zlacker

>>shscs9+(OP)
This is intersting.

Occasionally in YC founder circles a new founder will raise a bunch of money and then ask something like "What's the best way to invest all the money our company just raised?"

The responses are always along the lines of "Your startup is already risky. Don't innovate in areas of your business where the status quo is known to work. Innovate your product + technology, don't be innovative with your company's finances, HR, etc"

That advice always stuck with me. It just makes a lot of sense to do things in the most boring way possible, except where it matters (your competitive advantage <-- that's where you innovate, that's where you set yourself apart)

Running a startup is distracting enough. Doing things non-standard just adds to the list of distractions that you don't need as a founder.

>>cj+ul
Then again, to play devils advocate, doing all the other stuff in a new way might also help your company break out of the cycle that typically impacts startups. It may be that the other things you do apart from your product are what make it successful.

>>polish+Bz
This comment really shows how far the SV VC culture still is from running profitable businesses with solid fundamentals. No surprise that I am hearing this on the same website where people come to act like hard-done-by factory workers whenever [incredibly bloated and dysfunctional FAANG] lays people off after facing the real-world financial realities.

For the love of God, no. Do not do that. The cycle begins when you take the money. How there are still people here that don’t get this, I don’t understand.

>>UqWBcu+t41
The purpose of VC’s were never to fund companies until they become profitable, it’s the find the “bigger fool”.

Occasionally it’s the public market…

https://medium.com/@Arakunrin/the-post-ipo-performance-of-y-...

Most often for successful exits, it’s to get acquired and shut down the original product with a “Our Amazing Journey” blog post.

>>raw_an+3i1
That chart is telling about the durability of this business, but do we actually know the precise point at which YCombinator as an entity sold out?

For instance, I know Coinbase may be down -22% from the IPO price, but that doesn't mean YCombinator lost money nor made very little. If they, for instance, sold off during the first few days of the IPO they would have made out quite well.

There's also the whole question of how much money did YCombinator put in vs what they got out.

Without knowing this, about all the chart tells me is YCombinator is not a predicated on building exceedingly durable businesses, but it doesn't mean they lost money on any of these investments either.

>>no_wiz+Bl1
YC isn’t the “bigger fool”, their business model is great for them. Of course they made money at IPO. They don’t care about durable businesses. More than likely they sold at IPO.

>>raw_an+2m1
I realize, but that's my entire point: the durability of the business as represented by these valuations says nothing meaningful about YCombinator startups other than they aren't building alot of highly durable businesses.