5 ms·
The distribution by batch is pretty interesting: S2011 10 W2012 10 S2012 9 S2014 7 W2013 7 S2013 6 W2016 6 W2015 6 S2016 5 W2014
by aston 8y ago
The distribution by batch is pretty interesting:
S2011 10
W2012 10
S2012 9
S2014 7
W2013 7
S2013 6
W2016 6
W2015 6
S2016 5
W2014 5
S2010 4
S2015 4
W2011 4
S2009 3
W2008 2
W2007 2
W2017 2
S2006 2
W2009 1
W2018 1
W2010 1
S2008 1
S2005 1
S2007 1
The top three batches were consecutive starting from summer 2011 through summer of 2012. That period happens to also be when the seed and venture capital ecosystem started its recovery from the 2008 crisis [0].
What I wonder is, which way does the arrow of causation point? Did the success of these companies lift the entire ecosystem? Or were macroeconomic factors the dominant driver of capital entering this market, and those three batches happened to benefit?
edit: There's another possibility here, which is that there are two curves that may have maximized for companies around that time period. The first is the batch size, which has increased from ~10 companies to ~100 over the years. And the other curve is that companies take something like 5-10 years to mature. Maybe it's just that the companies of that vintage are just old enough to be really valuable, and that there were enough companies in the batch to push them to the top of this ranking.
My money is on macro effects, though.
[0] https://medium.com/the-mission/state-of-seed-investing-in-2018-25eb28ac0e93 https://medium.com/the-mission/state-of-seed-investing-in-20...
- immad 8y agoAlso the bottom of that list has companies worth 400x less than the top of the list. So you would want to apply another scaling curve for that.
- nostromo 8y agoThe results are very different by market cap though. Half of the value on the list came from 2009 alone (Stripe and Airbnb). (Obviously it takes a while to become a unicorn.) Here's the sum of the unicorn market caps by year: 2005 1b 2006 (none) 2007 11 2008 5 2009 50 2010 2 2011 (none) 2012 10 2013 6 2014 16 2015 1 2016 1 2017 1
- savrajsingh 8y agoalso of note, there was an economic crisis in 2009, which is also the year with the highest current market cap (it was super hard to raise a round of any size at that time)
- jedc 8y agoYou can see the progression of # of companies per class and how much they raised here - https://seed-db.com/accelerators/view?acceleratorid=1011 https://seed-db.com/accelerators/view?acceleratorid=1011
- tedmiston 8y agoSorted by time earliest to latest also looks interesting. S2005 1 S2006 2 S2007 1 W2007 2 S2008 1 W2008 2 S2009 3 W2009 1 S2010 4 W2010 1 S2011 10 W2011 4 S2012 9 W2012 10 S2013 6 W2013 7 S2014 7 W2014 5 S2015 4 W2015 6 S2016 5 W2016 6 W2017 2 W2018 1 Visualized: S2005 * S2006 ** S2007 * W2007 ** S2008 * W2008 ** S2009 *** W2009 * S2010 **** W2010 * S2011 ********** W2011 **** S2012 ********* W2012 ********** S2013 ****** W2013 ******* S2014 ******* W2014 ***** S2015 **** W2015 ****** S2016 ***** W2016 ****** W2017 ** W2018 * Edit: Fixed a bug in my output that showed S11 and W12 as 0 instead of 10.
- paraditedc 8y agoYou missed the top 2.
- tedmiston 8y agothanks - fixed now
- dsugarman 8y agoWinter x should be before summer x, should be a smoother curve
- tedmiston 8y agoThank you — here's the output sorted by Winters before Summers. S2005 1 S2006 2 W2007 2 S2007 1 W2008 2 S2008 1 W2009 1 S2009 3 W2010 1 S2010 4 W2011 4 S2011 10 W2012 10 S2012 9 W2013 7 S2013 6 W2014 5 S2014 7 W2015 6 S2015 4 W2016 6 S2016 5 W2017 2 W2018 1 S2005 * S2006 ** W2007 ** S2007 * W2008 ** S2008 * W2009 * S2009 *** W2010 * S2010 **** W2011 **** S2011 ********** W2012 ********** S2012 ********* W2013 ******* S2013 ****** W2014 ***** S2014 ******* W2015 ****** S2015 **** W2016 ****** S2016 ***** W2017 ** W2018 *
- 8y ago
- capocannoniere 8y ago> edit: There's another possibility here, which is that there are two curves that may have maximized for companies around that time period. The first is the batch size, which has increased from ~10 companies to ~100 over the years. And the other curve is that companies take something like 5-10 years to mature. Maybe it's just that the companies of that vintage are just old enough to be really valuable, and that there were enough companies in the batch to push them to the top of this ranking. I think that's basically it. It takes a while to reach a 100M or 1B valuation, so you wouldn't expect to see many of the most recent YC companies on the list just yet. On the flip-side, YC batches were significantly smaller early on before ~2011. I wouldn't read too much into this distribution.
- diminish 8y agoGetting more popular ~2010 lures more 'big-dreamers' to flood into YC. It's the same thing as the Ivy League effect on universities where top talent chooses top universities which yield top science/business champions in a virtuous cycle. YC's actions to increase batch size, open a startup school are all going to have bigger "net" effect. Timing-wise the web2.0 and then smartphone waves as business disruptors have their trace on the numbers as well as the prolongation of the market boom with increased venture money and the network effect of YC alumni. Risks include a market correction, post-smartphone bets, applicants more apt to 'gaming' the YC acceptance process. I would like more numbers on competition (other accelerators), overall startup market, and the YC batch size.
- brandnewlow 8y agoIt's possible the demographics of the applicant pool did change for Summer 11. Summer 11 (my batch) was the first to apply AFTER Start Fund (Yuri Milner and SVAngel) announced they'd give $150k to every YC company. This program may have attracted founders who wouldn't have done YC previously.
- radiusvector 8y agoAgreed. I just did a deep dive on this data - https://sridharsmusic.com/analyzing-ycs-top-100-companies-list-by-vintage/ https://sridharsmusic.com/analyzing-ycs-top-100-companies-li...
- jerrre 8y agowhat do you mean by 'vintage' in your article?
- radiusvector 8y agoCohort by year. From the wine industry.
- javiramos 8y agoMaybe it's a Darwinian effect - things were so bad that only the best could've survived.
- itronitron 8y agoor they happened to survive because there was much less competition for resources
- dennisgorelik 8y agoY-Combinator was very successful while Paul Graham and Jessica Livingston were picking founders. Now Paul and Jessica retired, so I expect Y-Combinator results of new batches to stagnate (in a similar way how Microsoft performance was stagnant with Steve Ballmer in a CEO role).
- DoreenMichele 8y agoI don't think Jessica has retired. She is not listed as retired: http://www.ycombinator.com/people http://www.ycombinator.com/people
- dennisgorelik 8y agoJessica worked with Paul in tandem. Their isolated work is less impactful.
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- paraschopra 8y agoIt could also be a sweet spot for entering into SaaS before it got too-crowded but after companies warmed up to the fact that they could subscribe to software.