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0 pointsmikert896mo ago0 comments

Alot of them do, not only that, they build skills that help them start their next company. Many of which are bootstrapped and profitable. This whole idea that startups are a complete lottery ticket is not only false, its increasingly less false, more money is being made now in startups than ever

0 comments

toomuchtodo6mo ago

Based on public exit and liquidity event information, startups still remain a lottery ticket for most. 90% of startups fail entirely, for example (CB Insights). YC startups have more longevity, and more get to a Series A then non YC startups, but the best batches based on performance have been between 2009 and 2013. 10% achieve an exit, 4.5% became unicorns. Only 17 companies backed by YC (out of almost 5k) have gone public, and all except Airbnb, Instacart, and Reddit have underperformed post IPO.

Have fun, learn, develop and grow your skills and network, take the investment, but it’s important to be honest with one’s self about odds of success and outcome. If you win, respect and appreciate the lottery ticket for what it was. Hard work and years of grinding is table stakes, but you can still fail (and most do).

https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/pulling-back-the-curtain-...

https://www.marketsentiment.co/p/the-yc-report

bix66mo ago

> More than 50% of companies are still alive after 10 years

I’d rather have a 50% chance at my own startup being alive after 10 years than go work some big corp job.

toomuchtodo6mo ago

To each their own. If you must do a startup, do so. My comments should be treated as informing prior to an informed decision.

koolba6mo ago

If you work for 10 years in big tech and save your money, you’d have enough for a lifetime of chasing startup ideas.

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raspasov6mo ago

I have a problem with the analogy “lottery ticket”. I think analogies are helpful as long as we are talking perhaps a singe order of magnitude difference between the two things.

The chance of winning most popular US lotteries is approximately 1 in 300,000,000. In comparison, the chance of IPO-ing a YC company is approximately 1 in 300. You can count how many orders of magnitude of difference that is.

toomuchtodo6mo ago

I buy a lottery ticket for $1, in a moment, with no further effort. A YC startup founder grinds for years, if not a decade, to reach IPO with unknown opportunity costs. They are not the same. How many lottery tickets over how many lottery draws to equalize the odds is a fun thought experiment to quantify a dollar value for the option premium.

17 YC IPOs over how many total YC founder years (Lifetime YC companies * # of founders * years YC company active, roughly)?

(I’ve put a lot of thought into being a founder, from an aggressively data driven perspective about how to spend time, which is non renewable)

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mikert89OP6mo ago

10% chance at millions fresh out school sounds great!

pclmulqdq6mo ago

If you think "exit" automatically means millions, you've probably never seen an exit before. Of those that exit, the majority of startups get almost $0 for the common shareholders. I continue to believe that a lot of YC's alpha comes from the fact that they are very good at angling people toward small exits where they basically make no money but YC recovers their investment.

bangaladore6mo ago

10% of 0.01% of people is probably closer. 0.01% is probably way to high even.

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse

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toomuchtodo6mo ago

https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/pulling-back-the-curtain-...

https://www.marketsentiment.co/p/the-yc-report

bix66mo ago

> More than 50% of companies are still alive after 10 years

I’d rather have a 50% chance at my own startup being alive after 10 years than go work some big corp job.

toomuchtodo6mo ago

To each their own. If you must do a startup, do so. My comments should be treated as informing prior to an informed decision.

koolba6mo ago

If you work for 10 years in big tech and save your money, you’d have enough for a lifetime of chasing startup ideas.

1 more reply

raspasov6mo ago

I have a problem with the analogy “lottery ticket”. I think analogies are helpful as long as we are talking perhaps a singe order of magnitude difference between the two things.

toomuchtodo6mo ago

17 YC IPOs over how many total YC founder years (Lifetime YC companies * # of founders * years YC company active, roughly)?

(I’ve put a lot of thought into being a founder, from an aggressively data driven perspective about how to spend time, which is non renewable)

1 more reply

mikert89OP6mo ago

10% chance at millions fresh out school sounds great!

pclmulqdq6mo ago

bangaladore6mo ago

10% of 0.01% of people is probably closer. 0.01% is probably way to high even.

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse