

Incubators, Incubators, every where - Is there an incubator bubble? - davidcrow
http://startupnorth.ca/2011/05/26/incubators-incubators-every-where/

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jerf
Is there a "first to declare a bubble" bubble?

Bubbles aren't just "lots of people are trying the same thing" or "lots of
people are trying to copy a new idea" or "people discover a new market", you
know. The value of the term "bubble" has been frittered away to nearly nothing
by people rushing to slap the label on everything showing the slightest bit of
growth. Sure, a lot of these guys will end up failing or acquiring each other,
but that's not a bubble, that's just how the rush into a new market always
works.

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davidcrow
“trade in high volumes at prices that are considerably at variance with
intrinsic values” <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economic_bubble>

So while flippant, the goal was to point out the disparity in the perceived
value generated by incubators and the investment to build them. And
wholeheartedly it was flippant and designed to garner attention, but not out
of context. Sorry.

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lichichen
I don't see how title of the article is relevant to the content.

And on the issue of the bubble it's the natural flow of the market, based on
supply, demand and competition. There are so many flavors of pop, do we have a
"pop" bubble?

Should be retitled, "Do you need an incubator?" or "On selecting an incubator"

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pchristensen
What is the worst case scenario of lots of YC clones? Zero successful
startups, zero investor exits, a bunch of people who have tried at least one
startup, and slightly fewer programmers working in industry? Is this really
that much worse than the alternative, that all these founders work for BigCo?

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dy
Just as there are A-grade startups and the B-startups, there are now A-grade
incubators and a growing list of B-ones. Founders thinking that he value of
participation in New Incubator X will be similar to participating in
YCombinator are in for an unpleasant surprise.

Long term, I don't think that this will look like the college market since it
will be much easier to measure the quality of an incubator's outputs than of a
college's outputs and we'll see the lower quality ones fade away.

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lukelockhart
Yes. I predict a high number of start-ups left hanging in the wind without
follow-on funding after completing incubators.

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minalecs
if you decide to quit your pursuit of building a startup after the 3 months in
an incubator, then you probably wouldn't of succeeded even within a big
incubator.

~~~
lukelockhart
Totally agree. I just question whether the channels for follow-on at the post-
incubator stage are growing in proportion to the number of incubators popping
up.

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FrancescoRizzi
I'll repeat myself: "How to detect a #bubble? There's more Hubs than spokes"
[http://twitter.com/#!/FrancescoRizzi/status/7129779448014848...](http://twitter.com/#!/FrancescoRizzi/status/71297794480148480)

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jagtesh
Yes. But they're all missing the point. It's the quality of advisors and the
nature of their advice that shapes a great startup. Just throwing some cash at
them is akin to giving fish to a poor man. The poor man will eat the fish and
ask for more. But teach him to fish and he may become a millionaire fisherman.

~~~
jagtesh
Any particular reason for the down-vote?

I don't think Y Combinator can be replicated. PG's experience and his
contribution to this community is unparalleled. I'm NOT against other
incubators coming up - but just saying its highly unlikely they'll achieve the
level of success Y Combinator has.

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franze
i think it time to start an incubator incubator or is such an incubator
already incubated?

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davidcrow
It's more of a meta incubator. You can buy my e-book: Lean Incubator - Get
Incubators to Market Faster to Get Startups to Get Products to Market Faster -
Local Mobile Social Cloud Edition

