How Startup Fundraising Works | Startup School

For detailed advice on how to actually get in touch with investors and set up meetings, check out this video: www.ycombinator.com/library/71-how-to-get-meetings… For YC's comprehensive guide to seed fundraising, check out this guide: www.ycombinator.com/library/4A-a-guide-to-seed-fun…

I'm currently 23, live in Southeast Asia, not from a rich family, and I just started out my career. Never in my life before thinking about building a startup. But in the past few weeks, I have watched several YC videos and get inspired to build my own startup! Sure I still have a lot of work to do, but learning from all of these great videos, I get assured that it's not impossible. Thank you YC for the great inspirations.

"Coin-operated lizard people" ... I will forever remember this when approaching investors. Lol. And Thank You!

I'm building an assistive technology company and had an investor tell me during a meeting HE asked for, "This is a great idea. Someone can do this, but I don't think it's you." So I stopped fundraising, dialed back my vision to the first, smallest, most accessible piece and it's working! While almost everyone around me is trying to stop me, it's great to have videos like this that prove what I'm doing is exactly how founders win. Thanks!

This is some kind of different reality which i guess works in US only. I think i`ve spoken to 100+ investors, spending 1.5-2 years and raising 0 before i realized that all those investors are not interested in you or your team or your product. All they ask is what is your revenue and growth rate. Thats it. At first they will say "oh you are too early for us, but please let us know when you will reach X MRR" then "or you are too late for us, there is too much competition". Even though in your pitch deck it is clearly explained why you are different. Long story short, after we stopped chasing investors and focused on business, we managed to make it work organically without investors. Now we have entities in US, Europe, Asia and continue to grow.

Thank you. This is a fresh breath amidst all the negativity. Why don’t we have a world where builders get more air to experiment and find something people want. I have spent countless hours on my own to come to that stage. Now I have a business which is generating revenues. Still fighting and will keep fighting.

Chapters (Powered by ChapterMe) - 00:00 - Intro 00:27 - Fundraising resources 00:50 - Paul Graham Essays 01:27 - Tactical guides 02:13 - 7 fundraising myths 02:28 - About 04:06 - Raising money is glamorous 06:51 - The need to raise money before starting a startup 08:19 - Example - Solugen 10:10 - My startup need to be impressive to raise money 12:49 - Example - Retool 13:56 - Raising money is complicated, slow, and expensive. 15:33 - SAFE - Simple agreement for equity 17:05 - Example - Asher Bio 18:04 - I am going to lose control of my company 19:17 - Example - Zapier 20:29 - Bootstrapping forever sucks 21:58 - I need a fancy network to raise money 23:18 - Best for Founder to talk to investors 23:43 - If investors reject my startup its a bad startup 24:00 - Example - nVision 25:09 - WhatNot 26:35 - Wrap up - This isn't for you

Recommended viewing! Brad has a knack for simplification. This video is worth the time of every founder just starting (or struggling through) the early fundraising journey.

His last phrase: "You can do this. You can do this." 😢❤

The last bit is the biggest challenge for me, “you can do this”, thank you Brad.

Proudly bootstrapping but love the content!

Thank you, Brad. I learn a lot each time I watch a Y Combinator video. The journey is not for the faint of hearts.

I really thank you for this video. I always wanted to know that. And you took away my fears because now I understand that everything is so simple. You always imagine everything to be so difficult when you read about start-ups in the media. Thank you very much

I'm currently building my MVP. I'm more on the technical side of things so these videos are absolutely informative. I'm still going through a couple of books as well, just to name a few.: - The Startup Owner's Manual - The Lean Product Playbook - The Lean Startup - The Founders Dilemma Keep up the great educative videos.

I'm 1 year into my business of agricultural products trading and talking to different investors and pitching for additional capital. I'm really glad I was able to stumble upon YC videos. My goal is to build my own feedmill to supply premium quality feeds at a reasonable cost for Filipino livestock and poultry farmers! I'm now planning to apply for YC's funding. Love from the Philippines, YC!

This was just the video i needed for my confidence to manifest my start up. Thank You for this!!

Thank you for your words - you have freed my mindset from several barriers that one carries with them and often are not real... Feri

Brad, I'm 47, a senior technical product manager who coded before. I'm building an app that solves the problem of trust between people. Your video was a soothing balm to my heart :) Being very conscientious in everything I do I tend to over engineer and worry too much. Very thankful for your video. Cheers from Vancouver! :)

By YouSum 00:05:01 Raising money is not glamorous; it's about quiet conversations. 00:07:01 Start working on your startup before raising money. 00:10:12 Investors are convinced by progress, not impressive pitches. 00:14:02 Fundraising can be quick, simple, and inexpensive with safes. 00:17:28 Implementing safes can change power dynamics when talking to investors. 00:18:06 Seed rounds today offer founders more control than ever before. 00:20:30 Bootstrapping a company forever is challenging and not recommended. 00:22:00 Investors prioritize profitable ideas over fancy networks when investing. 00:23:46 Rejection from investors doesn't signify a bad startup idea. By YouSum

Extremely transformational and inspiring! Thank you so much!