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Ask HN: [YC-Funding] : Will it work?
It is beyond doubt that YCombinator model is a successful one but will it still work if we take "funding" out of it? When startups apply to YCombinator what they want most - investment? guidance? or popularity of being a YC company?
What if someone creates a similar organization where a team of experts(Technology/Design/Marketing/Finance etc.) guides and helps promising startups to bring out MVP of their product and connects them with investors in return of 5%-10% shares? Will it work?
- patio11 14y agoThere exist many, many incubators out there which are essentially on the YC model. Let's charitably describe them as occupying a good bit of a hypothetical spectrum of value one could provide. A new incubator which provided no funding is signaling to prospective companies that it is not as valuable as other incubators. It is less about the $10k (which is a virtually meaningless amount of money anyhow in business) and more about "We couldn't actually convince anyone to part with $10k per startup but don't worry despite that we do know what we're talking about". This would likely doom that hypothetical incubator to only getting applications from people who are probably not ready to make successful companies, who are legion. You know, "great idea for a social network around filtered mobile pictures of razor blades just needs a tech cofounder to get their gamification on". That would be the happy end of the inbox for that hypothetical incubator.
- debacle 14y agoYou could create something on this model, but you're not going to get 5-10% of shares without opening your wallet and you'd be hard pressed to put together a group that is as engaged as YC.