed to grow fast. Being newly founded does not in itself make a company a startup. Nor is it necessary for a startup to work on technology, or take venture funding, or have some sort of "exit." The only essential thing is growth. Everything else we associate with startups follows from growth."
http://www.paulgraham.com/growth.html http://www.paulgraham.com/growth.html
- eanzenberg 8y agoIs AMZN a startup? BTW they are not the exception either.
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- paulsutter 8y agoYes Amazon is a startup, and startups dominate the list of largest companies today (startups in italics) - Top 10 companies in 2018: Apple, Alphabet, Microsoft, Amazon, Tencent, Berkshire Hathaway, Alibaba, Facebook, JP Morgan Chase, Johnson and Johnson - Top 10 companies in 2008: Exxon, PetroChina, GE, Gazprom, China Mobile, ICBC, Microsoft, AT&T, Royal Dutch Shell, Procter and Gamble Maybe Microsoft is no longer a startup. But the others, startups for sure. They are qualitatively different from normal companies. from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_public_corporations_by_market_capitalization https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_public_corporations_by...
- dasil003 8y agoThis is ridiculous, Microsoft and Apple who's founders are retired and dead are still startups? Startup is not just a synonym for tech company, it implies a certain lifecycle stage (among other things).
- paulsutter 8y agoCertainly Apple is a wobbler (and Microsoft is questionable). But Amazon is kicking ass as always, undermining industry after industry. They're still managed with the same tenacity. And dont count out Alphabet, Facebook, etc. Whether or not we like these companies, they're a different animal from the norm.
- dasil003 8y agoYes, they're a different animal from the past, but they are the new norm as software becomes a primary competitive advantage in all industries. We don't need to subvert the idea of startup to describe this: tech company does just fine. A startup is something that's starting, it's right there in the title, it completely neuters the word of all meaning to apply it to decades-old multi-billion dollar companies.
- asdsa5325 8y agoHis definition is terrible, and it's not the mainstream definition.