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YC: Requests for Startups

• yashap 3y ago
  > A way to end cancer What they’re proposing here seems so doable. Certainly not EASY, but POSSIBLE. Companies tackling this problem could legitimately change the world.
  • hef19898 3y ago
    They do already as we speak.
    • yashap 3y ago
      The idea is basically “MRIs for all, so that we can consistently catch early stage cancer before it spreads.” They don’t go into specifics, but it seems to me like this means making MRIs cheap enough, with low enough false positive rates, that every day ppl can get them frequently. Probably ~twice a year, given how fast cancer spreads. I’m aware of companies doing proactive MRIs that cost ~$2K/scan, that aren’t covered by health insurance. Great for the wealthy, but seems infeasible for every day ppl. I’m not aware of anyone legitimately trying to make this affordable/scalable enough that most people can get scanned frequently. Maybe they’re out there and I just haven’t heard of them? Or were you referring more to the ~$2K/scan companies?
      • hef19898 3y ago
        Look up all the mRNA research going into fighting cancer for example. Or tailor made treatment. Fighting cancer is so much more than just early detection, which isbincredibly important for sure.
        • yashap 3y ago
          Yeah agreed, early detection isn’t a panacea, but it does seem like a pretty promising approach to have a big impact.
• deleted 3y ago
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• thebiglebrewski 3y ago
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  • polygamous_bat 3y ago
    I’m a little out of the loop, could you please elaborate?
    • bigbillheck 3y ago
      https://missionlocal.org/2024/01/y-combinator-ceo-garry-tans-online-rant-spurs-threat-to-supe-police-reports/ https://missionlocal.org/2024/01/y-combinator-ceo-garry-tans...
    • sroussey 3y ago
      Not sure, but I found this character assassination in poor taste. https://twitter.com/garrytan/status/1751264791719719371 https://twitter.com/garrytan/status/1751264791719719371
    • 5cott0 3y ago
      https://techcrunch.com/2024/01/28/y-combinator-president-garry-tan-publishes-a-menacing-tweet-before-deleting-it-apologizing-die-slow-motherfckers https://techcrunch.com/2024/01/28/y-combinator-president-gar...
• 7e 3y ago
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  • duxup 3y ago
    Have you had experience with this? It's not like these deals are a mystery to the folks who sign them are they?
  • leetrout 3y ago
    Even respecting some of the truth in that, sharing that on this site is yelling at the wind.
    • candiddevmike 3y ago
      May make folks think twice before applying to YC
      • toomuchtodo 3y ago
        Not founders, they are bought into the idea (if you can get into a demo day or other function as an observer, highly recommend), but perhaps employees that fuel the machine and their common shares lottery tickets. Important to ask yourself, "Am I working for someone who will be a decent person if my time and effort ends up making them wildly wealthy?"
  • Invictus0 3y ago
    Won't someone think of the poor exploited YC founders?
• 5cott0 3y ago
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  • leetrout 3y ago
    Context: Wrote [YC President Garry] Tan, addressing seven San Francisco supervisors who oversee the delivery of local government services: “Fuck Chan Peskin Preston Walton Melgar Ronen Safai Chan as a label and motherfucking crew … And if you are down with Peskin Preston Walton Melgar Ronen Safai Chan as a crew fuck you too … Die slow motherfuckers.”
• paganel 3y ago
  > BRING MANUFACTURING BACK TO AMERICA That explains the admin on this forum throwing a "you're a nationalist!" at me recently, turns out I was ahead of the game on that (only that I was doing it for the wrong geo-political bloc) > NEW DEFENSE TECHNOLOGY Ooo, that certainly explains lots and lots of stuff, including the "warnings" whenever the comments don't support the correct geo-political bloc mentioned above. All in all very interesting, turns out that YC and the money behind it has smelt where things are going and are following the likes of Eric Schmidt. Let's see what the time will tell.
  • diggan 3y ago
    > That explains the admin on this forum throwing a "you're a nationalist!" at me recently Are you referring to this? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39315543 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39315543 If so, it seems wildly unrelated to "BRING MANUFACTURING BACK TO AMERICA".
    • goles 3y ago
      Interesting, I have never seen this chinamod list before and it's undocumented[0][1][?]. https://news.ycombinator.com/chinamod https://news.ycombinator.com/chinamod Are there more? [0]https://github.com/minimaxir/hacker-news-undocumented https://github.com/minimaxir/hacker-news-undocumented [1]https://news.ycombinator.com/lists https://news.ycombinator.com/lists [?]https://www.google.com/search?q=site%3Anews.ycombinator.com+%22chinamod%22&rlz=1C1ONGR_enUS1048US1048&oq=site%3Anews.ycombinator.com+%22chinamod%22&gs_lcrp=EgZjaHJvbWUyBggAEEUYOTIGCAEQRRg60gEINDIzM2owajeoAgCwAgA&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8#ip=1 https://www.google.com/search?q=site%3Anews.ycombinator.com+...
      • dang 3y ago
        I put lists like that together sometimes to answer specific user questions—primarily when I can't use an HN Search link because there's no search query that's precise enough. That one stuck around because the perception that it corrects (of HN moderation being against $COUNTRY, where $COUNTRY = China in this case) shows up semi-regularly—as does the opposite perception, of course. These things always come in opposing pairs. As a side note, it's interesting to see how different users react to reading such a set of comments, i.e. comments that contradict their assumptions about how HN is moderated. In some cases the reaction is something like, "Wow, I had no idea - thanks for the information" and the person presumably goes on to adjust their priors. In other cases the reaction is a complex explanation of how none of that matters and the original perception remains intact, even though it's inaccurate.
• deleted 3y ago
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• duxup 3y ago
  >Bring manufacturing back to America That one is interesting in that I wouldn't naturally think of manufacturing as a common start up idea.
  • hef19898 3y ago
    Manufacturing is capital intensive to begin with. An dgiven how little the average HN crowd, assuming the average HN applicant is somehwat similar, knows about manufacturing, well, the answer to that can inly be AI? Right?
    • duxup 3y ago
      Yeah the AI line in there is interesting, it feels more than a little tacked on. I can't help but imagine some startup with limited manufacturing knowledge ultimately offering what is at best some incremental improvement in some process that isn't enough to support the start up. Or at least that's what I've seen from start ups entering areas that I've had experience in.
      • hef19898 3y ago
        They really talked about ML-automated robotics in that blog... I swear, I dodn't read it before commenting. This line >> Companies like SpaceX and Tesla have trained an entire generation of engineers in how to build an American company that makes physical products but operates like a startup. is sending chills down my back so. After all, Tesla was almost bankcrupted by their drive to automate everything. And Tesla's robot is a guy in a spandex costume. After that, I refused to see what they have to say about their goal to de-thron SAP, aka their call for new ERP systems (nice touch to include the full name in the link and not kust the accronym, I am sure people able to theoretically build a new ERP from scratch appreciate the clarification...). Edit: Ok, I did click on the ERP link. No idea how they came to that conclusion here This type of software is so valuable and important that we can imagine that there is the opportunity for dozens of new massively successful vendors. considering they wrote the first sentence if it... At least they don't mention AI, LLM or ML...
• rgrieselhuber 3y ago
  I’ve mentioned this one before but I would really like to see a startup make an attempt at prison reform. It’s not completely a technology problem but I do think there are ways in which a combination of technology and smarter segmentation of types of prisoners can work more toward rehabilitation and careers post-incarceration, while also supporting families and relationships.
  • atlasunshrugged 3y ago
    I think this was actually an idea that Palmer Luckey was exploring before Anduril took off. I also agree that there should be something done in the space but have no clear idea on a venture scale biz that doesn't end up being exploitative. https://twitter.com/PalmerLuckey/status/1530604281732116481?lang=en https://twitter.com/PalmerLuckey/status/1530604281732116481?...
    • LunaSea 3y ago
      If you follow Palmer Luckey's business plan, wouldn't you need a huge initial investment to stay afloat during the first years before getting paid? (Not sure how long you would need to wait before getting paid?)
  • duxup 3y ago
    I wonder if this is a case where you could really facilitate a better outcome when government policy is not in your control? You can't make prisoner's lives better / post prison lives better IF the voters and politicians don't wish to / pay you to do so...
  • toomuchtodo 3y ago
    https://www.ameelio.org/ https://www.ameelio.org/ sort of followed this route with prison communications. Non profit startup, but needed policy as rocket fuel to nuke entrenched for profit incumbents. Prison reform feels much more weighted towards policy work, but perhaps I'm missing a path. https://hn.algolia.com/?q=ameelio https://hn.algolia.com/?q=ameelio https://old.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/hy70st/i_am_zo_orchingwa_a_yale_law_student_and/ https://old.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/hy70st/i_am_zo_orchin... https://www.npr.org/2023/01/01/1146370950/prison-phone-call-cost-martha-wright-biden https://www.npr.org/2023/01/01/1146370950/prison-phone-call-... > When the law goes into effect next month, Massachusetts will join Connecticut, California, Minnesota and Colorado in eliminating prisoner phone call fees. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38454743 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38454743 (citations) Commissary Club (formerly 70 Million Jobs) tried on the post incarceration jobs topic, but did not obtain traction (casualty of the pandemic). https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/commissary-club https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/commissary-club (some solutions simply cannot succeed when profit is a requirement; they require systems you throw money in and outcomes come out instead of profit)
• monero-xmr 3y ago
  Great that they are looking at Stablecoins, and by extension blockchain / crypto. The unwarranted hate on HN for this tech is a very interesting mirror on perspectives of economics and finance. The crypto economy advances year after year, as does the tech, but you would never know it perusing HN.
  • dpflan 3y ago
    Do you have some ideas for this request? What’s a stablecoin development that’s needed?
    • monero-xmr 3y ago
      With USDC and local fiat-crypto exchanges available in nearly every country, it is now possible to hire a truly global workforce and pay them with a crypto-payment vendor. If some company systematically went country by country, learned the local HR laws, partnered with the most trusted exchange, and then handled all accounting and taxes, a truly global HR and payment system could be built to make onboarding and paying everyone 10x simpler. Even better is the employees could keep most of their money in USDC and only convert to fiat when they need to pay bills. Now they have a dollar bank account and avoid local inflation.
      • troupo 3y ago
        So, you want a centralised trusted (trusted by whom?) entity to go in, do all that stuff and handle it in a centralised fashion, and work with centralised trusted (by whom?) entities to provide payment to people around the world. Definitely needs crypto. What a novel idea.
        • monero-xmr 3y ago
          Your general attitude is exactly the know-nothing, anti-crypto sentiment I was advocating against. I really don’t want to get into a debate, the point of my business idea above was to solve a pain point around paying a global work force considering the costs of global wire transfers vs. instant USDC settlement.
• atlasunshrugged 3y ago
  The defense-tech one is interesting. I wholeheartedly agree that more people should be involved in the space and it is critically important -- I think the war in Ukraine clearly shows the need for the Western world to be prepared to fight for freedom and democracy -- but as far as venturebackable business models go I don't really understand how many defense tech co's will fit. Most defense firms, other than perhaps Palantir which has a unique position as a commercial provider trade at extremely low multiples to revenue on public markets, whereas tech stocks usually have a relatively large boost. Perhaps not as much concern at early stages but not sure how the financials work out long term.
