We had three things we where hoping to get out of joining an incubator and i/o seemed to offer these things (plus it was in the mission in SF, which rules):
1) Ability to hang out with other people doing start-ups. My co-founder and I had been coding alone for the last few years and we really wanted some people to develop relationships with who were doing the same types of things as us.
2) Introduction to the top angel investors in the valley (to get our next round of funding). The guys at i/o definitely gave us a huge amount of introductions. There were 150 angel investor / VCs at our demo day for only 6 companies (that is a pretty badass ratio!)
3) Help with our product. While we thought we knew what we were doing, the guys at i/o taught us a lot about how to build products people want.
Overall the experience for us was great. From the time we joined in June we went from around 200K users to over 1.7 million users today. We just recently wrapped up our seed round of funding (400K) from some of the top investors in the valley, including Charles River Ventures and Dave McClure's 500 Startups. Additionally we made friends that will last a lifetime.
i/o has one of the best track records I have heard of as well. There were 6 companies that joined, 3 of those companies (including us) went on to raise a solid seed round, 2 were acquired and 1... well is pivoting, so we will see what happens with them.
Jim Young (Hot or Not) was the main i/o partner who got us to join. I will never forget the way he described incubators (as it was one of the main reasons we joined as opposed to waiting for the next YC cycle). He said, "Incubators are like martial art houses, different incubators specialize in different things depending on what you want to do." I found this really true with i/o, because they seemed to specialize in costumer facing startups based around social media and entertainment. That was exactly us so it was a perfect fit.
One main point is this, there are many good people out there who can get you to where you want to go. YC is just one of many routes to what I think is every entrepreneurs goal: Building a successful company that greatly benefits your life.
Enjoy yourselves!
The amount of attention you get from these guys is huge. I can honestly say we have built a great relationship with the partners. From advice on handling interest from other companies, product vision, help with raising the round or even giving us a place to crash while we found one of our own; they were there all the way throuh.
I would like to stress the importance of their network as well. It was instrumental in helping us raise our round. Getting quality intros to 60 of the top angels in the valley is incredible.
In 2000 I founded a company that did social bookmarking/crowdsourcing of search that got founding from Teknologisk Innovation (http://tekinno.dk/ - link in Danish). They were, to say the least, absolutely terrible. The partner that was assigned to our company had no idea how the technology worked, had little business sense and no connections worth speaking of. I still vividly remember the conversation in the board room where he said he had a standard contract for cooperation between companies lying around that we could use. Everyone wondered how something like that could be standardised, and noone was surprised when he sent out a standard NDA. Apparently he didn't know the difference...
To their defense it should be said that this was ten years ago, and they had only started their incubator one year before, so maybe they've gotten better.
The second was with a company that I cofounded that ran an advertising network with a number of flatscreens hooked up to a server via the phone network, making it easy to update and send out new ads and news to the screens. This was initially founded by Symbion (http://symbion.dk/ - link in Danish). This is a seconed Danish staterun incubator. They were much much better than Teknologisk Innovation, but still not amazing in any way. Their contact network was fairly good, but they had no idea about technology and focused a lot on paperwork, contracts, milestones and other red tape. This was around 7 years ago.
The problem with these staterun incubators is that the people who run them and work there aren't entrepreneurs, they're basically state bureaucrats that got moved to an incubator. This means that they don't know a lot about technology and their processes are rigid and timeconsuming. To my knowledge they don't have much success. Unfortunately this is the main channel for funding in Denmark since we don't have a tradition of funding startups. Also, not a lot of people have the kind of money needed for investing, I guess that's the downside to a huge welfare state where the top tax bracket is 65%.
It's a pity since there are a lot of extremely competent programmers in Denmark (PHP, Ruby on Rails, Turbo Pascal, Delphi, C#, C++, the V8 Javascript engine, Google Maps and Google wave were all created or engineered by Danes - Not bad for a country with a population that's half of New York).
I think there's an open market for a good incubator in Denmark.
They've had some great companies come out of it (SCAVNGR, SeatGeek, Postling, Notehall, etc.) and everyone I talk to (I've asked lots of people for candid responses) has said it was well worth it.
Some things I like about the program that sets it apart IMHO:
--mentors; they get 1-1 mentors for each team that really fit and work with the companies.
