Startup founders, how old are you? - python_kiss
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abstractbill
31.

For what it's worth, I feel more ready and able to do a startup now than I
would have been when I was younger. Just for starters I was already in my
mid-20s when I got my PhD.

A good friend of mine sold his startup last year to AOL for enough money that
he'll never have to work again. He was 41 at the time and I believe his co-
founder was around the same age. This gives me hope that I'm not quite over
the hill yet ;-)

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python_kiss
In my opinion, startup founders hit mid life crisis in their early 20s.
Considering Paul's influence on YCombinator, I am guessing that is the age
group most of us belong to. So go ahead and share with us your age.

I just turned 22 today :)

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nostrademons
"In my opinion, startup founders hit mid life crisis in their early 20s."

I'd agree with that. I'm 25 and sometimes wonder if I'm over the hill.

Then again, my boss in my day job (sole founder and CEO) is almost 50. So it's
not *impossible* to start late. I have noticed that it makes things difficult,
culture-wise. The startup I'm at has a very 9-5 culture and tends to move
fairly slowly, which is frustrating for young, ambitious hires like myself. It
does have customers and manages to turn a profit, but I worry that we're
falling behind the technology curve and may find ourselves without customers
if a major market shake-out occurs or a competitor invades.

~~~
jwecker
All through my early startups I had a lingering feeling deep down that maybe I
was too young- in over my head. Then one day I wake up and I'm feeling like
maybe I'm too old- what if I missed the sweet spot or something? So my
recommendation to all, young and old- ignore it.

Every time I hear someone older say they are getting forgetful because of
their age (unless they really have dementia) I laugh inside, because everyone
forgets stuff all the time- it's just that when you're older you have an
excuse to pin it on. If your boss is 50 and the company is sluggish and behind
the culture and curve, then it's your boss's disposition that made it so, not
his age. It's a kind of slow culture that anyone turning a profit can get
stuck in.

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iamelgringo
Feeling like an old fart here...I'm 33.

I'm career changing and going back to school. I should be done with my CS
degree in two years. While I'm finishing school, though, I'm setting up my
life to be a serial founder. I'll be 35 at that time.

I know that's breaking the mold, but I've had some time to set things up:

When I'm done with school, I will make a decent living working part time. I
have moved to Silicon Valley. I will have my team together. We won't be
betting the farm while iterating through startup ideas.

I'm sure it won't all be a bed of roses, but I think there's something to be
said for taking time to prepare for a life of uncertainty.

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reitzensteinm
With all respect, if you're planning to found companies what do you need a
degree for? Backup plan? It seems like an odd choice to me.

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iamelgringo
Finishing my degree has been a personal goal for a while. I also know that I
have a few gaps in my self-education that I want to fill in before I take the
plunge.

That being said, I'm taking the summer off school to work on a project.

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jmzachary
37 and smarter than you little snot-nosed whipper-snapper holligans! And turn
the music down!

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azsromej
So far, the approximate average age for a founder based on the responses is
(27.8)

\--

require 'hpricot'

sum = 0 count = 0.0

file = Hpricot(File.open("comments.htm","r"))

file.search("span.comment/font") do |line| if line.inner_html =~
/([^\s][0-9]+[.,\s])/ number = $1.strip.to_i if number gt 10 && number lt 70
sum += number count += 1 end end end

puts "average age of founder is: " + sprintf("%.1f",sum/count)

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pootytang
I am 32 and recently married. For me the trick is to get this thing started
before we have any kids, as I am doing my startup in addition to a 9-5 (for
now) and I know having rugrats competing for my attention will be a major
demotivator.

The founders of the company I work for during the day are late 30s and one of
them about 50.

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pg
The average YC founder is about 25. The range so far has been from 19 to (I
think) 33.

