5 ms·

"We started in January 2012, and may still be the only Asian YC founders ever." So that is not true. 9gag is from Hong Kong. Semantics3 is from Singapore. Stri

by kevin 12y ago

"We started in January 2012, and may still be the only Asian YC founders ever." So that is not true. 9gag is from Hong Kong. Semantics3 is from Singapore. Strikingly is from China. Memebox is from Korea. Cleartax is from India. Those are just off the top of my head, I'm sure there are more. That being said, I actually would love to see more Asian startups applying to Y Combinator. We should be funding one from each country EVERY batch, not just averaging one per batch. I've made several trips to Asia now talking with startups to try and better understand how YC can do a better job and what is it about their ecosystem that makes the Asian startup scene so different. For example, I did office hours with over 60 Japanese startups trying to understand why it feels different over there. What surprised me the most was how much we take for granted here in the US about our startup ecosystem and values. My plan is to write this all down in depth soon and figure out what actionable things can be done by YC to help. Stories from companies like AnyPerk help, but so much more needs to be done by us to reach out to founders out there.

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kamikazi 12y ago
Disclosure: Indian W'15 applicant here. Very pleasing to my ears. Few days back @sama also mentioned in one of the interviews to local print about wanting to make inroads into India and I welcomed it. Done properly YC can get nice response here. Some of the challenges or differences about Indian start ups which you might have to address are: a) Visa related issues: This is taken for granted by applicants from EU and other visa-on-arrival countries but it's a huge Qn mark for Asians. eg: I still don't know if we're selected for interview will I have to arrange for a B1 or B2? Will we be able to get it within a month? (There's an elaborate application process with long waiting periods - US embassy is notorious for rejecting on flimsiest of reasons). If we get selected, I'm still bit unsure what visa will be applicable for the 3-4 months of incubation period. To what extent YC will be involved in visa process. What happens after that? Some of these things are not laid out upfront in YC FAQ as of now. b) Incorporation: The more you branch out into Asian territories the more likelihood that for many startups it won't make sense to incorporate in USA. Or maybe have a dual structure with HQ + subsidiary in USA/$home country (Ours might be dual). On the other hand there are some SaaS cos who have a Delaware co just for ease of seting up merchant a/cs and ease in collecting recurring payments (We still don't have Stripe here). I know this comes later in the picture but I think some of the uncertainty around these Qns would keep many an Asian startup from applying. For someone in Boston, if he doesn't make the cut, he can always go back to his home and figure our whatever he wants to do after 3 months. He loses just 3 months of his time. For many of us it's not easy to decide to upend your roots/family everything for that one chance of making it big only to realise all the wind is out of your sails after 6 months due to some stupid visa/IRS issues or for that matter even FDI/tax guys back in our home countries (eg even huge cos like Amazon India with billions of dollars investment in their Indian arm, are still caught in Indian tax/FDI redtape - they're facing an ongoing struggle against authorities as well as entrenched local retail community. They are forced to operate as marketplace and still have to dance as music changes). There's a reason why we're #134 in ease of doing business and #179 in Starting a business (out of 189). So I think a clearly thought out YC roadmap on visa/incorp in itself would be a huge bump to smart founders. b) The type or quality of startups in India is slightly different than the typical SV co. The typical SV startup goes: Stanform/MIT grads, batchmates, started building a SaaS/app2.0 product in final-year from dorm -- where you first figure out how to get millions of users and then sometimes after SeriesA maybe think about monetisation. Many of them get acquihired, defensive acquisition before making a cent in revenue. The good startups here in India that I like are mostly revenue generating from day one. Enough to have founders earning 3x+ of his erstwhile salaried job. They might not have hockey-stick growth in millions within months. A hockey-stick chart of nonpaying users is as good as 1/3rd of same chart of solid profitable paying users I reckon. c) The way you do due diligence has to be slightly different. Yes there are lot of smart founders but just due to our sheer numbers you'll also find more shady characters (which in absolute nos would be a huge jump from what you might encounter in SV, even if %wise same - so a perception problem), so you'll have to gradually build up your sniffing skills in other vectors and also set your internal founder-meter accordingly. Plus there's a lot more diversity here in social/living conditions hence the founder diversity that goes with it. Which also means the good founders might be disproportionately outliers on the map which YC or SV references. eg: IIT gets a huge mindshare in SV but I see more startups from non-IITians here. There are lot of similar subtle things from an Indian founder's perspective. I know coz I've grappled with some of these until I studied and organically warmed up to an idea so strong that made me jump through all the hoops and decide to go for it. Would be glad to discuss any further - my email is in profile. (or in person alongside YC interview :-)