--space; everyone works in the same big open space.
--focus on business and strategy; they have a real focus on customer acquisition in addition to just hacking
Of course the other stuff is good too, i.e. speakers, etc.
We enjoyed the speakers; knowledge gained in marketing & PR has proven invaluable(we were featured on various tech publications after the program). As well the stories of perseverance (CD NOW) were inspiring.
Further the support and advice you receive from the core team as alum is strong and very helpful!
Also, you are provided the opportunity to interview recent business college graduates and MBAs and bring them onto your team if a good fit is found. Some of DreamIt's most successful companies found some great people that has facilitated their successes!
I have to agree that DreamIt was a fantastic experience.
> 1-on-1 mentor system is great – nice and in-depth > communal space is great – led to more communication and collaboration than would have existed otherwise. > focus on business/strategy is great – they could develop this even more in future years, but they're starting w/ a great approach > speakers were good and always well balanced in their backgrounds & discussion topics. > pro-bono legal aid is top notch – we would have racked up thousands of dollars worth of legal fees spending so much time speaking and working with partners from such a great firm.
Overall a great experience, and we'd do it again in a heartbeat if put back in time knowing what we know now. Also, I'm very glad to hear that they're coming to New York this summer! http://dreamitventures.com/
For me, the greatest part of DreamIt was the physical space. Founders + partners + mentors + speakers = immediate exposure to 100+ experts in everything from web development to sales, database management to pitching. It was great to share experiences and build camaraderie with a group of smart and talented new friends. Not picking up the phone or emailing, but turning around and bouncing ideas off the person at the table next to me -- totally awesome and super valuable.
Highly recommended.
Being 10 feet away from other teams was amazing - we had awesome frisbee games where some of our best ideas came from, and my most trusted startup-world connections have come from working in close proximity for three months.
Back then, the incubator was hosted on-premises at Red Gate Software; they're the friendliest bunch of folks I've ever met, and always went out of their way to help us however they could. About once a week, we'd have a one-hour lecture by one of the Red-Gaters giving us a "crash course" in some area of the software business -- sales, marketing, customer service, product management, and more.
We also had the chance to have beer and pizza with some of the big names in the startup world: Peldi (of Balsamiq), Ryan Carson (of Carsonified), and even Joel Spolsky. It's great to have a few minutes to bounce ideas off people who have built a successful business in the same way you want to, and it was really cool of them to take the time to give us advice.
I could go on for ages, but instead I'll wrap up with this: it'll tough -- because Springboard offers you a lot of learning opportunities (in addition to the work you'll need to do to build your startup) -- but going through the program will be the best thing that ever happened to you (and to your startup).
Apply: http://www.springboard.com
If you have any questions, feel free to send me an email (my address is in my profile).
We learned a lot from them about how to establish pricing plans and how to market to businesses -- mostly by talking to their staff about how they did these things at Red Gate.
Quora has some decent comments about it: http://www.quora.com/Is-Founder-Institute-a-good-deal-for-en... http://www.quora.com/How-do-programs-like-Y-Combinator-and-T... http://www.quora.com/Founder-Institute/What-has-the-experien...
The biggest difference is that FI is not full-time, and a lot of people were both older and had unrelated day jobs to their startups. There were also a lot more business types than tech types, and the program is more focused on VC/fundraising than technical product development, although the product is also iterated on.
Assuming I had to choose between YC and FI, I'd pick YC almost every time.
By far the best program (maybe even better than YC) that I've ever seen is the MIT Entrepreneur's Club (e-club) run by Richard Shyduroff, but it's only open to the MIT community. It is affiliated with the MIT 100k competition, too. There are classes, a lot of people from the business school and engineering school mixing, etc. If I lived in Boston, I'd try to be actively involved; it's not too hard to get invited if you're a decent tech person there.
It was the first year, and we were the first company they invested in, and the only company to do their summer program. The largest benefit by far was access to mentors: the primary guys involved are a group of entrepreneurs who started a company called Webmail.us which is now Rackspace Email and Apps, and they all still work at Rackspace. Another primary group of mentors are some folks at Modea, a quickly-growing digital ad agency in Blacksburg.