~~~
python_kiss
Paul, is the YC demographic a good representative of the average startup
founder's age? Judging from your articles, I sense that there is a certain,
though justified, bias towards funding younger startup founders. This is the
excerpt I am referring to:

"The other reason it's hard to start a company before 23 is that people won't
take you seriously. VCs won't trust you, and will try to reduce you to a
mascot as a condition of funding. Customers will worry you're going to flake
out and leave them stranded. Even you yourself, unless you're very unusual,
will feel your age to some degree; you'll find it awkward to be the boss of
someone much older than you, and if you're 21, hiring only people younger
rather limits your options." - How to start a Startup

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Harj
I'm a current YC company founder and I'm 21. I see the points pg makes in that
essay you quote but I can't say I've let them apply to me personally. I have
someone working for our company at the moment who is 33, in fact I don't think
I've ever worked with someone who is the same age or younger than me (my co
founder is 23). I've never had a problem with it personally, in fact I
probably prefer it as I can generally learn more from more older than I am.

To make that situation work I think you need to believe strongly in two
things:

1) Being a good leader does not mean being the smartest/most knowledgeable
person in your company. It means being able to spot the smartest people and
make them work together and learn from each other. That's not as simple as it
sounds

2) You MUST believe 110% that age is a completely irrelevant metric when
determining the "smartness" of a person. I don't care if someone is 20 years
older than I am - if they haven't done a start-up then that puts me ahead of
them in respect to running a start up. They may be an infinitely better
coder/designer/whatever than I am but not a better startup founder.

The second reason is why I ditched my career as an attorney to be a start up
founder. I don't intend on letting my income be determined by the number of
years I've been sitting behind a desk.

~~~
pg
You're only 21? I would have guessed 26.

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Readmore
I'm 25 and feel like I'm just starting to get the hang of this stuff! Some
friends and I tried to start a Video Game company out of college and it didn't
get us very far. Once I started working a 'real job' I quickly realized how
much better it was to be your own boss. I've been working SO much harder now
than I ever thought about working in college or right after. Real life is a
great motivator ;)

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mikesabat
I am a month past 29 and just got my first "real job" (previously I had
started 2 businesses and joined a good friend in his business). A friend I met
told me about Saturn's Return (google it) which is a f*cked up period of life
that happens between 27.5 and 29.5 so hopefully Im on my way out.

BTW the "real job" means the 4th person in at a digital media startup. Older
and Wiser.

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ratlaw
32\. With wife, kids and new country.

I couldn't have done it any early. My collective experience over the last 10
years has really helped me focus on my startup Tinbag.com. As said above,
having a supporting wife is a must. The new country part, I left England
because it was just too cost probative to do a startup there.

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rmorrison
I bootstrapped my first company when I was 23. The company hit a positive
monthly cash flow a few months ago and looks like it will break even in 2007.
The invaluable lessons that I've learned in the years since finishing college
have given me a much better perspective about how the real world operates and
will certainly help in future entrepreneurial ventures. Holding down my day
job at a multi-million dollar software company (with less than 20 employees)
has also helped me learn how to manage and how to sell.

I will be 26 next month, and I've never felt more prepared.

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tyohn
Im 39 going on 20. The other two co-founders involved in this start up are
49. They are extremely intelligent and the experience they bring to the table
is invaluable. I know there is something to be said about youthful exuberance
but experience has to factor in somewhere. "When I was a boy of fourteen, my
father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have the old man around. But
when I got to be twenty-one, I was astonished at how much the old man had
learned in seven years." -- Mark Twain

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domp
I'm 24 and not interested in being an assistant for my whole life. I spent
time at some major labels which sounds cool but it really wasn't. It turned
out to be a pretty frustrating and disheartening experience, but I learned a
lot. After some time in NYC I just decided to come back to Massachusetts and
really try and get my own ideas off the ground. My partner is 25 and rotting
away at a repetitive flash development job. He's damn good at flash though
haha

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veritas
I'm 20, will be 21 in April. Will also be applying for this summer's Y
Combinator round as soon as I can get my prototype/alpha up and running for
basic testing and as soon as I can find a founder. It is ridiculously hard to
find a founder when you're surrounded by 9-5 types who have a family and a
mortgage. I should've done this while I was in college. Hopefully I'll see
some of you in Cambridge.

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andyjenn
I'm 31; tinkered with technology from a young age, did the University thing,
backpacked around the world, now married with a kid. I think the age depends
on what you want your startup to give you...fulfillment, enlightenment - its
not just about acquisitions or IPOs. I think a rounded view on life would help
some of the very guys not to end up like software's answer to Britney Spears!?

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bizfund
34\. And like some others, wife's support and income are absolutely essential
to make this all possible.

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jwecker
I was watching the "secret YC video" that was posted the other day. You could
see some older people and a few who looked quite young. But you really had to
look for it, because what you really saw was a bunch of geeks. And I mean that
in the best possible sense.

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mattculbreth
32, wife and 3 year old son. My son might be a cofounder also, depending on
the YC rules.

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benhoyt
25, and my co-founders are 23 and 32.

Relatedly: two of us have wives and families, which does make things more
difficult financially and time-wise. Do any other founders have families? Do
you work on the startup full-time? How do you fund yourselves?

