
Ask HN: Why does being in an accelerator pre-YC lessen your YC chances? - stringbeans
Our startup was in an accelerator previous to applying to YC, and this was the reason why we were rejected after the interview. I understand the concern that we should already be &quot;accelerated&quot; by now but its hard to compare the previous program we were in to the caliber of YC.<p>Why does being in an accelerator pre-YC lessen your YC chances? Has anyone had similar experiences with this? Are there any YC alumni that had their company in an accelerator pre-YC?
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pg
We have a much higher threshold for startups that have already been through an
"accelerator" program. Mainly because we expect them to have thereby been
accelerated; if they're not doing well, we worry they might be
unacceleratable. It's also a problem that such startups will be twice as
diluted at Demo Day, which decreases their fundraising options.

I can think of two startups we've funded that had been through things calling
themselves "accelerators" before YC.

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webwright
AirBnB took quite a while before they started growing. If they had done YC in
the first month of their existence, do you think that growth would've happened
A LOT sooner? I think it would've helped considerably but I think some
startups just need to "age" for a while. Ben / Pinterest had a similar
long/flat growth line before they started to take off. On the other hand,
maybe those "taking off" moments were a result of advice from smart folks
(like YC).

~~~
pg
Yes. All startups evolve, but most that have evolved slowly could have evolved
faster.

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aegiso
Pretty sure the reason that you didn't get into YC wasn't simply because of
some binary metric like your previously going though an accelerator. Give them
more credit than that and look deeper, regardless of what the email said.

-A fellow YC reject from a few years back

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stringbeans
You're right, it's probably not JUST because of the pre-YC accelerator and the
original post should be worded differently. I think however being in an
accelerator pre-YC has some definite weight in the decision. Curious if anyone
has any insight into this. The interview was going fantastic and all the
partners seemed impressed by our traction and opportunity until they brought
up the previous accelerator (which coincidentally turned out to be the last
question before time was up)

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techtivist
I think one needs to have the right expectations about what they want to
achieve from an accelerator. If you are a company with a broad audience like
consumer web or consumer mobile, an accelerator will help you build your
company fundamentals, guide you through the generic process of starting up and
at the end of it all give you audience with the investors; and if you are in a
program like YC garner you a little more attention. So I really fail to see
how useful it is to go through two different accelerators other than the just
the last two reasons.

If I were running an accelerator and you were applying to mine after having
gone through another program, I wouldn't just look at if I will gain
(financially or otherwise) from you but really question how you will gain from
having you in in the accelerator, having already gone through a similar,
perhaps even conflicting process.

For a company with a more specialized market like education or health, while
the requirements above stay the same, there are important differences. So
going through a generalized accelerator to build those fundamentals and then
going through an accelerator specific to your industry makes sense because
while building strong fundamentals in business may be the smae, scaling up,
selling and operating successfully in these industries is rather different and
perhaps even more different than the consumer space, like Imagine K12 for
education and Rockhealth for health; or even the other way round.

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paulsutter
Any low-value credentials on an application make a company look bad. Another
example: winning a business plan competition. The problem is that you thought
mentioning it would improve your chances of getting accepted. If that's the
best you've got, you haven't got much.

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nivertech
There are some corporate accelerator programs who licensed TechStars model. If
they will see startup who went thru accelerator and didn't raised money - they
will ask thought questions. The funny thing is, that even being in coworking
space and not raising money was also a negative signal.