We were working on a totally different idea when we initially took investment, and this group helped us pivot to Heyo, and put together a follow-on funding round in the Fall, and has recently made some introductions in the Valley that have prompted us to make the decision to move out there in May of this year. Having access to the Rackspace and Modea folks has been huge, from introductions to experience in growing a company from 2-3 people to 100+ people, to help with fundraising, understanding our market, etc. As the only company who has been with DayOne from inception, I absolutely recommend it.
Since you guys are still local, I'd love to buy you lunch sometime so I can hear more of your story.
In the program itself we had a lot of really good speakers. Tim O'Reilly was probably my favorite. LBD had a great connection with the local DC tech scene. We got to talk with a lot of good startups from the area. Not to keep name dropping, but it was pretty cool to pitch Steve Case one on one in a meet and greet.
My biggest complaint is it went too fast. There is so much going on with the speakers and advisor meetings that it was difficult to be productive on the startup itself. Everything was geared towards demo day and the pitch.
One of the most beneficial things was the peer reviews. I sort of wish we had more peer to peer discussions as it proved very valuable.
Overall it was great experience where I gained valuable understanding on the funding process and some awesome connections. Pitching, going through investment meetings, and connecting with people pretty much sums it up. Entrepreneurship truly is a journey and the program gave me a look into a areas that were previously harder to access. Even though we didn't secure additional funding for Ubernote, we are still bumping a long and LBD will always be part of our story.
We wanted to join Excelerate mainly for the guidance we could get from all the leading entrepreneurs in the midwest area. Some of the mentors of the program are Brad Keywell (Groupon/Lightbank), Blair Garrou (DFJ Mercury), Chuck Templeton (OpenTable), Kevin Efrusy (Accel Partners), Lon Chow (Apex Venture Partners), Mike Gaiss (Highland Capital Partners), Pete Wilkins (Sterling Partners). The program is led by Sam Yagan (OKCupid,Sparknotes) and Troy Henikoff (SurePayroll), who are both amazing entrepreneurs and have great connections in the midwest area. If you need their help, they are more than willing to work with you even on a daily basis.
Excelerate's program is similar to Techstars' as the focus is on getting more and more help from outside mentors and finding a mentor-match for the startups. The program is divided in three months -- meet 60-70 mentors in month 1, develop / polish product in month 2, prepare for investor pitch in month 3. The startups are also provided office space and legal help. But the most value comes from the daily improvements your startup makes through strategic and tactical advice you get from some of the best minds in the country. I strongly recommend this program. If you want to know more about the program or want to talk to Sam or Troy directly, then let me know ( namit AT mathzee ).
JumpStart provides similar levels of funding as YC or Techstars. They also provided me with three mentors (one lead and two others). This was the first year for JumpStart and it was done on a rolling basis (one company funded per month). A side effect of that was that there was no programming or much interaction between the startups. JumpStart is going to work differently in 2011 and I believe is now part of the TechStars affiliate network.
The Nashville Entrepreneur Center has the mission of "connecting entrepreneurs with critical resources to accelerate business creation and growth." That is exactly what they have provided for us. There are 6-12 companies at the EC on any given day. There are mentors here regularly available for meetings and advice. The local investment community has started coming by the space regularly and watching and learning about the companies.
The combination of JumpStart and the Entrepreneur Center has taken Bizen from conception to a viable startup within the span of about 5 months. We are closing enough funding to operate for a year and are starting to hire.
It has been a great experience.
http://www.mo.com/ben-johnson-and-james-hobbis
The biggest reason why I wanted to join the i/o class was because of how small it is. i/o only brings on 5-6 start-ups per class which really helps let them focus on making sure you succeed. At any time, we can get a sit down with the partners to bounce ideas off of or just chat and hear about their experiences.
And they're completely honest about their opinions. I remember when we first joined with our original idea (we pivoted twice), Jim flat out said I'm not a big fan of your idea, but I know you guys will succeed somewhere down the line, and that's why I wanted you guys here. And 4 months + 2 pivots later, he's excited about what we're working on now and the potential it has.
One of the best parts was if we ever needed advice around a particular topic: SEO, scaling, customer acquisition, sales, PR - one of the partners would introduce us to a founder who knows everything about it. The best way to leverage advisors and learn from them.