- davidglauber 12y ago
  I'm not related to YC in any way, just an applicant like you. I'm a US applicant, even-though I'm an immigrant and wasn't born here. I'll try to answer some of your questions from common knowledge + my understanding: 1. Getting a US visa may sometime be difficult or take time. My best advice is to get the visa anyway when you can. This way you're ready to come to the interview if and when you're invited. Visa is just a way of getting here. Serious candidates are up for promoting their startup in any possible way. Many of these ways go through the US and especially SV (angels, VCs, acceleration programs, the big US market, tech giants, etc). Get it anyway if you can, regardless of YC. 2. I think you actually have a huge advantage as an Indian founder - you have a native access to a huge talent pool and a huge market. Since the ease of doing business in India is at the bottom of the global rank, this advantage is even bigger. 3. No Stripe in India? Difficult place to do business? Difficult place to start a startup? These are real problems. It sounds like a source of many GREAT startup ideas. And Indian founders are, again, in advantage here. 3. As for incorporation, I think it's about what makes sense to your company. Every place has it's advantages - many big US VC firms fund only companies with a US office while having an R&D and support site in India is cheaper than in most other places. I'm sure the that folks in YC have good advice about what's right for your company. If you must incorporate already - I don't think that getting incorporated in India will disqualify good candidates from YC. 4. From what I know and read on YC's formal posts, they can't get you a visa. Tourist visa should be enough to get here (it gives you the equivalent of what EU visa-on-arrival gives you, but for 6 months instead of 3). When your company will get US funding over some threshold you should be able to get a working visa. I used to have a tourist visa in the past (wasn't born in a visa-by-arrival country). My co-founder will soon be on a tourist visa, so I know what you're facing. One of the HackerRank (YC S11) founders didn't get a visa eventually. So his co-founder attended YC in SV and he stayed in India. They kept working hard & on remote during YC. They are very successful today. DONT let any visa stop you. 5. About your difference from a guy from Boston - you and I are not that different at all. Each of us will leave his place and life if accepted to YC. For you the opportunity may just be bigger and more important, because it gives you full access to the best place in the world to start a startup. 7. Forget about a 'Typical YC applicant'. Be the best applicant and founder you can be, regardless of YC. Their application is built to find great hackers. Graduating from a top US school/IIT can help to demonstrate your abilities, but it's ONLY one way and doesn't necessarily mean you're a successful applicant. Get a founding experience, keep hacking, contribute to open-source projects - all of these help and matter. Read this blog post by a recent YC grad: https://medium.com/theli-st-medium/hi-im-a-mom-and-a-start-up-founder-my-yc-story-3b8c8650ae95 https://medium.com/theli-st-medium/hi-im-a-mom-and-a-start-u.... Forget about typical applicant. She made it while having two little girls in LA. Read her words: Grits, Perseverance, Passion. Not visa, IIT or anything like that. Msg me if I can be helpfull in anything else. Best of luck with your YC application!
omegaworks 12y ago
>I did office hours with over 60 Japanese startups trying to understand why it feels different over there. As someone who has "Start a company in Tokyo" on their long-term plan, can you elaborate? I wish there was more out there about international startup hubs.
neilunadkat12 12y ago
When you are trying to solve a problem which is specific to the country, then I am not sure how very effective would it be for the founders to come to the US, work on something, and try it make it big from there. I guess YC would need some members who know about the scene in each country. That help would be a lot more effective I guess.
blackkettle 12y ago
In Japan at least, there is a very different mainstream cultural perception of 'startups'. It is basically not OK to try one and fail - you do not get credit for trying, and it can have a significant negative impact on your career if you do not succeed. There is a small, fairly tight-knit community within which this is obviously not the case, but mainstream Japanese culture still takes a conservative, and predominantly dim view of the 'startup'.
- patio11 12y ago
  And by "significantly negative" read "You have forever passed on the opportunity to work at any Japanese megacorp." Think of an alternate universe America where AmaGooBookSoft did substantially all of the hiring at universities and if, on the day you were invited to interview, you said "Oh I am exploring a startup so I don't want a job this minute" that barred you from them for life:
- aswanson 12y ago
  Sad. There seems to be an outsized amount of artistic/sci-fi as well as technical talent in that country. It's a net loss for the world economy that Japanese culture cuts the balls off the prime movers.
j_lev 12y ago
My Chinese friend says that the reason there isn't a startup culture in China can easily be explained by guanxi. Specifically, for Chinese people there's no obligation to not rip off an investor (especially a foreign one), and the reverse is assumed true too.
- nichtich 12y ago
  The reason sounds interesting... But there is a startup culture in China.
mastef 12y ago
Duly noted.. let's have a coffee when you're in the area again and review some vests