  • natpalmer1776 3y ago
    If I'm not mistaken the 'monetization model' (for founders / investors) in defense related investment looks significantly different due to the blurring of the line between public and private sector funding.
  • htrp 3y ago
    Lockheed/Boeing buys you and applies cost plus pricing. I assume that's how Anduril is going to end up.
  • fakedang 3y ago
    Palantir started with as much "seed capital" as OpenAI did, strong founder reps in tech - the one thing National Intel lacked back then, good contacts in the intelligence community and defense sector, and a practically untamed space back then. Same for Anduril. I don't see how YC's model is applicable to any of these spaces.
  • oflannabhra 3y ago
    Palmer Luckey and Anduril have about a 6 year head start. I agree that superiority is one of the best deterrents.
    • Apocryphon 3y ago
      Based on how much time he spends picking fights with randos on Twitter, perhaps so. https://twitter.com/josephpolitano/status/1757975699208417563 https://twitter.com/josephpolitano/status/175797569920841756... https://twitter.com/palmerluckey/status/1757896863884444053 https://twitter.com/palmerluckey/status/1757896863884444053 https://twitter.com/uticaeric/status/1757927405124030852?s=46 https://twitter.com/uticaeric/status/1757927405124030852?s=4...
• gnicholas 3y ago
  This list variously refers to AI, LLMs, and models. Any idea why it would use different terms where it does, and what each means?
  • islewis 3y ago
    I doubt there's much thought behind it, and just the fact that each "Request" is written by a different person.
  • plaidfuji 3y ago
    It’s used mostly correctly in each case, and they have different meanings. AI is a marketing catch-all that encompasses technologies of a certain level of “how did they do that” automation that are generally understood to leverage machine learning models under the hood (but not always). LLMs are one class of ML models that operate in a text-in-text-out fashion. “Models” are more of a statistical/mathematical term that generally mean “anything that can make a prediction” - it’s broader than just ML (eg climate models that are first-principles-based, not learned from data).
• byyoung3 3y ago
  models != startup
  • imjonse 3y ago
    how about models + a tailwind SaaS boilerplate? /s
  • danielmarkbruce 3y ago
    Valuable ones do.
• bulkseo84 3y ago
  [dead]
• malermeister 3y ago
  Some cool ideas here, but Garry Tan really can't be leading this organization after his death threats at elected officials.
  • pyb 3y ago
    If picking investors is a bit like a marriage, it's a bit scary. Who'd want to commit to having Garry in their cap table for the next 10 years? I say this as a potential applicant.
    • monkin 3y ago
      Everyone who values what Garry can bring to the table, so probably 99% of applicants. ;-)
    • duxup 3y ago
      I don't entirely disagree generally, but I suspect the answer is "people who want money" and that might be enough for many of them to bypass any potential concerns.
  • 5cott0 3y ago
    "die slow" was just a request for more startup ideas to disrupt medicine
  • google234123 3y ago
    If you believe that these elected officials have facilitated the deaths of 100s of people and the suffering of many more then... (btw I think they pretty much have fueled the drug and lawlessness epidemic in SF)
    • malermeister 3y ago
      Ironically, people like Garry have actually fueled said epidemic, by contributing to ever-rising inequality, driving people to the streets, where they turn to crime and drugs.
• fakedang 3y ago
  Most of the stuff on the list is either so far out of achievable reach from its current stages, or just generic America-first proselytizing. What all of them have in common is that they require massive amounts of capital, the kind that most VCs don't have/aren't ready to invest. Those who have the capabilities to start a company targeting these problems are not the YC crowd of young college students and techies under 40 looking for cred - they are either folks who have massive amounts of dry powder to deploy, or have the connections who have that kind of capital to combine with their experience. In both cases, none of those guys are stupid to give away 7% of their company (effective 15%) for $500k. It's kind of laughable how YC is now requesting for startups in these lines when 10 years back, they rejected us (DefTech) on exactly the above premise. While we didn't manage a multibagger exit, we did manage a non-acquihire exit, which is more than what most YC companies can manage. The right time to invest in these problems was 10 years ago, when all the low-hanging fruit still existed.
• troupo 3y ago
  > Every week the YC Group Partners meet and discuss the current batch. One common area of discussion is ideas — what kind of ideas are these founders having the best luck with? Which ones are they pivoting away from? How about: do you have any path to profitability, or you're still on the path to lose hundreds of millions of dollars per year or get sold to the highest bidder?
  • dang 3y ago
    YC is about making something users want. That's the trailhead for all paths to profitability. So there's no conflict here. If you haven't made anything users want, then you might need to change your idea, and that's what that sentence is referring to.
    • troupo 3y ago
      > YC is about making something users want. Okay, let's assume that is true > That's the trailhead for all paths to profitability. You can open a list of YC's companies, and then find profitable ones. An eye opener. For those who are profitable now, you can also look at how long they have existed, how long they have been profitable, and how long it will take them to break even considering those losses.
• scythe 3y ago
  >New defense technology If you want to build machines that kill people, you should at least be willing to say it clearly. If it makes you uncomfortable to talk about, maybe that should tell you something. And it's not a very good excuse to argue that you didn't build a weapon, you just built something that makes it easier to use weapons. Arms races are not the way. The biggest threat to the West isn't somebody else's weapons, it's that Indonesia's elections today went to a candidate who doesn't want to align with the West, relations with India are increasingly strained, and even Brazil and Turkey are starting to lean out. Geopolitics is politics, and politics requires appeal. Our brand image is significantly worse than two decades ago, as far as I can see. If the West can't gain allies on friendly terms and maintains power through the development of ever-more advanced military technology, then what kind of world have we built, exactly? It's extremely disappointing to see this.
  • pc86 3y ago
    Countries need to defend themselves, and sometimes defend their allies, and not having had to defend yourself in the recent past does not mean you won't need to defend yourself in the near future. Having a robust, capable network of defensive technologies requires a lot of investment and a lot of people, and decades to build. You can't spin up a national defense overnight. The difference between defensive technology and offensive technology is very, very blurry even among people extremely familiar with the topic, which 99% of us here are not. Pretending any of these objective truths are wrong is folly and ignores a dozen millennia of human history. There will always be individuals/organizations/countries that don't the "the West" as an ally. Some subset of that will be outwardly hostile to Western ideology, and some subset of that will be willing and able to use violence as a means to their end. The fact that some Western countries have impressive militaries doesn't somehow mean they should stop investing in that technology.
  • nonethewiser 3y ago
    > If you want to build machines that kill people, you should at least be willing to say it clearly. Well maybe that's not at all what they're saying. Perhaps you could share what you consider the least extreme version of "building machines that kill people." Building missiles - OK yeah obviously. Improving satellites which are used for information gathering which could be used for missions where people are killed? Does that fall within "building machines that kill people?" What is the mildest example of something that constitutes "building machines that kill people?"
• brettv2 3y ago
  > NEW ENTERPRISE RESOURCE PLANNING SOFTWARE Very curious if anyone knows how to pull this off. There's so much value to be unlocked but it's just impossible to break through. I've personally met three very talented founders that tried and failed (one was accepted to YC as a mid-market ERP and successfully pivoted into an application tracking system) and failed very quickly. I'm guessing an important feature would be an integration system that maps data from the current ERP seamlessly into the new ERP. And that assumes you can even get through the enterprise sales process to even get the company to migrate.
  • 5cott0 3y ago
    ERP market is way too complex and oversaturated for pretty much every vertical imaginable
  • ibash 3y ago
    I’ve met a few people who’ve been on the buyer side of an erp migration. It’s a multi million dollar affair that takes years. Two approaches I can think of: 1. Target mid market or smaller and grow with customers (will be slow) 2. Take a front-door-wrapper approach
    • samsolomon 3y ago
      Or 3. Target a small slice of ERP/CRM tooling and gradually evolve into something more fully-featured.
      • SteveNuts 3y ago
        The problem is ERP needs to be incredibly tightly integrated into the whole business from end-to-end. You can't only offer raw materials tracking, but not accounting and shipping. There's just not a lot of value to the business unless you have everything coupled. The MVP for an ERP is essentially, a fully featured and battle-tested system which is very expensive and time consuming to build before it's profitable.
        • 3y ago
• distantaidenn 3y ago
  And we'll still see the next batch of YC companies being 90% SaaS and/or devtools (but this time with AI)!
• riemannzeta 3y ago
  Anybody interested in talking to a potential customer for: * Developer tools inspired by existing internal tools * LLMs for manual back office processes in legacy enterprises Feel free to message me. Having worked in-house for the last 15 years, I've seen a variety of these, have built more than a few of them myself, and am in the middle of building some new ones using LLMs right now — all within large enterprise legal departments. I won't be able to share any confidential data, but I'm happy to answer questions about patterns I've seen across a few different organizations and where the unmet needs seem to be.
  • onepaulmbw 3y ago
    Hi, I'm interested in learning more, let's chat - onepaulmbw@gmail.com
  • sethkim 3y ago
    Hey - can you shoot an email to seth@skysight.cloud? Curious what you've seen.
  • gavinhoward 3y ago
    I am interested too! https://yzena.com/contact/ https://yzena.com/contact/
  • deoxykev 3y ago
    Hi there, I would be interested in a chat about those back-office patterns and use cases. Could you send an email to a2V2aW4gQCBkZW94eSAuIG5ldA==
  • elpalek 3y ago
    Would love to talk about the back-office processes. Let's connect via sam@instance.co.jp
  • arach 3y ago
    interested - @arach in twitter or arach@tchoupani.com
  • jan-stehlik 3y ago
• jbverschoor 3y ago
  Small comment about the "Stable Coins": > $136b worth of stablecoins have been issued to date but the opportunity seems much more immense still. Only about seven million people have transacted with stablecoins to date, while more than half a billion live in countries with 30%+ inflation. U.S. banks hold $17b in customer deposits which are all up for grabs as well. And yet the major stablecoin issuers can be counted on one hand and the major liquidity providers with just a few fingers. This is not entirely true. There has been a stable coin for over 50 years now, and most billionaires should be familiar with it because it's used to pay for satphone calls. SDR (Special Drawing Rights) is IMF's stable coin. US$935.7 billion SDR are currently allocated. It has been called paper gold and an international reserve currency.
  • brandnewlow 3y ago
    Thanks for the note. Did not know about SDR.
    • chucklam2828 3y ago
      Lyn Alden (a noted bitcoiner) has talked about SDR in a few interviews. Here’s one I can find right now: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6aUwtxMw-D0&t=882s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6aUwtxMw-D0&t=882s.
  • mxwsn 3y ago
    Can SDR really be traded on demand by civilians with a smartphone or computer at any time of day anywhere in the world with internet? It doesn't seem so from a quick Google search, but I don't know. If not, it seems pretty clearly quite different from stablecoins operating on blockchains.
    • hef19898 3y ago
      One sure can cash in on crypto, even today! Or so I am told in various YouTube get rich quick adds. And since YC is following the strategy of selling shovels during a gold rush, them promoting stablecoims makes perfect sense!
• deleted 3y ago
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• vishnumohandas 3y ago
  Related: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39369766 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39369766
  • dang 3y ago
    Merged hither. Thanks!
