

Ask HN: YC & other programs - is this data correct? - jedc

As part of my master's dissertation (which I'm writing on YC &#38; similar programs) I'm trying to collect data on all of the startup incubators/programs that exist and all of the companies that have been funded through them.  I hope this is at least interesting, if not helpful.<p>Here is the link to the list of programs:
http://docs.google.com/View?id=dmqzzmg_12fcp7g7c8<p>Here is the link to the list of funded companies (different sheet for each program):
http://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?key=t_toYuVyy6fci0MAiIaZ30A<p>While I've done my best to make these accurate, I know there are still errors.  (And the acquisition prices are just guesses.)  I'd appreciate it if you could let me know where I screwed up (either here or at jed [dot] christiansen [at] gmail).<p>Once it's more accurate I'll post some additional statistics/analysis.
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emmett
From personal experience:

Kiko had a website at <http://kiko.com>, although apparently it's been
recently taken down by the acquirer. We sold it on eBay for $258,000 in the
summer of 06. We took follow-on funding from two angels (of a very very small
amount) before selling it.

Justin.tv was actually started in October of 2006, in between the 6/1/2006
cohort and the 1/1/2007 cohort.

~~~
jedc
For justin.tv, which cohort were you a part of? The summer 06 or winter 07?
(I'm going by that, since the actual founding dates don't always correlate to
YC cohort.)

Thank you very much for the corrections.

~~~
emmett
Neither - we were a special case; we'd already done Kiko Calendar as part of
the Summer 05 cohort, and this was our second company.

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il
It would be interesting to see more data such as traffic(Alexa/quantcast?),
number of employees/founders and so on. This sounds rather silly, but if you
collect enough data, you may be able to approximate something of a "formula"
for startup success, or at least increasing your chance of success by a few
percent. I know PG always says it's the people and not the idea that matter,
but looking at your spreadsheet, and assuming PG only picks equally smart
people to fund, some ideas/verticals are clearly more likely to succeed than
others. I know there's obviously no statistically significant data to back
this up, but my hunch is that, given the talents and abilities of founders
chosen for YC are roughly equal, it may be the niche or market you choose to
enter that can make or break your startup.

At the very least, a comprehensive list like this should give YC applicants a
rough idea of what types of companies are likely to get accepted.

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c3o
Programs:

<http://www.iventures10.com> in Champaign, IL

<http://iaccelerator.org> in Ahmenabad, India

YEurope did provide office space.

Seedcamp: Basekit (Eden Ventures, NESTA), Toksta (TAG) and UberVu (Eden
Ventures) have received follow-on funding.

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emmett
The most striking thing about this list is just how many _more_ startups have
been funded by YC than by any competitor. There are almost as many YC
companies as the rest put together (especially considering all the unlaunched
YC companies missing from the list).

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Savil
I believe you might have left out the Lightspeed Ventures program:

<http://lightspeedvp.com/summergrants.aspx>

~~~
jedc
Thanks. Will look into it.

