
Ask YC: How did YC S20 demo day succeed? - beforeiapply
In the past, YC was very specific about moving founders to bay area and it was willing to reject the ones who can&#x27;t. The reasoning was that the downsides of not being in valley overweighs missing out on otherwise good startups. Now I hear from YC partners, S20 Demo Day was more successful than previous batches. Did all the downsides suddenly disappear? What are the downsides and which ones still exist?<p>Explaining them would help YC applicants to make informed decision. Otherwise, such claim sounds salesy and too good to be true.
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mimixco
I think the whole Covid and remote work thing has given new perspectives to a
lot of people who didn't think their companies could be run any way other than
physically and in person. Perhaps YC's previous succesess had them believing
too much in their own method.

As for the latest batch, others have commented and I've noticed that the
_kinds_ of companies YC chose last time seems to have a different focus than
previous rounds. Notably, there's a heavy emphasis on dev tools and, to my way
of thinking, more companies with quick go-to-market products and fewer
moonshots. Perhaps the apparent changes in YC's selection criteria also
contributed to their feeling that this batch was "more successful."

Personally, judging from the "me, too" nature of many of the accepted
companies in the last round, I find it hard to believe that many (any?)
unicorns will come out of choosing the low-hanging fruit. It remains to be
seen how these companies will be valued going forward or if their products
will succeed in the marketplace, and those will be better indications of the
success of the overall batch than any press release.