• ChicagoBoy11 3y ago
  For the AR/VR space, I'm curious about YCs thinking about the addressable market and the possibility to have a unicorn-scale company developing solely for VR/AR in the foreseeable future (that isn't a device manufacturer). The devices seem to be getting better and better, but the software seems rather lacking (currently typing this from a gorgeous giant display on my Vision Pro, which I use mostly exactly like how I would use my computer). Even in gaming, where the use-case is a lot more mature, we haven't seen the kinds of investment in AAA content that you'd expect, even though clearly the platforms could benefit from it. I'm curious what YCs thinking is, and if perhaps they just feel no one has earnestly taken it on yet?
  • sroussey 3y ago
    Augmedix was built off Google Glass, and is a public company. Not a unicorn though.
  • siyinghz 3y ago
    Hi there, I wrote this RFP. We like to back strong technical founders, and some may be interested in working in AR/VR like I did years ago. You are right that the software is lacking which is more of an opportunity. Wrt with the market, yes, it is still very nascent, so founders working on this space have to be be very excited and inherently believe in it in the long run.
    • hazeii 3y ago
      Technical founder in the VR/AR space here. Not in a rush so have discounted YC in the past, still may be worth a short chat. Use the "Apply" link on the RFS page?
  • brandensilva 3y ago
    I think the larger dev ecosystem has created a bit of backlash against the big players for some time and aren't quick to adopt the new tech they are dishing out. I would guess taking a 30% cut, lawsuits, and unfair terms has left a sour taste in everyone's mouth. And it wasn't until competition stepped up with an indie dev, aka a YouTube VR app called Juno made for the Vision Pro, that even Google decided to jump into developing YouTube for the Vision Pro. So now we are back at the chicken and the egg problem and few big devs want to support the giants. It'll happen probably eventually when monetization becomes a reality for devs embracing the tech but I don't see it happening any time soon.
• divbzero 3y ago
  > Occasionally we gather up all of these ideas and share them in what we call a Request for Startups, or RFS — a Y Combinator tradition that goes back over a decade. I wonder how many YC startups joined due to a past RFS and went on to be successful. My impression is that YC emphasizes the quality of the startup founders over the quality of the startup idea, so I find it interesting that this RFS tradition persists.
  • gavmor 3y ago
    Seems perfectly fitting. These ideas give a good team "permission" to believe in themselves. People who think they need "the right idea" might be stuck in the Alignment Trap, from which any execution engine is the exit.
    • hef19898 3y ago
      Lookong at some of the stuff on the YC list, well, ignorance is bliss I guess. But whatever helps you to get running and successfully pivot to something actually realistic.
• throwaway4good 3y ago
  New defense technology Bring manufacturing back to America New space companies Careful not shooting yourself in the foot there …
  • throwaway4good 3y ago
    YC has a solid brand that enables it to get capital and talent from all over the world - venturing into areas that are deeply divisive for a hot dollar may just cut that off.
• gavinhoward 3y ago
  I am building a company that falls under two categories (commercial Open Source and developer tools based on internal tools), but I would never take YC money for it. Because of that stake, they want an "exit" in some form, and the drive to that exit will pave the road to user-hostile software and make it the path of least resistance.
  • Bagged2347 3y ago
    I'll bite, I'm interested in the OSS dev tools field and I agree with your stance on investment money tending to corrupt good products. It's a big trade off. What are you working on? Do you have a website to share? Is it just you right now or do you have partners or employees?
    • gavinhoward 3y ago
      I am surprised at the interest, thank you! One note: technically my software isn't quite Open Source; it's source available. [0] I will have my first release in less than two months, hopefully. It will include a scripting language and a build system. If the language gets interest, I'll expand it and build the standard library. If the build system gets interest, I will expand it. The end goal is Nix for mere mortals. If neither gets interest, I will have to move to my next idea: VCS with project management and that handles large, binary files. Beyond that, we'll see. I have a business website, but not yet for those projects. I will at release, including tutorials. You can read an old commit of design docs at [1], [2], and [3]. It's just me; I want to run my business like Hwaci, the SQLite guys. That also reduces overhead and will let me provide excellent support [4] for paying clients. [0]: https://gavinhoward.com/2023/12/is-source-available-really-that-bad/ https://gavinhoward.com/2023/12/is-source-available-really-t... [1]: https://git.yzena.com/Yzena/Yc/src/branch/master/docs/yao https://git.yzena.com/Yzena/Yc/src/branch/master/docs/yao [2]: https://git.yzena.com/Yzena/Yc/src/branch/master/docs/rig https://git.yzena.com/Yzena/Yc/src/branch/master/docs/rig [3]: https://git.yzena.com/Yzena/Yc/src/branch/master/docs/yar https://git.yzena.com/Yzena/Yc/src/branch/master/docs/yar [4]: https://github.com/gavinhoward/bc/issues/66 https://github.com/gavinhoward/bc/issues/66
• zug_zug 3y ago
  One interesting thing about this is that this what investors want you to make for them to invest in, not necessarily what you want to make. Investors are very happy with moonshots (1% chance of you succeeding, but 10,000x return if you do). But I don't think any rational founder should be. Not all of these are moonshots, but some of them are (e.g. securing defense contracts seems lower risk). Also I imagine getting that defense contract may be a very different value proposition depending on what connections that investor has.
  • dang 3y ago
    I don't know how other investors operate but if YC sees a good founder working on something they don't care about, just because they think investors want them to work on it, they'd almost certainly tell them to switch to something they do care about. pg's most frequent advice to founders about ideas is to ask themselves what they themselves wish would exist, then make that—i.e. solve a problem you yourself have. Another thing he and Jessica say a lot is that you need to be passionate about what you're working on in order to make it through the arduous haul of a startup. That's even more true of the 'moonshot' startups, since they're harder and take longer. If you look at the hardest startups YC has invested in, you won't find many founders who aren't personally obsessed with what they're working on, and have been for many years. That's one of the things YC would be looking for before funding somebody to work on such things.
    • Draiken 3y ago
      Interesting, because on existing startups I've seen them build features/products solely because they believe VCs will like it. Just look at AI and the amount of useless chatbots and other half-baked "AI" solutions several startups built in a rush after the topic became the latest fad and VCs were saying it's hot.
      • the_only_law 3y ago
        I wouldn’t count out the thought that there are many brainless people who convince themselves what’s “VCs will like” is “what they wish would exist”.
• deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
• realty_geek 3y ago
  I created an open sauce project called propertywebbuilder for creating real estate websites many years ago. I got distracted with other projects, but recently I've started looking for someone to work with to life again. If anyone is interested please reach out to me.
• otteromkram 3y ago
  > AI to build enterprise software One idea is getting rid of backroom office workers, the other is to replace developers. Plenty of underlying sadism here. Who will peruse Hacker News if no one is a software engineer?
  • notpachet 3y ago
    The OpenAI web scraper.
  • amadeuspagel 3y ago
    Intellectually curious people.
  • intelVISA 3y ago
    pg's 3 gholas
• itsdavesanders 3y ago
  I find it strange that they would write "The hollowing out of US manufacturing has led to social and political division and left us in a precarious place geopolitically." And then suggest the answer to that is robotics and ML, which does nothing but exacerbate the social and political divisions - unless government and enterprise make the hard choices to provide a real safety net. And then, if we do that, it doesn't matter if the US is excelling in manufacturing as a source of revenue or not - providing revenue to fund these programs is coming in from somewhere, the source is far less important.
  • renewiltord 3y ago
    Well, the point isn't to stop the social and political division. The point is stop the geopolitical precariousness. > My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or to destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone, I would also do that.
    • mamidon 3y ago
      I would suggest that our geopolitical precariousness comes from our social divisions. I doubt Russia, China, or anyone else will ever be able to invade. But if the losers of globalism keep getting purposefully shortchanged I can more easily foresee them deciding to change the system by force. I don't think that's a terribly likely outcome, but much more likely than Red Dawn.
      • 23B1 3y ago
        Our social divisions means they don't have to invade in order to unseat the U.S. as a global superpower.
    • deleted 3y ago
      [deleted]
  • emseetech 3y ago
• quadcore 3y ago
  APPLYING MACHINE LEARNING TO ROBOTICS Exactly what I thought would be absolutely terrific: a robot commanded by voice that poses floor tiles. That's v1. V2 builds a house. I can't think of any "toy" as exciting as this atm. Plus you pose the first tile of this and you're a trillionaire.
  • hef19898 3y ago
    Tesla's robot shoupd be able to do just that already! Well, depebding on who's wearing the costume that is...
    • 93po 3y ago
      thank god someone mentioned elon's companies, it had been about 5 seconds and i was starting to worry it wasn't cool to blindly hate him anymore
      • hef19898 3y ago
        Come on, the spandex robot presentation was so cringe it was almost hilarious. Even the dancing was bad.
• manuelabeledo 3y ago
  "Eliminating middlemen from healthcare" is probably the most ambitious one.
  • beambot 3y ago
    Indeed. Many efforts that start with the goal of eliminating middlemen inevitably devolve into more middlemen. It's like the xkcd trope about standards: "Situation: There are 14 competing standards. Rediculous! We need to extablish one universal standard! Situation: There are now 15 competing standards." https://xkcd.com/927/ https://xkcd.com/927/
  • hypothesis 3y ago
    That section reads like we are going to replace one middleman with a more “efficient” one, not eliminating one altogether. On the other hand, this is listed below “cure for cancer”, so maybe it’s an ambitious one…
  • teaearlgraycold 3y ago
    If you do this by building a business you will end up the new middlemen, financially motivated to keep the system from receiving the complete overhaul it needs.
• codegeek 3y ago
  "ELIMINATING MIDDLEMEN IN HEALTHCARE" I honestly am game for this even though I have zero experience in healthcare but as a consumer, where do I start how bad it is. I would do anything to change our shitty healthcare system where there are so many middlemen b/w me and my doctor. Recent event: Went to ER because my toddler son spilled hot coffee on him (thankfully he is ok and wasn't as terrible as it could have been). There was a pediatrician on call who looked at him for like 2 mins and then left. A nurse came in and most of her questions were about "insurance details". Then they didn't tell me what the heck was going on and after pressing, they said "we are getting stuff for him. wait". Then after almost 1.5 hours of waiting where my son is wailing, they got some bandage (I kid you not) with some Over the counter stuff (bacytracin) and applied it on the burn. Then we went home. Bill = $2000 after Insurance coverage. Our premium for family is $1800+/month btw . Then there is the deductible. Supposedly, the insurance company only partially approved the claim. Whatever the f that means. If you don't see a problem with this whole cycle of experience, I don't know what else to say. And no, don't tell me to get better insurance. I want to get rid of all these middlemen mafia.
