YC vs. Techstars, Launchbox, and DreamIT | Hacker News Reader

YC vs. Techstars, Launchbox, and DreamIT

9 pointswumi16 comments

There's obviously YC.

But there's also Techstars, Launchbox, and DreamitVentures, in the United States at least.

Three Questions:

1. Can they not all co-exist (does it have to be us vs. them? or can't we celebrate entrepreneurship in varied forms)

2. Why are people so irate when a good idea is cloned -- doesn't that re-inforce the strength of the idea?

3. Who will be the first (or does it exist) to do a YC in the under-developed world?

Certainly, Ashoka (http://ashoka.org/) already exists, but what about a focus on entrepreneurs/ mentoring and connections, regardless of whether its social or not.

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>> 3. Who will be the first (or does it exist) to do a YC in the under-developed world?

Kiva.org and Prosper.com seem to be doing quite well in this space.

A few I'm aware of that exist in India:

TIFAC ( http://tifac.org.in/ ) Seedfund ( http://www.seedfund.in/ ) Erasmic incubation fund ( http://www.erasmic.com ) Aavishkaar ( http://www.aavishkaar.org/ ) TIE ( http://bangalore.tie.org/ )

But I'm not sure how reliable and enterprising these are actually.

Wondering if there are any seed funding orgs like YC in Australia?

Don't know of any in AU, but as far as kiva and prosper, that's not really the YC / seed-funding model, that's the Mohammed Yunnis Micro-loan model.

Lending money to somebody and watching their progress is a lot different then what Y C or any seed-fund does.

The YC model is probably not generally applicable in countries spanning all stages of economic development. Even though kiva/prosper are not exactly the same thing, they may be the equivalent workable solution in the countries where they are active.

"... Wondering if there are any seed funding orgs like YC in Australia? ..."

Ahh let me see. There is easy funding for real-estate, mining, farming, construction, dredging, highways and those new fangled finance schemes. But I doubt it. The VC's in Collins or Pitt St see Startups as too risky and do not understand them.

I'm sure many groups better than YC will spring up, barring a major market collapse.

It's hard to even look at YC in a positive light anymore. They've gotten too greedy in just choosing the most ideal cookie-cutter groups that follow their rigid profile of the ideal founders.

It just always seemed that YC had a bigger vision than making lots of cash. No longer.

This is not unique to YC, many successful people admit later in their careers that they would never, today, hire themselves. I just wonder if YC will continue down this path or reach a point where they will turn around, stop trying desperately to prove themselves and make a more meaningful difference.

You're suggesting that greed (YC acting in their financial interests) is a bad thing. I don't think it is.

What makes investors successful, is the same thing that makes startups successful: Figuring out a pattern that works.

What YC is doing is betting that lots of small investments in hackepreneur types is better than what VCs and other early-stage investors are doing.

Also, I don't see much evidence of them "desperately trying to prove themselves". Looks like they're doing what any smart investment group should do: Trying to attract great entrepreneurs that they think they can help. If Paul and company were good at detecting and promoting talent in the life sciences sector, that's what they'd do. But they aren't, and so they don't.

This is really just a very early prediction on my part of where YC may be headed. I, personally, feel very little animosity towards YC or their current methods but have become more wary of their direction.

But yes, placing _too large_ of a priority on financial interests is always bad.

Finding a pattern that works is a good strategy, but what's their fitness function? This seems like an easy way to fall into the trap of only looking at the short term. With the volatility of software startups, I can't blame them too much for that.

It would serve their publicity greatly to show that they are still interested in improving the situation for us regular hackers and startup founders who are still at the bottom than appearing to just focus on their bottom line. This does not require lots of money or diving into unnecessarily risky investments.

Its not really clear how you are suggesting YC change. What are you suggesting they do?

1. i think over the years you will see several more companies like ycombinator. you may even see something better. that is just how it goes, but in the long run, seed fund will die. and companies will go straight from doormroom to acquisition. add the fact that acquisition will be in the low millions and high hundred of thousands.

"Who will be the first (or does it exist) to do a YC in the under-developed world?"

I suppose politics are in the way - most underdeveloped countries don't have capitalism, or am I mistaken?

Some do, some don't. But most frightening to most investors is the unreliability of the capitalism that does exist. See Kenya, for a recent example. Would you invest in a company in a nation that may, or may not, have a free market to operate in next year? Kenya has, for the past several years, seen tremendous economic growth and development, much of it supported by outside investment...but with the newly elected leadership, genocidal military actions, and a return to the tribalism and cronyism that accounts for the problems in the rest of undeveloped Africa, those businesses are fleeing and the economy is collapsing...with the favorite people of the new president dividing up the corpses of industry amongst themselves.

Russia, while not undeveloped, has seen tremendous investment over the years from outsiders...and a very big amount of that investment has vanished into the void that is a constantly shifting economic picture and the pockets of former KGB leadership who leveraged their power into positions as "captains of industry" as state-run services were privatized into their possession. Same story...if you can't rely on the rule of law to protect your investments, you not only take on the risk of investing in a new idea and unproven people, you're also betting that the government won't rip it all out from under you when it begins to succeed and give it to their favorite crony.

The US isn't unique in offering respect for rule of law (nor is it getting better in this respect), basically free market, and checks and balances to prevent any one person from wielding too much power over businesses, but it has a long and stable history in these areas. Despite SOx, the US is still one of the best places to start and grow a business...and no matter what happens with the leadership of the nation, it probably will remain so for the foreseeable future. This is also why investors like Delaware corporations...well-understood and very slowly evolving corporate law.

So, it's not just capitalism, but consistency: the removal of one variable from the risk side of the equation.

1. Yes 2. not sure, fanboyism perhaps 3. can't they already apply to YC?

There is also seedcamp over here in the UK/Europe.

it is simply unrealistic for thousands of startups around the world to get invited to YC -- unless YC has plans for mega expansion.

plus, most startups through YC, even though they're web-based, don't really have a reach to under-developed world

I think web based start ups could be massive in the under-developed world. They don't have the infrastructure as more developed nations. Look at Estonia they have moved most of their infrastructure online and its working well for them(well if you discount the russian cyber attack a while back). The problem for these countries is internet access but there are lots of pretty cool projects giving them access. Also with open source development tools wide and the low computing power needed for developing web apps the barrier to entry is a lot lower.

of course if anyone from these countries applyed and they had something that sparked interest they would be invited over to YC interviews. Its not that different than me applying from the UK.

and web based mobile apps even bigger. 2.2 billion mobile phones vs. 700 million computers in the world.

I doubt more than 1000 people in under-developed world know what Y C is. Again YC's reach is not world-wide -- not yet anyways.

true, I only come here for the community not to get into YC though.

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