The i/o space is also amazing. I love the fact that it's like a second home. Whenever we're in the city we drop by to catch up with everyone there. And even after the program, everyone still hangs out there.
I think all of the incubators bring a lot of value to a start-up. It really just depends on what you're looking to get out of it ...
My start-up is a better approach to what I have been doing for years. In fact, the project was suggested to me by quite a few customers. It's a small business system (order processing, inventory, accounting, ecommerce, CRM, etc.) that can easily be modified to handle the company's special needs.
I had been (and continue to) work on this. I don't need the money but there were several compelling reasons to want to be part of the program:
- access to advice where I am weak
- possibilities for collaboration
- better access to new ideas
- better access to more funding
- office space (a nice perk for a single founder)
- Hacker News has opened me to the possibilites for a program like yc
- I would LOVE to be more involved with the start-up community
- I am committed to Pittsburgh for family reasons
The staff was extremely helpful with feedback and office hours. I completed my application and got a little help from friends from Hacker News (rms & SteveKlabnik).
I made it to the presentation round, but was rejected. I focused on the technology, but my audience was more interested in the business plan. Since my own customers were pushing for this, I didn't see the need. Big mistake.
The feedback I got was that there wasn't a business case. No one would buy it. I know they're wrong, but I didn't convince them otherwise, so I just moved on.
Ironically, at the exact moment I was being told that no one would buy it, one of my biggest customers texted me, "do they get it when do u start" How I wish my phone was turned on. Eight words from a customer said more that I could say in 30 minutes.
- Mentors / Speakers: They give you access to a lot of local mentors who are great for vetting your idea and making you think straight about your product. They also bring in some prominent connections from outside like VCs (USV, FirstRound, etc.), founders (Eric Koger, CEO of ModCloth) and others in the national entrepreneurial scene.
- Network: You can really build your network in Pittsburgh, but I've also found it helpful for getting some legitimacy outside the region as well.
- Investment: Of course the $25K was very helpful to get my partner working on it full time and to cover other expenses. There's also companies that go on to receive follow on funding from Innovation Works (the AlphaLab parent org) and of course angels - which we were lucky enough to get.
- Space / Community: It's really great to be in the same space other startups and afterward to be able to have them for peer-support.
Overall, I think the experience was great, and my own criticism is that they require you to maintain a presence in PA - which is a turn off to many good people who could end up staying.
They also offer a number of programs/perks, like workshops on various aspects of business development, networking events, speakers, negotiated rates with lawyers and other services, classes on entrepreneurship, and access to grants and interest free loans. With their guidance I was able to win money in some business plan competitions and drop to part time in order to fully pursue the business. Recently they have helped us find a few angel investors as well.
Without them I'm not sure where I would be. I started out as a single founder and now I'm to the stage where I can bring on three or four friends/employees full time to help me take things to the next level.
Perhaps the best part is the constant ability to both collaborate and give back. There are opportunities everywhere for bouncing ideas around and helping other startups with their problems.
Following the success of the programme I was approached to help relaunch the Springboard.com programme based in Cambridge University - funded by the backing of a consortia of Angel Investors. We are in the middle of applications and will accept teams from anyone on the planet. We have received overwhelming support both from the Cambridge and London entrepreneurial community.
Based upon the success we have achieved before we are definitely aiming to get over 50% of our teams funded.
Having a local incubator is way better than a far away solution IMHO. I applied for YC last fall and didn't make it. I'm glad I didn't wait for the next round. There's not a lot of angel investment here yet, but they are working on it. Once we get to lead generation, marketing and promotion we'll see if we even missing the VC side of things. The main thing is, we're doing it.
The calibre of mentors / investors and other entrepreneurs, inspired and drove us harder than we could've otherwise.
Since becoming a winner of Seedcamp, they have supported us through product, relationships with investors, technical partners and more. They're hands on and are more than willing to help wherever they can.
I couldn't recommend it highly enough and I actually think programs like Seedcamp will help create some of the most innovative companies world-wide. It's still early days for them, but that's the feeling I got by being part of it.
I'll be brief since I don't think many people are thinking of doing a startup in China, but the environment is fun and filled with smart people. Just as importantly they offer a ton of assistance getting my company registered with the Chinese government.
The incubator is being ran by people with a ton of valley experience, so the ideology is not too different from whats preached here.