  • screenothethird 3y ago
    [dead]
  • KittenInABox 3y ago
    This is almost certainly not a healthcare issue, but a political/lobbying issue. Solutions will happen in the political/lobbying space. We will need to fix shit like: * very fast, arbitrary disapprovals of healthcare-- requiring 6 weeks of physical therapy before ordering a test of what is almost certainly a torn ligament or other thing is stupid and directly harms patient outcomes; * enforcement of mental healthcare equality-- hospitals should have equal beds, equal availability, equal pay for workers, and insurance companies should also be paying equally for mental and body health; * forcing the hands of drug price fixers-- that's right, it's not just insurance, or pharmaceuticals, it's a shitty middleman between them all that rolls up and sets prices on both sides, things like e.g. medicare negotiating drug prices directly will disrupt these fuckos * DOCTOR OWNED HOSPITALS MUST COME BACK-- no more vulture finance that literally made this illegal * hospital geographic monopolies must be eliminated-- that's right, hospitals can ban competition! No more of this! * SAFE STAFFING RATIOS * releasing the budget on residency-- that's right, the government sets how much money they are willing to put towards new doctors! * jail time for negligent insurance decisions-- we know that insurance companies will slow-walk bureaucracy lifesaving healthcare to desperately ill, disabled people in the hopes they will die before the approval goes through
• micromacrofoot 3y ago
  "Eliminating middlemen in healthcare" Unless YC is looking for a startup that lobbies against for-profit health insurance this is more like "eliminating middlemen and replacing them with our own in healthcare" "Uber for healthcare" now pivoting to "OpenAI for healthcare"
  • pastacacioepepe 3y ago
    Healthcare has been "solved" already in many countries, it's just the USA that can't deal with it. You don't need "disruption" or a technological revolution to fix healthcare, you just need socialism. Just look at what Cuba is doing for once and learn something.
• webel0 3y ago
  (Tangentially related to, “A WAY TO END CANCER”) After seeing how my doctor iteratively ordered up different sets of tests for me over the course of a few months, I got to thinking about improving decision trees for blood testing (and maybe others). However, when I spoke to a (first year) med student about this he suggested that doctors actually don’t want something like this. I don't think I followed the thought process completely but it was something along the lines of, “we’ll always find something.” Would be interested if someone could elaborate on this line of thinking.
  • nonethewiser 3y ago
    Can you elaborate? Im not following but it sounds interesting. What problem did you see and what alternative did you propose? I take it that the doctor was performing an inefficient search.
  • OJFord 3y ago
    I've had similar conversations (another one is classifying ECGs as normal or whatever variety of abnormal rhythm, for example) with my wife, who's a doctor, and it's always some combination of 'yeah, that kinda does happen' (just more manually/lower tech, or human-driven, etc. than we're imagining) and 'we don't want that' like you say. What they do want afaict is more fundamental, should-be-so-much-easier stuff like case management software that doesn't suck, and like, a chair to sit on while using that computer.
  • learn_more 3y ago
    I think he was describing the fact that they already operate with decision framework that they already understand. Implicit in the results received from a particular test is the fact that there was a particular observation made that suggested they get such a test. If they get results from a test, but without the compelling observation, they're then operating outside their well established statistical framework, and they can't confidently evaluate the meaningfulness of the test results. To me, this doesn't mean the extra information is bad, or unhelpful, it's just they are not yet properly calibrated to use it properly. I've heard this sentiment from medical professionals before and this was my conclusion.
• matt3210 3y ago
  I should have gotten into AI
  • SoftTalker 3y ago
    What's stopping you?
• psuedo_uuh 3y ago
  YC wants a more direct hand in genocides I guess. Shouldn’t be surprised
• eltondegeneres 3y ago
  Jared Friedman and Gustaf Alströmer want to make it easier to kill other human beings, and turn a profit while doing it. Shame on them and anyone else who works on "defense technology." > I have told my sons that they are not under any circumstances to take part in massacres, and that the news of massacres of enemies is not to fill them with satisfaction or glee. I have also told them not to work for companies which make massacre machinery, and to express contempt for people who think we need machinery like that. Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut (p. 19)
  • nonethewiser 3y ago
    In your opinion, should we not have any defense technology?
    • mandmandam 3y ago
      There's probably some middle ground between no defense tech whatsoever, and trillion dollar illegal wars and genocides. Every American - and the rest of the world too - is paying that very real debt. We're all paying the opportunity cost too, and the societal cost. It will be paid for generations, and many of the true costs are incalculable. Some very few people are making a tonne of money, and here, YC is saying they want a piece of that. I feel like they're not getting dragged enough for it tbh. Right this moment the US is being investigated by the world's highest court for complicity in genocide. And YC is openly asking to invest in companies that directly enable and support such action.
      • nonethewiser 3y ago
        > There's probably some middle ground between no defense tech whatsoever, and trillion dollar illegal wars and genocides. There is obviously middle ground. Which is why categorically condemning defense spending is indefensible. What are you referring to as genocide?
        • mandmandam 3y ago
          > Which is why categorically condemning defense spending is indefensible. That doesn't actually follow. > What are you referring to as genocide? Take your pick.
• davidmurphy 3y ago
  Glad to see YC supporting US-based manufacturing. Kudos
• johnea 3y ago
  20 categories of innovative startups, primarily centered around the technological breakthrough of putting the letters A and I next to each other...
• advael 3y ago
  It's bizarre to me that Tesla gets cited as an exemplar for operating as an American manufacturer for physical goods, given that it's been the subject of numerous scandals regarding quality control of the physical components manufactured there, many of which I've found out about through this very site. If manufacturing comes back to the US in the form of more companies that operate like Tesla, I would guess that American-manufactured goods would come to be distrusted more Of course, to put this solely on Tesla isn't completely fair. A lot of the problems with how Tesla does business are symptoms of the larger crisis in how businesses are run here, but I think that trying to bring manufacturing back without solving the corporate governance problems that make doing it well infeasible (and indeed caused a lot of the offshoring in the first place) is likely a fool's errand. Most businesses face little discipline on quality in the form of either regulation or competition (which tends to be eaten by mergers even when it arises), and intense pressure from investors to cut corners at every turn
  • BadHumans 3y ago
    Tesla has done fantastic R&D and marketing for EVs but you're right that their cars themselves has always defective rolling off the lot. I know a good number of people who have had or currently have a Tesla and every single one had to take it in after buying it to get something fixed.
  • bko 3y ago
    What scandals (honest question)? Is it more than comparable companies? I think a big problem is that modern American firms outsource practically all required expertise to suppliers so they are left with no core competency apart from marketing, lobbying and financial engineering. Its my impression that Tesla does more stuff themselves so they were quicker to innovate and experiment. But not sure if that's just their marketing and cult that leads me to believe this. But I do know that electric cars were long thought impractical and dead, and their sudden rise in popularity coincided with Tesla creating a good electric car
    • advael 3y ago
      Off the top of my head, there was a story on here about cars crashing due to axles failing months after they rolled off the lot, and a more recent story about the bodies of cybertrucks rusting from small amounts of rain exposure This is just on the physical components side. Tesla is also continuously dealing with scandals about data provenance, transparency, the false promises and dangerous consequences of its pushes toward autonomous driving, and of course the same nickel-and-dime nonsense other tech companies do like trying to charge subscriptions for every little feature, gradually rolling out user-hostile behavior in a proprietary software ecosystem, litigation threats toward victims of accidents who seek any remedy or even accountability for harms caused by many of these issues, etc. It serves as a better exemplar of how much hype and marketing to attract investment drive the success of an American company in the current environment than of how onshore manufacturing could work EDIT: Also, comparable in what sense?
• ChrisArchitect 3y ago
  [dupe] Announcement post: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39369766 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39369766
• networked 3y ago
  I would still like to see RFS 5 "Development on Handhelds" (https://web.archive.org/web/20140428231118/http://ycombinator.com/rfs5.html https://web.archive.org/web/20140428231118/http://ycombinato...) fulfilled. I asked sama about it in 2015: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10361215 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10361215. The state of the art has advanced since. Termux (https://termux.dev/en/ https://termux.dev/en/) on Android is a viable development environment. With a Debian PRoot (https://wiki.termux.com/wiki/PRoot https://wiki.termux.com/wiki/PRoot), it feels a lot like "normal Linux". What I want to see, though, is something that takes advantage of graphics and touch input. Structural touch-based editing of s-expressions in particular seems like it could be practical and fun. Think Snap! (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snap!_(programming_language) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snap!_(programming_language)) but built for multitouch devices.
  • bagels 3y ago
    Something like copilot can really help with bridging the gap created by not having a full size keyboard.
    • fuzzfactor 3y ago
      I'm loving my rechargeable bluetooth keyboard & mouse which are really made to compensate for limitations of touchscreens. The keyboard I have is about the size of an ipad itself so there is no numeric keypad, and it's about as heavy as a tablet too since this one has a slanted slot in the back to slip the tablet or phone into, portrait or landscape, at a good angle for use so the combination acts not much differently than a laptop. If it wasn't so heavily weighted it would topple over backward when you left the tablet in the slot. There are other bluetooth ones that are lightweight which should be just as useful if you have a different way to support the device. Sometimes a hardware solution is ideal, other times software, most of the time with digital devices it's good to consider both and have lots of options which parts of the heavy lifting are where.
      • pests 3y ago
        I love the MX Keys Mini [0] Solid construction and a sleek feel. Pretty small form factor. But I love the multi-device support. Simple shortcut (Fn+F1, F2, or F3) to switch between devices. Pair to my laptop, phone, and watch and use it for all my types everywhere. [0] https://www.logitech.com/en-us/products/keyboards/mx-keys-mini.920-010475.html https://www.logitech.com/en-us/products/keyboards/mx-keys-mi...
• bruceb 3y ago
  Eliminating middlemen in healthcare In the spirit of Jeff Bezos’ “your margin is my opportunity”, we believe it’s possible to build a highly profitable business and make the system more efficient at the same time. Didn't Amazon try this and is now shutting down part of its healthcare (pill selling) play?
  • hef19898 3y ago
    Health Care is one field where nobody can seriously compete with state or state navked players, aka public health care or single payer. Especially not VC backed start-ups...
    • lukew3 3y ago
      What's the reason for this? Is this because of extensive regulation due to insurer/hospital lobbying and patient safety laws?
      • hef19898 3y ago
        Patient and health care regulation, for good reasons, but basically the number of shoulders to spread individual risks across (aka insurance). The latter is much easier when backed, directly or indirectly, by nation state households and budgets. Nothing beats the ability of controlling your own currency.
    • nradov 3y ago
      There is plenty of space for VC backed start-ups to compete in healthcare. It would be foolish to go head-to-head with a company like HCA or UnitedHealth Group. But there is a lot of opportunity to sell them better software which improves the experience for everyone in the system. Or build better medical devices or improve efficiency in the drug development process or a zillion other niche areas.
      • skrbjc 3y ago
        Someone needs to tackle Epic in the EMR space and overthrow their closed system.
• arjunaanand 3y ago
  Just plain marketing. In reality they will invest in incremental startups of serial entrepreneurs or well known people in silicon valley. They became traditional corporate long ago. Shows in their recent portfolio.
  • ianbutler 3y ago
    Seeing as I just recently talked to two young students who got in and also know someone from my college days who was accepted for the W24 batch this doesn't seem very correct to me. Notably neither of those two groups of people are SV based, both NYC affiliated.
  • SirLJ 3y ago
    Yep, already got rejected couple of times, even before the AI boom, with my company which clearly falls under "Using Machine Learning to simulate the physical world" and "Explainable A.I." and have the potential to fall under most of the rest...
