

Ask HN: 4 YC Founder Team? - sswin

My cofounders and I have been considering applying to YC. We've been working on the project for 2 years, paying the bills by performing industry specific services, and plan to have a sellable prototype by December (we're a hardware startup, which is why we've taken so long).<p>But, we have 4 founders in our current state. I understand that YC prefers 2 or 3 founders, but we've been bootstrapping for 2 years with 4, so does that balance out the higher risk of the 4 founder? Thanks in advance for your thoughts.<p>Also, just to clarify, our team consists of a hardcore embedded linux/os dev, a back end dev, a front end dev/designer, and a sales/marketing guy (who's learned enough coding to write simple CRUD apps). Disclaimer: I'm the marketing guy.
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kloncks
I'm personally not a YC founder, but I have gone through another high-profile
accelerator.

In the vast majority of cases, the "rules" are just a starting guideline.
There are _always_ exceptions.

Just like there have been (rare) cases of single founders, the opposite of
four founders is likely an option.

The one thing that matters is the same thing that has always mattered. Are you
rockstars? YC - like others - invest in people.

If you're an amazing set of people and work great together on an idea that
you've been working on for two years, but all means apply. You literally have
nothing to lose.

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aspir
I agree with the above post. Not dying after 2 years is enough for me to say
you guys definitely should apply.

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sahillavingia
Parse (YC S11) is doing well: <https://www.parse.com/about>

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petervandijck
Seems balanced enough. Good luck!

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Swizec
Not sure if this is relevant, but I just spent the summer with a YC startup
that had 4 founders. In fact when the final papers for the US version of the
company were made it had like 7 due to investor type people.

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robfitz
Ditto. We went through as a 4 founder team in summer 07.