by kevin 12y ago

deleted 12y ago

[deleted]

deleted 12y ago

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kamikazi 12y ago

Disclosure: Indian W'15 applicant here. Very pleasing to my ears. Few days back @sama also mentioned in one of the interviews to local print about wanting to make inroads into India and I welcomed it. Done properly YC can get nice response here. Some of the challenges or differences about Indian start ups which you might have to address are: a) Visa related issues: This is taken for granted by applicants from EU and other visa-on-arrival countries but it's a huge Qn mark for Asians. eg: I still don't know if we're selected for interview will I have to arrange for a B1 or B2? Will we be able to get it within a month? (There's an elaborate application process with long waiting periods - US embassy is notorious for rejecting on flimsiest of reasons). If we get selected, I'm still bit unsure what visa will be applicable for the 3-4 months of incubation period. To what extent YC will be involved in visa process. What happens after that? Some of these things are not laid out upfront in YC FAQ as of now. b) Incorporation: The more you branch out into Asian territories the more likelihood that for many startups it won't make sense to incorporate in USA. Or maybe have a dual structure with HQ + subsidiary in USA/$home country (Ours might be dual). On the other hand there are some SaaS cos who have a Delaware co just for ease of seting up merchant a/cs and ease in collecting recurring payments (We still don't have Stripe here). I know this comes later in the picture but I think some of the uncertainty around these Qns would keep many an Asian startup from applying. For someone in Boston, if he doesn't make the cut, he can always go back to his home and figure our whatever he wants to do after 3 months. He loses just 3 months of his time. For many of us it's not easy to decide to upend your roots/family everything for that one chance of making it big only to realise all the wind is out of your sails after 6 months due to some stupid visa/IRS issues or for that matter even FDI/tax guys back in our home countries (eg even huge cos like Amazon India with billions of dollars investment in their Indian arm, are still caught in Indian tax/FDI redtape - they're facing an ongoing struggle against authorities as well as entrenched local retail community. They are forced to operate as marketplace and still have to dance as music changes). There's a reason why we're #134 in ease of doing business and #179 in Starting a business (out of 189). So I think a clearly thought out YC roadmap on visa/incorp in itself would be a huge bump to smart founders. b) The type or quality of startups in India is slightly different than the typical SV co. The typical SV startup goes: Stanform/MIT grads, batchmates, started building a SaaS/app2.0 product in final-year from dorm -- where you first figure out how to get millions of users and then sometimes after SeriesA maybe think about monetisation. Many of them get acquihired, defensive acquisition before making a cent in revenue. The good startups here in India that I like are mostly revenue generating from day one. Enough to have founders earning 3x+ of his erstwhile salaried job. They might not have hockey-stick growth in millions within months. A hockey-stick chart of nonpaying users is as good as 1/3rd of same chart of solid profitable paying users I reckon. c) The way you do due diligence has to be slightly different. Yes there are lot of smart founders but just due to our sheer numbers you'll also find more shady characters (which in absolute nos would be a huge jump from what you might encounter in SV, even if %wise same - so a perception problem), so you'll have to gradually build up your sniffing skills in other vectors and also set your internal founder-meter accordingly. Plus there's a lot more diversity here in social/living conditions hence the founder diversity that goes with it. Which also means the good founders might be disproportionately outliers on the map which YC or SV references. eg: IIT gets a huge mindshare in SV but I see more startups from non-IITians here. There are lot of similar subtle things from an Indian founder's perspective. I know coz I've grappled with some of these until I studied and organically warmed up to an idea so strong that made me jump through all the hoops and decide to go for it. Would be glad to discuss any further - my email is in profile. (or in person alongside YC interview :-)

