Getting backed by Y Combinator

36 days between submitting an application and getting $500,000

Danny Sheridan

Feb 28, 2023

TLDR I’m writing to share my experience as a startup founder. I’ll periodically share updates about my journey building Fern. Support my team’s open-source project by leaving a star on GitHub! ⭐

Getting the “YC Sign” photo is a tradition among YC founders! The Fern team, from left to right: Danny Sheridan, Deep Singhvi, Zach Kirsch

Y Combinator is the best program for creating top-end entrepreneurs that has ever existed.
- Marc Andreessen, General Partner, Andreessen Horowitz (a16z)

Y Combinator’s Standard Deal

In November 2022, my co-founders and I applied to Y Combinator (YC), an accelerator program that backs early-stage startups with a $500,000 investment.

How does the investment work? You give up ~10% of your company for $500,000. The terms of the “Standard Deal” are:

$125,000 for 7% of your company
$375,000 at terms you will negotiate with other investors in your next investment round (i.e., an uncapped safe with a Most Favored Nation provision)

Founders don’t accept the YC deal because of the money.
They do it because it increases their odds of success.

36 days to get $500,000

We submitted our application to YC on November 16, 2022. Just 36 days later, we received a wire transfer for $500,000 💸.

Our timeline from applying → getting accepted → Demo Day.

The Winter 2023 Batch

YC hosts two 3-month programs — one starting in January and the other in June. We’re in the Winter 2023 (abbreviated to W23) batch with 200+ companies and 500+ founders. On Demo Day, April 5th/6th

, we’ll get in front of 1,500+ investors and media to pitch our companies—a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity!

What support does Y Combinator provide? That’s a topic for a future update 😉.

Thanks for following my journey,
Danny

P.S. Want to request a topic for me to write about next time? Share it here.

The number of companies participating in a YC batch has doubled in the last five years. As a result, Demo Day grew from a 1-day event to a 2-day event—just like Prime Day 😉.