Should You Validate Your Idea Before Applying to YCombinator?

Silicon Valley Accelerator on Your Cell Phone

Must-read Posts on Incubators and Accelerators

There is a very real knowledge gap in the early stage start-up game, on both sides of the table. First-time entrepreneurs lack the seasoning to captain a steady ship through turbulent waters. Inexperienced friends and family (and, increasingly, crowdsourced investors) lack the ability to gauge the viability of a business, or to mentor naïve entrepreneurs. This knowledge gap, I have come to believe, is best filled by savvy incubators. However, there are over 7,500 business incubators around the world, and most of them fail.

Here are several must-read articles on incubators and accelerators that will help you navigate and make informed decisions.

• Should You Join an Accelerator? – There are over 8,000 accelerators around the world. Most of them fail. Before you decide to join one, you should try to understand why they fail, so that you do not end up failing with them.

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From $100k to $1 Million: Should You Join an Accelerator?

There are over 8,000 accelerators around the world. Most of them fail. Before you decide to join one, you should try to understand why they fail, so that you do not end up failing with them.

The first business accelerator in the U.S. opened in 1959 and is still operating. In the last five years, we have seen a renaissance in the accelerator business. Pioneered by YCombinator, Silicon Valley’s flagship accelerator led by Paul Graham, accelerators have come back with a vengeance. YCombinator has seen some significant successes, including Airbnb, Dropbox, and Heroku. It has fueled a bit of an accelerator bubble, in fact. Accelerators are now a global phenomenon, and there isn’t a major city in the world where an accelerator isn’t cropping up.
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Incubators and Accelerators FAQs

This post answers some commonly asked questions about incubators and accelerators. I have answered these questions on Quora as well.

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When Should You Move To Silicon Valley?

The question continues to come up often in our work with global entrepreneurs, so further to my earlier Harvard Business Review piece, I will add more color to it. First, here’s a recap from the HBR piece:

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Bootstrapping a Billion Dollar Unicorn with Services from Utah: Dave Elkington, CEO of InsideSales.com (Part 5)

Sramana Mitra: We’re talking 2010 now?

Dave Elkington: That experience was in 2011.

Sramana Mitra: Where were you revenue-wise at this point?

Dave Elkington: We were probably doing $6.5 million. A lot of companies in the SaaS space talk about bookings. When you’re bootstrapped, that gap is the only important thing that exists and most importantly, it is cash flow. It’s all about managing cash flow. Other companies would compare with us on, “What are you on revenue?” I’d be like, “We did $6 million in gaps.” They’d say, “What about bookings?” I’m like, “What’s a booking?” All that matters is the cash I’m going to bring in.

Sramana Mitra: It’s not very helpful.

Dave Elkington: I talked to a company and I really didn’t know what a booking was. He tried to explain it to me and it was such a foreign concept. At that time, I was like, “Who cares?” >>>

How To Evaluate An Incubator

There are over 7,500 incubators/accelerators in the world. Most fail.

Entrepreneurs are thoroughly confused on how to evaluate incubators and accelerators.

Entrepreneurs are also thoroughly confused on why they get rejected by incubators and accelerators on the grounds of being too early.

This short slide deck outlines some points you ought to keep in mind in selecting an incubator/accelerator.

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