davidglauber 12y ago
I'm not related to YC in any way, just an applicant like you. I'm a US applicant, even-though I'm an immigrant and wasn't born here. I'll try to answer some of your questions from common knowledge + my understanding: 1. Getting a US visa may sometime be difficult or take time. My best advice is to get the visa anyway when you can. This way you're ready to come to the interview if and when you're invited. Visa is just a way of getting here. Serious candidates are up for promoting their startup in any possible way. Many of these ways go through the US and especially SV (angels, VCs, acceleration programs, the big US market, tech giants, etc). Get it anyway if you can, regardless of YC. 2. I think you actually have a huge advantage as an Indian founder - you have a native access to a huge talent pool and a huge market. Since the ease of doing business in India is at the bottom of the global rank, this advantage is even bigger. 3. No Stripe in India? Difficult place to do business? Difficult place to start a startup? These are real problems. It sounds like a source of many GREAT startup ideas. And Indian founders are, again, in advantage here. 3. As for incorporation, I think it's about what makes sense to your company. Every place has it's advantages - many big US VC firms fund only companies with a US office while having an R&D and support site in India is cheaper than in most other places. I'm sure the that folks in YC have good advice about what's right for your company. If you must incorporate already - I don't think that getting incorporated in India will disqualify good candidates from YC. 4. From what I know and read on YC's formal posts, they can't get you a visa. Tourist visa should be enough to get here (it gives you the equivalent of what EU visa-on-arrival gives you, but for 6 months instead of 3). When your company will get US funding over some threshold you should be able to get a working visa. I used to have a tourist visa in the past (wasn't born in a visa-by-arrival country). My co-founder will soon be on a tourist visa, so I know what you're facing. One of the HackerRank (YC S11) founders didn't get a visa eventually. So his co-founder attended YC in SV and he stayed in India. They kept working hard & on remote during YC. They are very successful today. DONT let any visa stop you. 5. About your difference from a guy from Boston - you and I are not that different at all. Each of us will leave his place and life if accepted to YC. For you the opportunity may just be bigger and more important, because it gives you full access to the best place in the world to start a startup. 7. Forget about a 'Typical YC applicant'. Be the best applicant and founder you can be, regardless of YC. Their application is built to find great hackers. Graduating from a top US school/IIT can help to demonstrate your abilities, but it's ONLY one way and doesn't necessarily mean you're a successful applicant. Get a founding experience, keep hacking, contribute to open-source projects - all of these help and matter. Read this blog post by a recent YC grad: https://medium.com/theli-st-medium/hi-im-a-mom-and-a-start-up-founder-my-yc-story-3b8c8650ae95 https://medium.com/theli-st-medium/hi-im-a-mom-and-a-start-u.... Forget about typical applicant. She made it while having two little girls in LA. Read her words: Grits, Perseverance, Passion. Not visa, IIT or anything like that. Msg me if I can be helpfull in anything else. Best of luck with your YC application!

omegaworks 12y ago

>I did office hours with over 60 Japanese startups trying to understand why it feels different over there. As someone who has "Start a company in Tokyo" on their long-term plan, can you elaborate? I wish there was more out there about international startup hubs.

neilunadkat12 12y ago

When you are trying to solve a problem which is specific to the country, then I am not sure how very effective would it be for the founders to come to the US, work on something, and try it make it big from there. I guess YC would need some members who know about the scene in each country. That help would be a lot more effective I guess.

blackkettle 12y ago

In Japan at least, there is a very different mainstream cultural perception of 'startups'. It is basically not OK to try one and fail - you do not get credit for trying, and it can have a significant negative impact on your career if you do not succeed. There is a small, fairly tight-knit community within which this is obviously not the case, but mainstream Japanese culture still takes a conservative, and predominantly dim view of the 'startup'.

patio11 12y ago
And by "significantly negative" read "You have forever passed on the opportunity to work at any Japanese megacorp." Think of an alternate universe America where AmaGooBookSoft did substantially all of the hiring at universities and if, on the day you were invited to interview, you said "Oh I am exploring a startup so I don't want a job this minute" that barred you from them for life:
aswanson 12y ago
Sad. There seems to be an outsized amount of artistic/sci-fi as well as technical talent in that country. It's a net loss for the world economy that Japanese culture cuts the balls off the prime movers.

j_lev 12y ago

My Chinese friend says that the reason there isn't a startup culture in China can easily be explained by guanxi. Specifically, for Chinese people there's no obligation to not rip off an investor (especially a foreign one), and the reverse is assumed true too.

nichtich 12y ago
The reason sounds interesting... But there is a startup culture in China.

mastef 12y ago

Duly noted.. let's have a coffee when you're in the area again and review some vests