Poll: What other US cities for a YC like program?
I know some may feel YC like programs aren't a regional business. In essence, they're not, but that doesn't mean there aren't large entrepreneur communities that could use something like YC in their city.
I only made it US cities, because that's probably a good place to start. Europe could be a poll of its own and maybe someone else should do that in a day or so. Tons of opportunity there
PS- if a choice isn't on there that shouldnt be, just leave a comment and i'll add it.
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[ 4.4 ms ] story [ 175 ms ] threadA YC-ish group called 'Capital Factory' recently began operating here, but if you look at the inaugural group of funded ventures, they're either:
or I'm not sure which, but I sadly suspect the former.Also, given that YC appears to be going Valley-only, perhaps the 'Another Boston option' should just be Boston, MA, right?
techstars is in boston now too.
Update: done. Geez polls get killed in terms of staying on the homepage rankings.
From what I saw, they appear to be looking for more polished startups, and their application process does not have the same focus on finding talented hackers that YC's appears to have.
I'm not really sure what motivated them to pick a hodgepodge of me-too web properties (a few niche craigslist-ish things and a pet medical site).
Outside of Capital Factory, it seems like Austin Ventures and friends will continue to fund more of the same recycled enterprise network/virtualization/identity management software companies, being started by the same management teams over and over.
I really hope the next batch of CF startups is more interesting/innovative. Good luck with your venture, it looks promising, even if CF didn't care to fund it.
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Many people know Las Vegas as only a resort community, which was and remains its focus, but recently it has a growing entrepreneurial base. Small companies such as Heatlh Data Insights have been started here and grew exceedingly quickly. Moreover even its nature as a resort town is helpful to certain types of startups since numerous conventions are held here and thus facilitate networking with people in various fields with minimal travel.
It currently has both a major university (UNLV) and a smaller community college (CSN). While neither are exceptionally highly ranked that is largely because they are young as institutions and UNLV was improving with impressive speed prior to the economic downturn. Boyd School of Law within UNLV continues to climb the charts in spite of the downturn. So there is a strong and growing academic base here.
While the cost of living here is unfortunately high, it is less so than Silicon Valley so that is clearly no major barrier.
In all, I think Las Vegas would be a rich vein for startups in the future.
And the relevance of this to startups is? (One possible answer is "they do startup law", but only if they actually do.)
> While the cost of living here is unfortunately high, it is less so than Silicon Valley so that is clearly no major barrier.
"barrier" has something to do with the relationship between cost and benefit. If the cost is 10% less but the benefit is 50% less....
>"barrier" has something to do with the relationship between cost and benefit. If the cost is 10% less but the benefit is 50% less.."
You are completely right. Perhaps I should have more cautiously said "While the cost of living here is unfortunately high, it is less so than Silicon Valley so that is clearly not necessarily a major barrier in itself."
> It depends on how you define startup. If you are referring specifically to high tech startups, then the relevance is fairly small. If you use the term more generally for recently formed, small companies then many fields require immediate access to lawyers.
(1) Lawyers, yes, but you mentioned law school. I've seen plenty of "SV works because" stories that mention law firms, but I don't think that I've ever seen one that mentioned Boalt (Berkeley) or Stanford Law.
(2) Why do tech startups have less need for a law school, or lawyers for that matter, than other kinds of startups? (Generally speaking of course, as you were.)
Please be specific, because I don't see it.
Being neither a lawyer nor a founder I am speaking based on assumption and conversations with certain business people, so take this with a grain of salt. As I understand it, most tech and especially software startups can grow to a substantial size with no need (or limited) need for a lawyer. They might come in handy for things like working with angel investors and initial incorporation, but as I understand it if the founders are bold and willing to read the fine print themselves, lawyers are not actually needed as long as you can avoid getting sued.
Certainly many other fields can get away with no (or limited) legal involvement to start with, but some businesses absolutely require a lawyer's services on a regular basis. Most government contracts, especially ones that involve any kind of personal information have such specific and detailed requirements mandated by federal law that regular legal counsel is required. Similarly, I understand that the biomedical field is so filled with patents that are aggressively enforced (not just in the defensive portfolio sense that many tech companies build) that lawyers are essential.
Also, any company involved in gambling in Nevada is carefully overseen and will have lawyers on retainer with the larger ones holding them in house.
Like I wrote, no one mentions Stanford Law, they mention Wilson Sonsini, so why would Las Vegas be different?
Again I caveat that I am neither a lawyer nor a founder, but I think there is an advantage to having a law school that is not one of the top 10 present (hence no Stanford). People graduating from one of the top 10 law schools generally expect and are frequently able to command exceptionally high salaries straight out of school.
What a lot of startups need in regulation-heavy fields (those dealing with gambling, government contracts, healthcare, etc) is large numbers of competent lawyers at the lowest price possible. In fact, I have seen cases where regulation requires a lawyer review certain types of documents and certify them, but they are not actually expected to reveiw them for anything in particular as far as I could tell. It was simply a requirement that a lawyer certify them.
Now naturally the presence of a reasonable (by which I mean good enough to be competent but not so elite as to have graduates overpriced for a startup) is an advantage shared by many cities, but I think it is an advantage, and some of the other points I mentioned in favor of Las Vegas are somewhat more rare.
And do note that I say that as a federal contractor.
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