    • Difwif 3y ago
      A lot of YC's material about their selection process centers around the founders instead of the idea. They openly admit that they choose a team and expect you to pivot a few times. Obviously I don't know anything about you or your ideas and I don't mean to offend but I've typically assumed that a YC rejection means they disqualified the candidate for one reason or another. Do they give feedback in their rejection? I'm considering applying.
      • sudosteph 3y ago
        They give zero feedback, so there are way better places to apply if that's all you're looking for. The truth is the applicants have to have a story that resonates with whoever reviews your submission. Sometimes people jive over a shared problem space, sometimes they just like people who remind them of themselves or who come from "trust networks" they respect. The latter cases are where the bias keeps seeping in. And just because they don't pick you for an interview doesn't mean you were disqualified forever. A lot of people reapply and have success. There are just so few slots compared to applicants that most don't hear anything.
• Animats 3y ago
  Most of those take a lot more time and money than YC usually offers. There are some opportunities in "New Defense Technology". Something like a low-cost replacement for the Javelin anti-tank missile based on off the shelf phone camera parts ought to be possible. Of course, once that's out there, every insurgent group will have some. "Explainable AI" is really important. "Stablecoin finance" is mostly how to make sure the issuers don't steal the collateral. Maybe the people behind the stablecoin have an explosive collar welded around their neck. If the price drops, it detonates. That might work. "Applying machine learning to robotics" has potential. Get bin-picking nailed and get acquired by Amazon. Many people have failed at this, but it might be possible now. "Bring manufacturing back to America". Is it possible to build a cell phone in the US? "Climate tech" - think automating HVAC and insulation selection, installation, and analysis. Installers suck at this. See previous HVAC article on HN. A phone app where you walk around and through the building with an IR camera is one place to start. Map the duct system. Take manometer readings. Crunch. That's do-able on YC-sized money.
  • echelon 3y ago
    > Maybe the people behind the stablecoin have an explosive collar welded around their neck. If the price drops, it detonates. That might work. I hate crypto, but I love this idea. We should apply this to a lot of systems. Make stakeholders of anything accountable. 100% skin in the game.
    • Animats 3y ago
      China sometimes does that. Zheng_Xiaoyu, the head of China's equivalent of the Food and Drug Administration, was caught taking bribes to allow tainted drugs to be sold. He was executed in 2007. [1] [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zheng_Xiaoyu https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zheng_Xiaoyu
      • pests 3y ago
        Wow and only 40 days from sentencing to execution
• fuzzfactor 3y ago
  Some of these are not like the others. Also some are way more achievable by software-type engineer-types and the financial associates in their ecosystem, due to extreme familiarity with that particular landscape. Some also require a little more commitment than starting a small software company. If I was going to split the combined vision into only two categories it would be like this: - Applying machine learning to robotics - New defense technology - Bring manufacturing back to America - New space companies - Climate tech - A way to end cancer - Foundation models for biological systems and then the less moonshotty efforts: - Using machine learning to simulate the physical world - Commercial open source companies - Spatial computing - New enterprise resource planning software (ERPs) - Developer tools inspired by existing internal tools - Explainable AI - LLMs for manual back office processes in legacy enterprises - AI to build enterprise software - Stablecoin finance - The managed service organization model for healthcare - Eliminating middlemen in healthcare - Better enterprise glue - Small fine-tuned models as an alternative to giant generic ones Interestingly, #1 rose to the top of my list well over 40 years ago when I had a chance to do a little machine learning to guide automated systems. Was very lucky to have such powerful advanced equipment under my complete control in the laboratory at such an early time. Needed custom gear to bump it to the next level though. Figured all kinds of people would be doing things like that once "personal" computers were no longer a rare curiosity. The remaining things in the first group are some other things I (and I'm sure many others) have had in mind since before personal computers became accessible. "Too bad" my ambition has grown with age and it would take about a $10 million company to build my prototype hardware, and that's before any deployable machine learning can commence. So it's been an interesting 43 years keeping in mind how I would apply automation and machine learning to almost everything all the time, and refining my intended approach for a greater number of decades the earlier I had the idea.
  • Fomite 3y ago
    I'd move "Foundation models for biological systems" to Moonshotty efforts. Foundational models for biological systems are hard, and honestly I think require a degree of patience that is at odds with VC funding.
• 8en 3y ago
  Cool list! I hope yc will also fund creative consumer companies. Ways to have fun, enjoy life, build healthy habits, cherish memories, dream about the future, and deepen relationships with friends. This is 100% selfish - I want more fun and meaningful products to use.
  • ahstilde 3y ago
    Maybe it's more difficult to make a "request for startup" because it's more difficult to see what's "broken" in the consumer space?
  • alanlammiman 3y ago
    I was going to say... All so serious and grownup and utilitarian. Whatever happened to 'the next big thing will start as a toy'?
• davemo 3y ago
  I submitted an application for w24 that fits in the "Developer tools inspired by existing internal tools" category but wasn't accepted. I suspect my pitch probably needed work, and I also haven't started building at all yet and submitted as a solo-founder which it seems has less chance of being accepted. Here's the pitch and some details, in case anyone else is interested in the idea: > Supportal uses AI to generate internal tooling for startups that enables founders to scale customer-support without having to rely on engineering resources. > Given some simple input context like tech-stack and a database schema, Supportal uses AI to auto-generate internal tools which allow customer-support to easily answer questions about and take action on customer-data without needing help from an engineer. > Supportal offers founders a fully-featured self or cloud-hosted web UI. Retool (https://retool.com https://retool.com), Zapier (https://zapier.com https://zapier.com), Airtable (https://www.airtable.com https://www.airtable.com), Superblocks (https://www.superblocks.com https://www.superblocks.com), and Google AppSheet (https://about.appsheet.com https://about.appsheet.com) would likely be primary competitors, although their products require heavy user interaction to build internal tools either through composition in a WYSIWYG editor, low/no-code solutions, or integrations expertise using a full programming language. Although I'm no longer there, we actually evaluated and/or used all of these tools at Pulley, so I've had first-hand experience with their friction and where the gaps exist that Supportal would fill. These tools are also all targeted at integrations-experts who have the technical knowledge to write code and spend time building the tool they want. Supportal aims to generate the tooling you need intelligently via AI introspection and get you up and running with useful command and query tools to help your customer-support team take action and gain insights without help from engineering right out of the box. My most recent experience comes building internal tools for Pulley; I built the initial version of the internal tools in ~3 weeks and added features to it within Pulley over ~2 years. Roughly ~2-3 months of full-time work spread over that time period. Features were added as we identified gaps in our support agents ability to answer questions and take action, which often required dedicated engineering resources to help with, leading to a productivity loss for both groups. That said, I haven't actually built out anything that would _generate_ tools like this yet, but I've done enough adjacent work in the codegen/AI space in the last couple years that I feel confident I could put the pieces together.
• pbiggar 3y ago
  I can't believe that there's a US-supported genocide in Palestine and YC is advertising for "New defense tech". The most tone deaf thing I've ever seen
• tomashertus 3y ago
  The fact that YC overlooks the dire need for next-generation cybersecurity solutions is quite shocking. In the coming years, cybersecurity, trust, and safety will be essential needs of every customer and enterprise application. For example, the whole fiasco with the spread of fake Taylor Swift's nude images is just the beginning of the exploitation of internet data on an industrial scale. We can already see attempts to commercialize services similar to ransomware-as-a-service that, for a small amount of money, generate atrocious content about every possible person and spread it online automatically. We are on the edge of a new revolution that will bring malicious tools and services even closer to regular consumers and make them more affordable. I think that our cybersecurity tool chain is far from ready for what is coming.
  • marcosdumay 3y ago
    You can't buy (or sell) cybersecurity. It's a property of things, not a thing in itself. The same will certainly apply to the intra-head security you want against fake content and propaganda.
    • tomashertus 3y ago
      I apologize, but I don't understand your point. Could you please explain to me what you mean by that or how the fact that you "can't buy cybersecurity" contradicts what I wrote? The cyber security market was valued at USD 153.65 billion in 2022 and is projected to grow from USD 172.32 billion in 2023 to USD 424.97 billion in 2030, so apparently people are buying cybersecurity solutions.
      • marcosdumay 3y ago
        Almost the entirety of that market does not actually improve the security of anything. The rest looks much more like services than products.
        • tomashertus 3y ago
          I understand and agree with your point that you can't just "buy" cybersecurity by throwing money at the problem. It's more like building a well-defended castle, where multiple elements work together to create true security. Cybersecurity is a company-wide process that needs to be powered by specialized tools. The fact that one of the fastest-growing markets is omitted by YC is shocking to me. The opportunity to build $1B companies, which seems to be one of YC's acceptance criteria, is enormous. I don't know how far or close you are to the security field, but I do share your sentiment that many tools and so-called security solutions are useless and don't solve the problem. So it's now even more necessary to go and build new solutions. The problem persists and grows.
• acrodrig 3y ago
  Education related efforts are missing from your list and it's one that stands to benefit the most from the current AI gold rush.
• samstave 3y ago
  @Dang, and @SAMA -- In this list without a single request for managing corruption in .gov, the senate, how we address world situations which difficulties are FN COMPOUNDED by the very tools youre asking for -- AND the fact that you claim Alignment is an important feature... Palantir muc, inqtel much, every fn defense thing Your list is literally CONfinment. 2. AI for defense == We can profit here. 5. Are you fn daft: East India Company, do you speak it? Show me how many hands you have. "The UK became the world's richest country in the 19th century by being the workshop of the world. Death, murder conquer brought this, not some hipster Build a Startup They Said.. meme claim" 10. Enterspiese resource mgmt ; so HR on AI jax? FUCK that. 15. DC much? 19. Ive built more hospitals than you can shake a stick at. This is a nuanced comment: Eliminating the middleman in healthcare, your startup list will ONLY be medical records "disruptors" against EPIC and such and a boon to insurance - you cant kill the Pharma PornStars slinging pills. If you want to eliminate 'middlemen' - KILL PHARMA ADVERTISING AND PHARMA PILL PUSHING. (Source, I have designed built, implemented, commissioned and GO-LIVE more hospitals than you have been admitted to in your life. (this is a political issue, not a tech/pharma issue, per se -- the middlemen are the political policy makers and this is just a money hole) Your RFS is written by grifter VCs who have no soul. Prove me wrong. I want technological improvement, but the nuanced self-serving focus of this RFS makes me want to puke (its not the what, its the how, and the complete abrogation of any sense of historic context on all the technological platforms that brought us here, and the lack of awareness by these requests... These requests are NOT to inspire you - they are to feed their input.... When we heard AI was dangerous... think of a single one of the RFSs that do not include @sama. ----- @Dang, and @SAMA -- In this list without a single request for managing corruption in .gov, the senate, how we address world situations which difficulties are FN COMPOUNDED by the very tools youre asking for. --- Where EXACTLY do YOU think we should be plannig for and that includes SERIOUSLY What are HN's motives. ------ Seriously
• xdeshati 3y ago
  Regard Explainable AI ,I'm building a prompt sharing platform https://www.thepromptsquare.com https://www.thepromptsquare.com. The idea is to provide a square where users can discover ,share, collaborate discuss on various chatGPT prompts and their corresponding outputs .
• dluan 3y ago
  "dont be evil"
• briandear 3y ago
  Stablecoin is a solution in search of a problem.
• meow_mix 3y ago
  I'd be curious about YC's thoughts on founders breaking into manufacturing/robotics from a normal SWE background
  • silentsea90 3y ago
    I imagine you need someone who's technical in the hardware/robotics space. There's also the route of doing a masters perhaps, or working at a robotics startup before you start your own company. I am curious about YC's thoughts here as well as someone who's enthusiastic about this space. I feel this is the next trillion dollar industry.
  • snowmaker 3y ago
    One of the interesting potential futures is one in which every software engineer can build awesome robotics systems. What really unlocked ML was when you didn't need to have a deep academic background in ML to be able to use it. Now that the primitives exist, every software engineer can build a compelling ML app. I'm not sure if robotics is there yet, but if not it probably will be.
• shrimpx 3y ago
  To those who think this list will help them get into YC, or lament "why didn't I get into YC when my idea was squarely on this list": The YC application is a sales pitch, and you're not selling your idea, you're primarily selling your charisma and capacity to spin vision and sell. Second, you're selling your chemistry with your cofounders and stability of your relationship. Third, you're selling your capacity to build, at least some usable prototype, but this a low bar. At no point are you actually selling the concrete idea, unless you're doing something extremely specific that seems valuable and you're one of the few who can build it. For the rest, the idea is a rhetorical vehicle to sell the other things.
  • leetrout 3y ago
    Spot on. Add in an ivy league or similar pedigree as social proof for a better chance.
    • ultrasaurus 3y ago
      Having met a bunch of YC companies now, I wouldn't say the Ivies are exactly under-represented but it always seems like there's more Stanford than UPenn and more UWaterloo than Cornell. If school means anything it's the quality of their CS programs. Don't let your school hold you back from applying :)
      • deleted 3y ago
        [deleted]
      • asymmetric 3y ago
        Is UPenn particularly good? It’s the first time I hear about it in these discussions. Stanford on the other hand, I always hear about (isn’t that where Page and Brin were at?)
        • Centigonal 3y ago
          I think GP is saying that YC founders tend to be more techy, entrepreneurial types than Wharton MBA types. I'm not sure though, there's a lot left to the imagination.
• arach 3y ago
  these are great. if anyone is interested in or already exploring the enterprise + AI opportunities shared, message me alternatively find me on the founder matching platform: https://www.startupschool.org/cofounder-matching/candidate/tEBpP9KQt https://www.startupschool.org/cofounder-matching/candidate/t... for reference these are the ideas: 1/ New enterprise resource planning software (ERPs) 2/ AI to build enterprise software 3/ Better enterprise glue 4/ LLMs for manual back office processes in legacy enterprises
• smashah 3y ago
  Does no 4. include startups that are developing systems to protect innocent civilians from US weapons and drones used by Israelis to conduct their genocide? I'm certain it will have many sales and be a viable business or do they have to be in line with American and Israeli imperial aims? Defense startups should not be normalized. If you are going to forcibly normalize it then don't pick sides as that's not good for business.
• cwiz 3y ago
  I felt so inclined toward startups in my 20, now in mid 30 I'll just start a GitHub repo if theres interest
• politician 3y ago
  Are there any open-source tools or charts for modeling the tax liability for a pre-revenue startup that primarily is doing software development R&D with some number of employees and some amount of investment?
• lifeisstillgood 3y ago
  I think there is a germ of an idea in - antithesis - topless computing - programmable company I was surprised to see ERP as a real option - interesting
• happytiger 3y ago
  I spent a great while inside of medical during the pandemic and it was… interesting. There are some incredibly large interests in the space that wield intense power and control over various markets. There is also a profound degree of inefficiency in a lot of what’s happening. The question is whether many of those inefficiencies are technology problems or if they are intentionally constructed for the many reasons these things are created. I feel like there needs to be almost a Walmart size company pushing down on prices with that kind of scale before many of these structures will be broken, and unfortunately that doesn’t appear to be the direction most things are going (oh they exist in scale, just not direction). I was hoping Amazon’s entry into the market would do it. It didn’t. Might be time for a different direction in health care entirely. Kaiser had it right, but I don’t think they executed well and they are largely a company rooted in past thinking in how they are structured. Combining health care and subscription with ongoing medical care is definitely the direction of things to come. The fundamental shift needs to be moving the system from fixing problems to keeping people actually healthy, and that means that healthy people need to pay for the system or the entire thing gets it’s incentives inverted (as it is now). This is a fundamental shift, but if it were done right it would be a massive company and really change the world. I’ve been looking in to how to build this over the last year and know I want to go in this direction. And there is also a ton of interesting businesses in generics. Just some thoughts from someone who has been in many aspects of the medical industry over my career. Hope it inspires some good discussion with my favorite community.
  • fakedang 3y ago
    > And there is also a ton of interesting businesses in generics. Can you please elaborate on this? We are currently exploring a project in the same space, and I would love to discuss.
    • happytiger 3y ago
      Well I met with a company doing surgical supply and viewed their facility, and at the time (2021) they were one of only a few vial generic manufacturers based in the United States. They were mostly supplying GPOs, but there is precious little manufacturing capacity in North America for the stuff. That’s just one example. The market for surgical supply is wildly inefficient but there aren’t that many people operating manufacturing domestically right now. I think it’s a r potential opportunity. Cuban’s Cost Plus drug play really showed another weak spot in generics: the entire business he’s in is simply shortening the inefficient supply chain. That can be done in a lot of ways, and can be bundled with financing in many other ways and that can be a big deal (b2b) in this space. That’s what I’ve consulted on in the past. https://costplusdrugs.com/ https://costplusdrugs.com/
• CalChris 3y ago
  ELIMINATING MIDDLEMEN IN HEALTHCARE by creating another middleman in healthcare. This was first proposed by Jim Clark's Healtheon. "We want to empower the doctors and the patients and get all the other assholes out of the way." … "Except for us. One asshole in the middle." — The New New Thing, Michael Lewis. The reason we spend so much is that public healthcare is a public good and private companies aren't good at managing public goods. They're good at making money which is a different purpose (which has probably served most people reading this very well). We need Single Payer. Indeed we have Single Payer in Medicare and TriCare and other areas. It works pretty well. We need to eliminate middlemen in healthcare by actually eliminating rent seeking middlemen in healthcare.
  • Ensorceled 3y ago
    Yeah, this one is weird, the middlemen are there because we allow rent-seeking behaviour whether by insurance companies, complex corporate structures that have taken over practices, PBMs, etc. etc. Those aren't going away if we make things "more efficient" with technology, there is too much money to be made in the inefficiencies.
    • madeofpalk 3y ago
      There’s only one way to ‘eliminate the middle man’, and that’s universal health care
      • mlhpdx 3y ago
        So there are no middle(people) in Medicare? Or the defense industry? Single payer may just as likely future calcify the structures.
        • Ensorceled 3y ago
          > So there are no middle(people) in Medicare? Or the defense industry? Sooooo close to getting it. I checked out "How does Medicare work?" [1] and, wow, that's so much more complicated than healthcare in Canada. A big part of the problem is that Medicare has to work within the current broken structure of the US health care system and pay those same middlemen. > Single payer may just as likely future calcif[ied] the structures. But what the US has is so much worse than the how the rest of the developed world has "calcify the structures". [1] https://www.medicare.gov/basics/get-started-with-medicare/medicare-basics/how-does-medicare-work https://www.medicare.gov/basics/get-started-with-medicare/me...
• shmageggy 3y ago
  > We have a fair chance of avoiding catastrophic climate change if startups offer commercial solutions to decarbonize society or remove carbon from the atmosphere. Either this is sloppily phrased, or the SV techno-optimist kool-aid is way stronger than I would have thought plausible. Does anyone seriously believe that a reasonable solution to climate change has exactly one thing on the list and it's "more climate tech start-ups"? Of course climate tech has to play a role (we need everything we can throw at the problem), and start-ups will certainly provide a subset of that tech, but claiming that this alone provides "a fair chance" is extremely revealing of certain bias (and ignorance)
  • FloorEgg 3y ago
    What point are you trying to make exactly?
  • nojvek 3y ago
    I believe startups can still make it if they can crack making solar + battery cheaper than $0.15/kwh, or bio fuels cheaper than gasoline. The sun is free 1.3kw / meter energy for ~5 hours in the sun belt states.
  • spike-s 3y ago
    While I agree the phrasing could be better from YC, there is also truth to that statement. A lot of solutions to decarbonize have fallen flat on their faces to become a commercially viable solution. Ideas and new technology are needed as companies everywhere have shown they will not take the necessary action if it impacts the bottom line.
    • catlifeonmars 3y ago
      Doesn’t that just mean that maybe we should drop the requirement for commercial viability? Everything looks like a nail and all that.
  • mlhpdx 3y ago
    Indeed. On the other hand there is absolute certainty that very, very large sums of money will be made mitigating the current and future impact of change. Maybe decarbonization matters and a maybe not, but rising seas and changing weather aren’t getting better anytime soon and there are real, human centric problems to be solved now and for the foreseeable future. YC is simply missing the boat here. Pun intended.
• kirse 3y ago
  Developer tools inspired by existing internal tools... they often don’t realize that the internal tools they had at prior jobs are a great place to get inspiration from. Interesting that YC is willing to toe the IP theft line on this one. I think plenty of us do in fact realize that homegrown corporate ideas / apps could likely be turned into external new businesses, but then the blurred ethics and legality of doing so occurs a few thoughts later. An F100 I worked for had an entire corporate group for the purposes of spinning off their IP so that it could be done ethically/legally and give the employees' new startup the boost it needed. Several of these startups have gone on to $MMM/$B valuations. If you're at Boring BigCo and thinking of ripping one of their developed ideas for a small YC check, I'd advise against it.
  • eastbound 3y ago
    Not to underestimate the power of evil, but ideas are cheap and execution matters. One never reproduces an idea as-is, if only because your service should be multitenant. On the other hand, going to BigCo’s legal department to beg for a spin off of an activity you’ve seen, is as risky as the next 10 stages of your startup. Especially since the first stage of your startup is to test the waters with an MVP, which leads to a quasi-immediate pivot from the initial idea. Example: > web application which would combine a project manager, contact manager, and to-do list became Blogger and was sold to Google in 2003 (by Jack Dorsey).
  • deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
• ivanojakov33 3y ago
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• austin-cheney 3y ago
  There is an unfulfilled niche for rapid defense applications. If you have ever used a military information system you are already fully aware of the many constraints imposed for security. I have always bypassed these limitations by writing my own applications in JavaScript because they simply execute in the browser. I have always found it interesting that JavaScript is one of the most consumed programming languages in the world and nobody can write in it, especially in the browser. When I say write in it I mean without abstraction libraries (React, Angular, jQuery, and so on) and doing something other than CRUD apps. Until last year I was writing JS full time and met only 3 or 4 other people who do this and of them had security clearances. There is a huge opportunity there that nobody is filling. While the talent for it is completely absent the surprising thing is that it’s ridiculously easy to train for provided the candidates are smart enough to follow simple instructions and write original code.
  • biztos 3y ago
    Writing your own programs in the browser can be great fun, I enjoy loitering in the Javascript console as much as the next guy (did?). I’m surprised to hear that’s not common anymore. But it doesn’t sound like bypassing the “constraints imposed for security” is the desired outcome for the bosses, so who are you selling to?
