
“With $80B in Value Created, Techstars Is the #1 Global Accelerator” - jkuria
http://blog.capitalandgrowth.org/david-cohen/
======
WisNorCan
David Cohen wrote a check as part of the angel round for Uber [1]. The "$80
Billion in value created" seems to include companies which may not have
directly been part of the Techstars Accelerator program like Uber [2]. I am
not sure if all the others were part of Techstars.

 _" Join our network of amazing mentors and portfolio companies such as
Sphero, Digital Ocean, Localytics, SendGrid, Occipital, Next Big Sound,
ClassPass, Simply Measured, FullContact, Realty Mogul, GrabCAD, Placester,
Scopely, DataRobot, Remitly, LeanPlum, Synack, Tap Influence, Bluecore,
Outreach, Cloudability, Distil Networks, Pilot, Yesware, Bellhops, Twilio,
Spothero, Bench, Uber, GoSpotCheck, Ginger.io, Threat Stack, Timehop,
PillPack, Plated and GameTime._"

Having said that, I love the transparency that Techstars provides on each
batch of investments and status (acquired / failed / active) etc. I wish every
investor provided this level of transparency on failure rates.

[1] [http://davidgcohen.com/2014/07/14/the-ponys-lucky-
horseshoe/](http://davidgcohen.com/2014/07/14/the-ponys-lucky-horseshoe/)

[2] [http://www.techstars.com/companies/](http://www.techstars.com/companies/)

~~~
mck-
It is indeed misleading to say that $80b in value was created, because Uber
and Twilio were not Techstars companies.

"The market cap on Techstars website is $7.5B, whereas YC’s portfolio was
valued at $30B in 2014" [1]

A more interesting days point (that ignores outliers) is the number of
startups that raised a Series A round; and using that metric, you can
rightfully claim Techstars to be #1 [2]

[1] [https://blog.routific.com/which-startup-accelerator-is-
right...](https://blog.routific.com/which-startup-accelerator-is-right-for-
you-729e87d424ef)

[2] [https://mattermark.com/500-startups-accelerator-
company/](https://mattermark.com/500-startups-accelerator-company/)

~~~
abrichr
Does it make sense to ignore outliers here? The VC model makes most of it
returns on the top few performers.

~~~
venantius
It's not a question of ignoring outliers; the point he's making is that these
investments were never a part of the Techstars portfolio to begin with but
were independent investments by people affiliated with Techstars.

~~~
elmar
using the same logic if you count investments of YC partners that were not
part of YC the final number will probably be much higher than $80B.

------
ilamont
"... on paper."

There's something else I would like to say about Techstars. I have a lot of
respect for Brad Feld and some of the managers running local Techstars
operations, but they have also had some questionable people running the show
in certain cities.

For instance, this Inc. article ([https://www.inc.com/magazine/201204/max-
chafkin/future-techs...](https://www.inc.com/magazine/201204/max-
chafkin/future-techstars-step-forward.html)) described the processes used by
the former head of the NY program to select companies:

 _" At the end of the day, you're trying to look at somebody and ask, 'Are you
the type of person I could foresee building a $500 million company?'... It's
pretty clear in 20 seconds whether that person has it in them or not."

"It's not that we're giving certain companies an advantage for no reason ...
They've earned the advantage by either knowing us or knowing people who know
us."_

I met the head of another local TS program who made it pretty clear if you
didn't have a salesperson/evangelist/consummate networker type leading your
team, you wouldn't get far.

------
thinbeige
I find Techstars in many regards underwhelming:

\- The people behind, from top to down feel uninspired and could work at any
random corporation; they just do not fit or appear entrepreneurial at all

\- Their white labeling/partnering with corporations is super strange: weird
corporations, awkward demos days with even weirder people running around
having absolutely no relation to the actual ecosystem; I guess they get a lot
of money for creating those joint accelerators and that's the point: it
doesn't feel like proper seed investing what they do but rather like a too
expensive event management service for clueless corporations

\- No clear positioning; for what do they stand? Being just another
accelerator shouldn't let you raise any money in 2017

~~~
thrownawayagain
Alum here. Throwaway.

The value they add it limited at best. The worst mistake they made was
broadening the program past NYC and Boulder to take money from corporations
and dilute the mentor/partner pool. My advice to other founders is to stay far
away.

~~~
trendia
Here's the key to running a successful accelerator:

1\. find people that would be able to succeed in any environment

2\. invite them to work for you under your accelerator. Don't do anything
particularly special to help them

3\. take credit for their success when they inevitably succeed (see #1)

~~~
Kpourdeilami
IMO, the technical teams with very little or no understanding of sales &
marketing are the ones who would get the most value out of startup
accelerators. They're not gonna help you build a better a product, but they're
gonna help you find resources to sustain your product development before
hitting profitability.

We're currently going through TechStars with a very technical product and no
experience in doing enterprise sales, marketing, and fundraising. They have
helped us a lot in figuring out who to target in big companies, how to put
together sales pitches, how to close pilots, how to price our product, how to
get follow-up sales meetings, how to talk to investors, how to pitch a very
technical product in a way that non-technical people can understand, etc.

If we end up succeeding, I'd say TechStars played a very large part in taking
us from being a bunch programmers who could build stuff to being a real
company with a real business model. Before Techstars when we were on our own,
we would make 10 wrong decisions per each right decision we made. Having
access to mentors who have been in our shoes before that can help us avoid
making mistakes is very valuable.

People in this thread are hating on how TechStars programs each have a few
corporate partners, but I have found them to be super helpful in getting some
early traction going. They're all very open to working and adapting the
products developed by teams in the cohort.

The associates, mentors, and the managing director in our cohort are all
amazing and have been super helpful to us. I would highly recommend TechStars
to anyone who's building a B2B company.

------
tschellenbach
We went through Techstars NYC with getstream.io. Alex Iskold the managing
directors was awesome. He has a strong tech background, started a few
companies and actually had experience with building feed technology from his
last startup. (Stream is an API for building feeds and activity streams) So
for us the experience was super relevant. Raising funding after the program
was easy. Now, 2 years later, Alex still helps us out with anything we ask
for. We're very happy, but I think to some extend it also depends on the
managing director that runs your program.

One thing they could improve is support for founders that are moving to the
US. In the beginning all the tax, visa and legal issues drove me a little bit
crazy at times. Having 1 person on their team dedicated to helping foreign
startups navigate those challenges would be very helpful.

------
slackoverflower
Biggest outlier is Uber, and they aren't even a Techstars company. They just
invested in their seed round, never was part of the accelerator that is
Techstars. YC probably comes out on top if you just remove Uber.

~~~
spraak
Your username is awesome

~~~
slackoverflower
Thank you! :)

------
lewisflude
Had an amazing experience going through Techstars London, headed up by Joh
Bradford and Jens Lapinski. Wouldn't recommend it to everyone, but certainly
provided an insane amount of value.

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nigrioid
Can you guys believe these numbers? Every day, people are throwing around
these incomprehensibly large valuations like it's normal. It's feeling more
and more like the early days of the 2000s.

