No East Coast Investment
June 1, 2008
Today, The Boston Globe featured an article, In a city that plays it safe, incubator has a tough job on the coming Summer 2008 class of Y Combinator startups. YC operates out of Cambridge, MA, for the summer months. The article was more validation that east coast VCs still haven’t made a single investment in a YC company and that early stage ventures need to look at the west coast for funding:
But the problem is that of the 80 companies that have come through the program, not one has yet received money from a Massachusetts investor. “There have been three cases where a Boston VC was talking to one of our companies, and they had the sandwich ripped right out of their hands” by a West Coast investor, Graham says. “The Boston VCs were so slow and timid.”
Of the Y Combinator alumni, only two have chosen to stick around in Boston - Tsumobi and a shopping site called Bountii. Dodge says, “We just have to do better.”
Graham says that Boston venture capitalists prefer making “safe investments” in companies with experienced executives at the helm. As a result, he says, “They miss the Googles - the ones that have the really extreme returns.”
Rumors of Xobni Acquisition by Microsoft
February 29, 2008
TechCrunch posted today that Xobni, co-founded by PSU-alum Matt Brezina, is in acquisition discussions with Microsoft. According to the post, the first offer was sub $20 million and they are negotiating. This would be a big win for a Penn State entrepreneur, as well as another Y Combinator-backed venture.
Collegian: Penn State grads launch lucrative site from class idea
December 11, 2007
The Daily Collegian published an article today regarding the PSU Y Combinator startups - Weebly and Xobni. It’s good background on some of the details regarding the founding of Weebly. In it, Xobni co-founder Matt Brezina makes the following statement:
“You don’t get exposed to [startups] enough at Penn State,” he said. “You think you’re going to be working at Lockheed Martin, while, if you’re at Stanford, you do a summer internship at YouTube.”
Good point and precisely one that we’re working to remedy with the Lion Launch Pad.
The last quote from Weebly co-founder Dan Veltri (”Don’t get stuck in the status quo.”) was good advice, as well. Always be searching for ways to change the status quo and innovate.
