

Ask HN: Share your experience with a non YC or Techstars incubator. - redrory


======
ryanjmo
This summer, we joined the first class at i/o ventures out the of Mission in
San Francisco (<http://ventures.io>), after being rejected from YC many times.

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!

~~~
jayair
We were a part of the io program as well and I would just like to stress a
couple of things.

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.

------
mixmax
I've been through two Danish incubators run by the state.

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.

~~~
ig1
What about Startupbootcamp in Copenhagen ?

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epi0Bauqu
I've been a DreamIt (<http://dreamitventures.com/>) mentor for the last couple
of years. On all measures, it is a top notch organization that I'm proud to
continue to be involved with.

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.

~~~
toddspitz
DreamIt 2010 graduate chiming in here.

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/>

~~~
jeffreyengler
Another thought from a DreamIt '10 grad:

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.

------
profquail
My startup, TidePowerd, went through the inaugural class (Fall 2009) of the
Springboard incubator (<http://www.springboard.com>). I'll say without a doubt
that we wouldn't have had anywhere near the success we've had to date without
going through the program.

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).

~~~
agmiklas
We really enjoyed the Springboard program as well. In our year, they seemed to
put an emphasis on bootstrapable, B2B businesses (possibly because this is the
route Red Gate Software took).

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.

------
rdl
I did about 50% of Founder Institute SV winter-2009/2010, but had to go to
Iraq before finishing. Overall, I liked it, and think it could be valuable for
a lot of people, but it's rather different from what I imagine YC is like.

Quora has some decent comments about it: [http://www.quora.com/Is-Founder-
Institute-a-good-deal-for-en...](http://www.quora.com/Is-Founder-Institute-a-
good-deal-for-entrepreneurs-Why-or-why-not) [http://www.quora.com/How-do-
programs-like-Y-Combinator-and-T...](http://www.quora.com/How-do-programs-
like-Y-Combinator-and-TechStars-compare-to-The-Founders-Institute)
[http://www.quora.com/Founder-Institute/What-has-the-
experien...](http://www.quora.com/Founder-Institute/What-has-the-experience-
been-like-for-people-taking-part-in-Adeo-Ressis-Founders-Institute-program)

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.

------
frederickcook
The startup I co-founded, Heyo (<http://heyo.com>), went through DayOne
Ventures (<http://dayoneventures.com>) last summer in Blacksburg, VA (small
town in SW VA where Virginia Tech is located).

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.

~~~
kevinpfab
As a Virginia Tech student that is excited about startups, I'm glad to hear
you had such a good experience with DayOne Ventures. I'm going to apply for
this year's summer session.

Since you guys are still local, I'd love to buy you lunch sometime so I can
hear more of your story.

~~~
frederickcook
Definitely, I'd be happy to. Email fred _at_ heyo.com, or reply
@frederickcook.

------
jlogic77
I was part of LaunchBox Digital class of 2009 in DC. We entered the program as
<http://www.ubernote.com> ended up presenting "KeepFu" and ultimately are back
to UberNote.

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.

------
namityadav
We at MathZee (<http://mathzee.com/>) went through the Chicago based
incubator, Excelerate Labs (<http://www.exceleratelabs.com/>) this summer.
MathZee is a mobile platform that teaches math through application. Our math
games develop critical thinking skills while assessing a child’s performance
in a non-intrusive manner. At the time of the application, MathZee was nothing
more than an idea. We launched our first mobile game Piggy Math
(<http://mathzee.com/piggy-math/>) on the Excelerate demo day (thanks to
Apple's app approval team for the perfect timing :-).

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 ).

~~~
seanharper
Excelerate is good, most of the companies have raised money as a result.

------
jaxn
We (<http://getbizen.com>) received seed funding from JumpStart Foundry
(<http://jumpstartfoundry.com>) and have been incubating at the Nashville
Entrepreneur Center (<http://entrepreneurcenter.com>). The combination has
been amazing.

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.

------
ohashi
I did a whole series of interviews with companies that recently finished
Startupbootcamp in Copenhagen, Denmark about their experience during the
program:

<http://www.mo.com/ben-johnson-and-james-hobbis>

<http://www.mo.com/artas-bartas>

<http://www.mo.com/juan-moreno>

<http://www.mo.com/ciprian-borodescu>

------
jwu711
We just finished the incubator program with i/o ventures
(<http://ventures.io>) I think it's certainly a different experience that you
would get from YC.

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 ...

------
edw519
I applied to AlphaLab in Pittsburgh but didn't get in.

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 funding is also provided by taxpayers, so I figured it would be nice to
get something back.

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.

~~~
megamark16
Just curious, but what is your startup? I spent the last 10 minutes cyber
stalking you and couldn't find a reference to any website other than your
Posterous account and the Mixergy interview.

------
ncash
My startup lives in the student business incubator at the University of
Northern Iowa (along with 9 others). We don't get any startup funding like you
would through YC (they are working on that), but we get a free office,
furniture, computers, software, and, most importantly, a lot of free
counseling. We have free access to professionals with backgrounds in
marketing, venture capital, intellectual property, accountants, and more.

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.

------
jdbradford
I helped to found the Difference Engine, a 13 week bootcamp programme, based
in the North East of England. The first batch of 9 teams "graduated" in June
2011 - from which 5 teams have had follow on funding.

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.

------
oldpond
We have an incubator here in Winnipeg called Eureka Project
(eurekaproject.ca). I launched my startup two weeks ago with them. I found out
they had space available, hired a programmer, and started coding all in the
space of a couple of weeks. I was amazed at how fast things came together.

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.

------
deans
Nuji applied for Seedcamp Berlin last year. It was gruelling, but the
opportunities since have been incredible.

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.

------
tstyle
I'm in a software startup based in Beijing called Innovation Works
(chuangxin.com)

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.

------
emigal
If you're in Europe, you should definitely check out Seedcamp. My company,
Brainient, won in 2009 and it's been awesome ever since. I blogged about it
here some time ago: [http://emigal.com/2009/09/28/how-to-put-your-startup-on-
ster...](http://emigal.com/2009/09/28/how-to-put-your-startup-on-steroids/)

------
exspiro
Dreamit Alum here. Served to be one of the best ways to focus and gain some
unfair advantage through the awesome community of mentors/advisors that became
available to us. Biggest benefit = how effectively they can remove barriers to
transition from idea/concept to business. Highly, highly recommend.