    • austin-cheney 3y ago
      Who are you selling to? Anybody with a budget. That could be other contractors. Any enduring units. Any commands. A JavaScript application could be anything that loads in a webpage but not necessarily from a server or domain. That could mean pasted into the console as you suggested, a SharePoint utility, any web page that does not sending data to the server, as well as pages opened from the local file system. The primary considerations for success are high portability, data saved in the browser’s localStorage, applications that execute in the browser as opposed to on a server, no dependencies, and high performance.
      • technics256 3y ago
• gautam14 3y ago
  When PG wrote this essay (last year?) about climate tech, it was a deep dive into what the problems were, what the potential solutions and roadblocks could be, and who they're looking to fund in that space. This essay is "Solve cancer," "stablecoin finance," and "ml in robotics." Like, thanks for the insights, lol.
  • dacox 3y ago
    which essay is that? having trouble finding it
• porphyra 3y ago
  > Robotics hasn't yet had its GPT moment, but we think it’s close. Hmm Tesla is using end to end GPT-style model for FSD V12. It actually works surprisingly well. For actual robotics, Electric Sheep is doing something similar for their lawnmower [1]. However, I am a lot more skeptical about that than Tesla's FSD. [1] https://sheeprobotics.ai/technology/ https://sheeprobotics.ai/technology/
• natehouk 3y ago
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• appplication 3y ago
  > The UK became the world's richest country in the 19th century by being the workshop of the world Ahh.. haha. Yes it was certainly the innovation and industrialism of the UK that did it, not the inevitable result of centuries of imperialism, conquest and subjugation.
  • ilrwbwrkhv 3y ago
    Ya I think the whole industrial revolution made them capable of colonizing everything. So I guess in a round about way.
    • cmrdporcupine 3y ago
      Massive navy + Ideology/ethic of feeling justified dominating others and a sense of superiority to go with it + A couple centuries of practicing on the Irish Profit!
      • ilrwbwrkhv 3y ago
        To be fair the English did teach the world categorization which made everything standardized and reusable.
  • jryle70 3y ago
    Huh? Spain and Portugal were also huge empires yet they never became industrial powers. Germany had very few colonies, yet achieved rapid industrialization in the 19th century.
• EGreg 3y ago
  Ooh, I’d love to know how the HN community reacts to YC’s own words on this. Will HN’s very strong anti-crypto anti-blockchain sentiment continue when it’s their own mothership accelerator contradicting them? STABLECOIN FINANCE - Brad Flora Stablecoins are digital currencies that peg their value to some external reference. This is typically the U.S. dollar, but it can be other fiat currencies, assets, or even other digital currencies. Their transactions are recorded on a digital ledger, usually a blockchain. This means they can be traded at any time of day between any two wallets on the same network, transactions settle in seconds, and fees are a fraction of what you see in traditional finance. There’s been much debate about the utility of blockchain technology, but it seems clear that stablecoins will be a big part of the future of money. We know this because YC companies have been effectively incorporating stablecoins into their operations for years now – for cross-border payments, to reduce transaction fees and fraud, to help users protect savings from hyperinflation. This utility is so straightforward it seems inevitable traditional finance will follow suit. In fact we’re seeing signs of this. PayPal recently issued its own stablecoin. Major banks have started offering custody services and making noise about issuing their own. It all looks a bit like digital music’s transition from the realm of outlaw file sharing in the early 2000s to becoming the norm as players like Apple entered the market. Importantly, those major players were all outmatched in the end by Spotify, a startup founded during that same transition moment. $136b worth of stablecoins have been issued to date but the opportunity seems much more immense still. Only about seven million people have transacted with stablecoins to date, while more than half a billion live in countries with 30%+ inflation. U.S. banks hold $17T in customer deposits which are all up for grabs as well. And yet the major stablecoin issuers can be counted on one hand and the major liquidity providers with just a few fingers. We would like to fund great teams building B2B and consumer products on top of stablecoins, tools and platforms that enable stablecoin finance and more stablecoin protocols themselves.
  • smoldesu 3y ago
    > Will HN’s very strong anti-crypto anti-blockchain sentiment continue when it’s their own mothership accelerator contradicting them? I mean, it's sandwiched in-between such moonshots as "A.I. TO BUILD ENTERPRISE SOFTWARE" and "A WAY TO END CANCER". YCombinator wants money, and stablecoins are a good way to make it if you're crafty and quick on the uptake. If anything this is wholly unsurprising given YC's opportunistic attitude and fits in well alongside their other pipe-dream investments.
• frob 3y ago
  Today I learned that YC not only funds military companies, but encourages new startups to focus on killing machines and spying. And to point to the spy firm Palantir as an example of a model company shows how morally bankrupt YC truly is. Anything for a buck, right? All this while those same defense firms are currently making tens of billions of dollars supplying hardware to kill hundreds of civilians a day right this very instant. Make bombs people want, I see.
  • sirspacey 3y ago
    See “American Dynamism” https://a16z.com/american-dynamism/ https://a16z.com/american-dynamism/ It’s a moral stance, explicitly The founders that work in defense are mission driven. they see nation-state preservation as a moral issue. They would fail to “make a buck” if that was their only goal, as is the case in most industries/sectors Respectfully, I’d encourage you to review the HN guidelines. Skepticism is welcome here, but even cursory research will show that the founders in defense have deeply personal reasons for building what they do. That closing line is hilarious tho
    • zemo 3y ago
      > The founders that work in defense are mission driven That's not really saying anything, since it doesn't say anything about what their mission is. Sure, you have to be mission driven to get things done and lots of good and necessary things have been accomplished by people who were mission driven, but every villain in history was mission driven too. To point at someone and say "they are mission driven" as if being mission driven is on its own evidence that someone is good is at best naive. > they see nation-state preservation as a moral issue. hmm, surely at no time in history was a bad thing done by a leader who believed that nation-state preservation was a moral issue. > They would fail to “make a buck” if that was their only goal A somewhat peculiar and unsubstantiated claim about an industry that famously makes enormous amounts of money. > See “American Dynamism” I'm not really sure what sort of point you're trying to make here other than "VCs like defense companies".
      • sirspacey 3y ago
• sirspacey 3y ago
  This is the first YC request for startups I’ve seen in a long time that I’ve found inspiring I’m not sure the companies who actually have a shot at solving any of them can benefit from YCs approach or even network Most of the industries are won through long standing insiders partnering with exceptional engineering talent Not really YCs model
  • skeeter2020 3y ago
    I wasn't sure if it was intentionally misleading, or just impossibly naive. ERP software loved by its customers for its flexibility and ease of use.... For decades, everyone has known that robots are the future... Eliminating middlemen in <anything>... Apple Vision Pro is the key to unlocking "Spatial Computing"... For society to reap the full benefits of AI, more work needs to be done on explainable AI... Some of these are "necessary but not sufficient", others just plain platitudes.
    • sirspacey 3y ago
      That may be the best summary of “app startup practices to real life” in one sentence I’ve seen. Kudos.
  • MichaelZuo 3y ago
    Of course YC can't compete with the latter hence why the vast vast majority will not succeed, but it's the select few that do succeed that covers the cost of the rest.
• shadexfyre 3y ago
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• anh690136 3y ago
  great!
• bigfatfrock 3y ago
  Have YC applications always required a LinkedIn? Why not my personal site which has served as my LinkedIn, instead of the actual LinkedIn I deleted over a decade ago?
• uptownfunk 3y ago
  These are all so CapEx intensive it is totally disconnected from YC reality. Which implies if this is really what YC thinks is the direction we are headed, then the approach will essentially be much fewer bets at larger check sizes, for a very small subset. Also the business model for some of these is not exactly obvious. It’s either that or, public equity and/or massive debt heavy capex financing becomes more prevalent earlier on, so some type of high risk debt instrument. Alternatively this is partly a content marketing play to show how forward thinking and visionary they are.
• btbuildem 3y ago
  Some real bangers on here, such as "new ERP" and "new defense technology" (ew) ... also seems crypto bros aren't quite dead yet. Interesting to see that overall the VC ghouls seem a bit out of ideas on how to squeeze more cents out of a dollar. The one thing on that list that remotely makes any sense is leveraging LLM tech to automate legacy manual processes. Scalability on that though, whew.
• peter_d_sherman 3y ago
  >"1. Introduction 2. Applying Machine Learning To Robotics 3. Using Machine Learning To Simulate The Physical World 4. New Defense Technology 5. Bring Manufacturing Back To America 6. New Space Companies 7. Climate Tech 8. Commercial Open Source Companies 9. Spatial Computing 10. New Enterprise Resource Planning Software 11. Developer Tools Inspired By Existing Internal Tools 12. Explainable A.I. 13. L.L.Ms For Manual Back Office Processes In Legacy Enterprises 14. A.I. To Build Enterprise Software 15. Stablecoin Finance 16. A Way To End Cancer 17. Foundation Models For Biological Systems 18. The Managed Service Organization Model For Healthcare 19. Eliminating Middlemen In Healthcare 20. Better Enterprise Glue 21. Small Fine Tuned Models As An Alternative To Giant Generic Ones" If I may suggest one: 22. Help The Growing Number Of Homeless People In Our Country
• bbor 3y ago
  Anyone else shocked the elephant in the room, AGI, wasn’t mentioned? First mover advantage on that announcement is going to be unspeakably potent, just culturally speaking. I imagine many on this path share my thoughts that early venture capital is a little unnecessary/outmoded in this context, but it’s still disheartening to be forgotten. Did the YC folks have a falling out with OpenAI and disagree that AGI is here? Or maybe the opposite - they’re letting OpenAI take the industry uncontested… What’s the hacker news policy on casually floating (ill-informed) accusations of cartel activities? ;) PS big laughs from me on seeing “cure cancer” halfway down a list of otherwise fairly capitalist short-term priorities. I’m sure they made that decision for a reason but I think the end result is a Freudian slip on behalf of our entire culture
• hcks 3y ago
  “YC request for things they would like someone to spend their life on while they get rich making enterprise SaaS”
• 35mm 3y ago
  “ L.L.MS FOR MANUAL BACK OFFICE PROCESSES IN LEGACY ENTERPRISES” That one sounds more like a salesperson + consultant rather than a software startup.
• ilrwbwrkhv 3y ago
  YC is too influenced by marc Andreessen. Not a good thing.
• choia 3y ago
  Last time I checked this page was several years ago, given that, my main takes on this list are: * Crypto currencies are clearly on a decline given their location and volume in the list. It seems that the hype is mostly gone. * Naturally, AI dominates the list, but the focus is on various applications such as healthcare, robotics, enterprise, and the always-a-hit: traditional industries. * YC lists three and a half requests with a strong geo-political aspects: army technologies (justified by current global wars), startups manufacturing in the US (the role of the US in the 21st century), space and climatech. Our zeitgeist (and as such YC’s justification) is that large changes occurring in the world and they aims to take part in it. This is both bold and on-point. * Companies relying on open source as part of their core business. YC identifies such companies as having multiple advantages and would like to see more such companies in their portfolio. This is a valid statement that I truly believe in, but I also think that this is only a part of the criteria and not something that solely holds an investment thesis.