~~~
jwecker
I have a family also.. Y'all will think I'm totally nuts, but I'm a polyphasic
sleeper ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polyphasic_sleep ). Altogether I sleep
about 2.5 hours a day, which means I can have a 15 hour work day (at night)
and still have 6+ hours at just the right times to be with my family and do
personal things etc. I have my wife's 100% support though, and that makes all
the difference (I won the support by cleaning the kitchen at night, of
course).

In some ways I miss the freedom of being a little younger and single- being
able to drop absolutely everything and move somewhere, knowing you'll be able
to take care of yourself at the very least no matter what. On the other hand,
there's a certain stability in your life that comes from being married and
from having children. It can really be an anchor when times are difficult. It
also usually forces you to take a lot more realistic view of your potential
startup. Will this really produce revenue? Am I really covering my bases? etc.

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danielha
My co-founder and I are both 21.

I believe that competence, experience, and drive are not determined by age. I
consider all aspiring entrepreneurs to be my peers and all successful
entrepreneurs to be my role models.

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juwo
I am by far, the oldest one here. 39\. Perhaps I should forget about YC!

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SwellJoe
I'm 32 and my co-founder is the 33 year old mentioned by Paul. We're a YC this
year. I didn't particularly feel like age would have played any role in
acceptance (though I believe we have the most traditional business model and
most traditional product in the bunch, and had Trevor and Robert not been
interested it may have triggered a "no" from Paul). There are three PhD
candidate founders who are probably much closer to 30 than 20, as well.

Anyway, I didn't notice any particular agenda for picking younger
founders...younger folks are the ones that showed up (I met all, or nearly
all, of the folks who got to the demo stage in Boston..including the majority
that didn't get picked).

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volida
i'm 24, being around the YC average opposes hapily to my feelings that i am
too ooold...

it's great to be among this virtual tech startup community sharing the same
stress and anxieties...maybe we should make some skype conference, public
chat, skypecast whatever is called...

as a matter of fact i am opening a new thread here in news.YC right after this
comment to suggest this.

*update: my suggestion is in this thread:

http://news.ycombinator.com/comments?id=2336

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henry
Turned 23 last month. I feel really old because I'm a 5th year in undergrad. I
thought this would be really cool, but not so much so.

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sszhou
24th bday coming up this year. A birthday gift in the form of a no-hassle
$50,000 investment will be much appreciated :)

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dfranke
I'll be sending in a YC application in a couple days if my cofounder decides
to commit. I'm 21. He's 18.

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sharpshoot
I'm 23, my co-founder is 20. We are looking for another co-founder btw.

~~~
veritas
Another co-founder? I'd be interested if you guys want to talk.

~~~
sharpshoot
Hey Veritas - send me an email at sumon [at] zintilla.com. Bonus: if you have
mad rails skillz

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zaidf
Ah, 19 for another couple months:)

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BennyBeta
26 now, 19 when founded first real startup

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juwo
I am by far, the oldest one here. 39.

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dawie
I am 25 and feeling very old

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wastedbrains
25

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jrjurzynski
Fifty