• nimblekuma 3y ago
  "Robotics hasn't yet had its GPT moment, but we think it’s close" From what I have been reading from those who run top-tier research labs in the field most agree that we are really far away. Why would people casually quote 30y away? https://techcrunch.com/2023/12/02/robotics-qa-with-metas-dhruv-batra/ https://techcrunch.com/2023/12/02/robotics-qa-with-metas-dhr... It is because core issues remain unsolved, has nothing to do with some old engineering process that can be disrupted and more so with the fact that science isn't there yet. Most of the GPT wrappers that are used as reasoning still sit on top of classical low-level control. Personally, as someone who works in AI specifically around robotics I believe there is headway to make here.
  • KiteloopMaster 3y ago
    Correct me if i’m wrong but no company has acquired enough robotic data to train an AI on it and test whether it works or not. Is there a more fundamental obstacle i’m missing?
• gaiagraphia 3y ago
  Man, it's pretty sad looking at this list. I feel the world's just rocketing out of reach of understandability. My background's in education. I always wonder whether a solid bet would be on overhauling the system totally so the foundations of these new 'future trades' are solidly grounded from 4 years old somehow. It seems our knowledge is an abstraction layer upon an abstraction layer upon... There's just so much shit to know, and it feels all muddied. I feel what I learnt at school hasn't equipped me for anything in the 21st century whatsoever.
  • sirsinsalot 3y ago
    Just wait until LLMs decide everything and you find yourself without recourse, help or justice because the LLMs say so, and nobody can reason why ... but statistically they're more right than a human!
• sirsinsalot 3y ago
  In the back-office automation example is: - Assessing applications for a mortgage or a business loan Really? Are we really giving these things as prime examples of what LLMs can automate. I do not want my mortgage application or business loan rejected because some un-auditable, non-deterministic, inference decided so. The tech upper classes really are sheltered from the real impact on real people that trusting IT can have. There's countless scandals of faulty algorithms (which are tractable) causing people real pain, often with suicides resulting. Using a black-box inference machine instead is MUCH worse.
• bilsbie 3y ago
  I’d love to work on any of these. Please get in touch if you want to team up. (email in profile)
• ansanabria 3y ago
  what startups have followed these requests and succeeded in previous years?
• bilsbie 3y ago
  I’ve been looking to join or co-found a startup for a while now but I never come across anyone interested in these type of problems. It’s always things like options research platform, medical records service, fitness app, etc. I thought I was just being overly picky but this request shows that there are lots of exciting ideas out there. Why do I see such a disconnect?
  • lokimedes 3y ago
    Perhaps the amount of capital available to fill the new commercial niches opened by the internet has led both entrepreneurs and investors alike to pick the low hanging fruits for the last three decades? Lots of smart people are yearning for opportunities to tackle more ambitious problems, but many I speak to, mention that they don't believe capital is available for high risk companies. Contrary, like we see here, I hear investors yearn for more ambitious startups. My take is that there's a mechanism missing somewhere between these groups. You don't just bootstrap and MVP a fusion reactor, to raise capital, you don't even go about doing meaningful due diligence beforehand, as these paradigm shifting technologies comes with a kind of event horizon, where projections become as meaningless as asking Edison for the ROI on utility electricity, prior to inventing the lightbulb. I don't want to plug anything from our gracious host, Y-combinator, but we have started Unbelievable Labs, to make headway on exactly this Catch-22 problem. My "RFS" includes: Electron-beam drilling, Nuclear Isomeric Energy Systems, Industrial-scale nuclear transmutation, Systems Biology for nano-scale structural assembly of macroscopic structures, Telekinetic manipulation (EEG+actuators), Electro-Hydrodynamic Air-Space Drive and similar "unbelievable" concepts. We have concluded that funding for these concepts requires at least proof of a new technological principle, and we are scraping together a pool of capital from dreamy angels, as well as a cadre of possible scientists and entrepreneurs, and then instead of waiting for "somebody" to form a startup, and hope they will allow us to invest in them, we are funding the pre-seed, setting the team and getting them started. If we can convince larger corporations and nations to fund this as a kind of "Bell Labs" for the post-monopolistic world, we would have succeeded in our dreams. I don't think anything less can generate the kind of progress requested here. Let's hope YC and others can accomplish this pivot from easy-apps to hard-progress soon.
• drdrek 3y ago
  Most of these seem aspirational for YC to produce them and less of something that they can offer value to the entrepreneur. They can offer very little outside of SAAS style company that is tech for enterprise or tech for consumer. If you are looking space, arms, robotics, GovTech etc you are better looking for some corporate VC or another specialized accelerator. No one is truly a generalist. But don't expect a corporate VC to be as fun or cool as YC.
• gc_c 3y ago
  [flagged]
• NarcisMirandes 3y ago
  Dalton Caldwell explained in Bloomberg: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YGKKI1JIlPc&t=2201s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YGKKI1JIlPc&t=2201s 36:42
• Utkarsh_Mood 3y ago
  sad to see no neuro-ai , is it too early?
• wolframhempel 3y ago
  Slight tangent - but I feel that our need for "explainable AI" might lead to us missing out on some fundamentally different ways of thinking and reasoning that AI could provide. Machines might reach conclusions in ways that simply can't be "dumbed down" to human reasoning. That doesn't mean that these means are esoteric or outside of logic, but it just takes a few levels of derivations and statistic to make something really hard to comprehend for us.
  • keiferski 3y ago
    I call this "machine metaphysics" and I think it's an extremely interesting area of speculation. A whole lot of human metaphysics are based on our (very limited) sensory inputs – which machines/AI have infinitely more of. As a quick example, it seems to me that an AI may not need the concept of a universal, in the philosophical sense, because it is capable of handling a near-infinite number of particulars.
    • practal 3y ago
      There are a LOT of natural numbers, even for an AI.
      • keiferski 3y ago
        I had in mind more concrete aspects of "human" reality. A lot of the divisions we make between objects seem dependent on our language, which is dependent on our sensory abilities. The concept of species is maybe a good example – it doesn't make a whole lot of sense, if you think about it. It's merely a linguistic placeholder to describe a step in a process, because the idea of constant evolutionary change is too difficult to encapsulate in a single concept. An AI would have no issue with this, as it is capable of taking in and holding much more data and conceptualizing the concept of a process.
    • wolframhempel 3y ago
      That's super interesting. Are there any books/articles/further reading on this you can recommend?
• keiferski 3y ago
  It's surprising to me that Tech never seems interested in conflict resolution. A lot of issues in the world are basically negotiation problems, yet they get treated as competitive ones. A better world is probably one in which conflicts are defused early, not one in which arms races are treated as the default. Why is that? Is conflict resolution too much of a non-tech thing and more in the realm of politics? Or is there simply no money to be made in reducing warfare and hostile nation-state competitions?
  • deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  • zknowledge 3y ago
    I don't have an answer for your questions but this comment really stood out to me. Maybe it's just my years in tech, but I have never thought of conflict resolution in the context of a tech problem to solve. The only format of this I can think of is anonymous forums or communications tech. Otherwise, it's very out of the box thinking which is great to see.
    • keiferski 3y ago
      One example that came to mind was providing information on various sides of an issue (I’m thinking of alternative media, Wikipedia in some sense, although it’s still a bit biased.) Essentially the internet as a communication medium allows for more viewpoints to be distributed and understood. Unfortunately in practice, no one is really using it to try and understand each other and solve conflicts. Instead, they’re still trying to push certain viewpoints and exclude others.
• conductr 3y ago
  > A new startup model has emerged as an alternative to PE ownership: the MSO (Managed Service Organizations) model. > The MSO model enables doctors to run their own clinics by (1) providing them software that can handle back office tasks such as billing and scheduling and (2) channeling patients to them. > These functions are largely what PE ownership provides. Doctors who are part of an MSO model can continue to run small, physician-owned practices while competing successfully with large, PE-owned conglomerates. I feel this is building off a false hypothesis. PE isn't out-competing independents. Sure, there is a tiny bit of synergy and some bargaining power that comes with the scale of having a portfolio of clinics. But most independents concerned with that have joined one of the numerous GPO/networks that exist. What's really happening is there is a huge generation of providers reaching retirement age and PE is a well capitalized buyer for them to sale their practice. New doctors are more likely to be employees versus being entrepreneurial in the past. I think for this to work, you would want to find ways for new providers to own a practice which means taking on debt that would out bid PE. It might be that the startup that gets this right, provides said financing with the management fee income as an addition to the debt service/income for risk. This could be interesting and new doctors might see this as an attractive path towards practice ownership; but getting the financial model for all constituents to be attractive is going to be tough IMO. MSO for back office synergies is possible, but from what I've seen it's usually more cost effective to have your under-utilized receptionist wear many of these hats and that's what independents tend to do.
• mpweiher 3y ago
  This "glue code" — ETL pipelines, integrations, and custom workflows — is the dark matter of the enterprise software universe. Hmmm...solving glue code, the "dark matter of [enterprise] software". Maybe I should apply? ;-) https://blog.metaobject.com/2021/06/glue-dark-matter-of-software.html https://blog.metaobject.com/2021/06/glue-dark-matter-of-soft...
• SilentM68 3y ago
  The first priority should be, "BRING MANUFACTURING BACK TO AMERICA", as that will create a sustainable and strong economy, but in my view, A.I. will takeover that job sector along with many others. So, the question is, when AI takes over the world, who will hire humans to work so that they can pay for goods and services. The answer to this of course depends on whether money will still be in use. Just a thought :)
• jamietanna 3y ago
  > Developer tools inspired by existing internal tools Is something I'm working on right now - it's all Open Source but I'm looking at what could make it Commercial Open Source or what additional offerings would make sense to businesses
• ThinkBeat 3y ago
  Do no evil unless there are massive profits. YC is seeking startups for "NEW WAR TECHNOLOGY" Killing is our business. and business is good. Yes, what we need are startups focused on killing people in ever more efficient ways, with the least amount of threat to our own people. Hopefully, we can invent a even more efficient way of genocide by inventing something much stronger than a hydrogen bomb, but with less radiation. Friendly and looks good on TV. The future so bright. I gotta wear shades. Many years ago, when the state was more honest the US had a "Department of War". Which it ought to have kept given that few wars ( or "military conflicts") that the US engages in is about Defense of our home country. Our patch of dirt. Easy to see since they usually take place on a different continent. In 1984 they call it "Department of Peace". -------------- >NEW DEFENSE TECHNOLOGY - Jared Friedman and Gustaf Alströmer The US is now engaged in large-scale conflicts in several regions that threaten to change our world. While the US has historically led the world in defense technology, the defense contractors it depends on have grown slow and inefficient, bloated by decades of cost-plus contracts. SpaceX showed the world that a private space company could be vastly more effective than the publicly-funded United Launch Alliance. New companies that sell to the DoD like Palantir and Anduril are showing that the same thing is true for defense tech. Silicon Valley was born in the early 20th century as an R&D area for the US military. Early Silicon Valley companies were largely funded by the DoD and played a key role in WWII by building military radar, code-breaking equipment, and components for the atomic bomb. This decade is the time to return Silicon Valley to these roots.
• Will2024 3y ago
  Is ycombinator the new arpa I hope so...