When Y Combinator Might Replace Founders with In‑House Apps
At what point does YC decide they don't need the founders, and can just make the 50 apps they want for demo day themselves and own more? :)
Profit Every Ad First Purchase, Not LTV
Ridge Wallet hit $200M/year with zero VC funding. Their rule? Every ad must be profitable on the first purchase. No relying on repeat buyers. Meanwhile you're losing money on the front-end hoping 'LTV' will magically save you. That's the gap.
Pressure‑Driven Hires Cost Severance; Hire Slowly, Hire Missionaries
Almost every time a founder is pressured by a board member, investor or advisor to make a major hire quickly, typically with absurd demands, it’s resulted in a bad hire — with a giant severance package 🤔 Hire slowly Hire missionaries...
Leverage Shifts: Attention, Not Ideas, Drives Growth
A lot of founder advice around growth already feels outdated. Not because it was always bad. Because the environment changed faster than the playbooks did. Ideas are cheaper. Code is getting cheaper. Attention is not. Distribution is not. That changes where leverage lives.
Audit Q1, Scale What Actually Delivered Results
It’s officially Q2 ‼️ Tech Founders how did your Q1 go? Quick audit: • What did you ship in Q1? • What actually drove results? • What are you scaling in Q2? Busy ≠ progress. Let’s be honest.
Beyond Revenue: Purpose, Health, and Relationships Drive Founder Happiness
I asked 1000+ Hampton founders (all doing at least 3M ARR): has hitting your career goals actually made you happier? Here's what they said: - Founder A (sold multiple companies): "Revenue milestones felt good briefly, then faded. But being able to buy...
Speed of Iteration Now Beats Idea Quality in Startups
I get asked often what matters most when building a company today. There are a lot of traits that have always mattered, but one has become disproportionately important in this environment: velocity of iteration. Today, products are built in months, markets...
Personal Outreach Beats Login Links for Lasting Customers
Most founders send a login and wait for feedback. Hewitt Tomlin showed up in person, called coaches, built real relationships. His very first customer from 12 years ago is still someone he talks to today. https://t.co/PbIlyv1cUM
Shark Tank's $700K Rejection Became $1B Sale
In 2013, Shark Tank rejected this “useless” doorbell. The company asked for $700K investment. The Sharks laughed. But 5 years later, Amazon bought the company for $1B... And Shaq invested $1M of his OWN money into the business. Here's the story...
First Quadruple-Layered SPV Closed in 12 Hours
Humbled to announce we have closed the world’s first ever quadruple layered SPV to participate in this round. We thank our LP’s for their quick turnaround on the 12-hour process, and we are excited to lend our expertise to the OpenAI...
Clear Numbers Drive Double Revenue and Confident Hiring
@happygirlmarketingco came to me not seeing her numbers clearly. One year later: revenue up 101%. She hired 2 employees with confidence. Started paying herself consistently. Said budgeting finally gave her peace. That's not luck. That's what happens when strategy meets...
AI Enables Solo Founders to Build Fast, Cheap
I've watched hundreds of founders quit their jobs too early and go broke. They all made the same mistake… no systems. AI makes that inexcusable. Now you can build in 4 weeks what used to take a team of 5 people and...
Early Bets on Founders Still Paying Off
this is why i invested in as many gundo founders i could a few years back. and most are still just getting started
Hire an Advisor to Cold‑email VCs for Funding
The best way to raise a round is to hire an advisor to cold email VCs
Entrepreneurship Remains the Most AI‑Proof Job
The most AI proof job in the world is entrepreneurship Use it to make products and services. Build more companies. On Shopify or otherwise.
Long Forms Drive 27% Abandonment; FormShift Solves
I spent today researching which industries have the longest forms. Healthcare patient intake: 15-30+ fields Insurance applications: 20-40+ fields Mortgage apps: 30-50+ fields 27% of users abandon forms because they're too long. This is exactly what I'm building FormShift to fix.
Choose Rooms that Accelerate Growth, Not Limit It
The room you’re in is either accelerating your growth or capping it. In this episode, we cover: ✔️The two types of rooms every founder needs ✔️Why success starts to feel normal when you’re around people doing bigger things ✔️How to add value even...
Allbirds' Rapid Overexpansion Doomed Its Core Brand
I think Allbirds failed because they tried to do too much and grow too fast too soon and that left them scrambling to make up revenue as a publicly traded company. I think being public was a crash grab for...
Solo Business Success: 70% Persistence, 30% Planning
Building a solo business is: • 10% tactics • 20% strategy •70% not quitting when it gets hard The tactics are easy The psychology is brutal
Founder Keeps 49% of $1B Exit via Smart Build, Funding
Julian Hearn just sold Huel to Danone for €1bn. he walked away with £420m personally. that is 49% of the exit. most DTC founders who raise that much end up with 15%. two things made the difference: how he built the business, and...
Free Services Come with Hidden Costs and Effort
OpenClaw is free. Except for the API tokens. And the server. And the 50 hours of setup. And the $600 I burned in 4 days. “Free” is doing a lot of heavy lifting. https://t.co/MFj5pVF0o6
Q1 VC “Record” Includes OpenAI Money Not yet Closed
Seeing some "record" reports on Q1 VC fundraising that includes all $120 billion for OpenAI. Most of the $$ didn't close in Q1.
Paragon Launches Korsana Biosciences, Targeting Alzheimer's
Paragon launched its 7th company today -- Korsana Biosciences, merging into the $CYCN public shell. New ticker will be $KRSA. Lead drug candidate is a shuttled anti-amyloid beta antibody for Alzheimer's disease in early studies. https://t.co/RcJ8adMakm
Apple's Early Allies Got Nothing Despite Company's Fortune
As Apple celebrates 50 today, there’s some brutal stories out there about one of the richest companies on earth. Steve Jobs’ best friend Dan Kottke, who he lived with, and who worked in the garage in the early days, was...
When SaaS Hits $50K MRR, Tiny Fees Don’t Matter
At $50K MRR with typical SaaS margins that’s $35K going to your bank every month after costs. Congratulations you’re printing money. At that point, life is so freaking good, and you cultivate such an abundance mindset, I guarantee no founder...
Scale Smart: Study Market Before Chasing Revenue
Most founders chase growth. They hire sales teams, run ads, and push for volume without studying the market. Growth-driven companies do the opposite: they study customers, test demand, and build systems before scaling. One model chases revenue, the other builds long-term value. Are you...
Open‑source Memory System Drives GStack’s Self‑improving Software Factory
GStack does more to try to remember failures and learn from them. Open source lets us create a memory system to self-improve in the open. We're still on a path to a software factory, but we're going to build it...
Remote Teams Can Depress Startup Acquisition Valuations
One impact of remote or partially remote teams - lower purchase price if startup goes for a smaller exit / M&A (or in some cases acquisition doesnt happen at all) Reason: fewer buyers want fully remote teams, or teams w key...
OpenAI's $122B Funding Lasts only 18 Months
JUST IN: OpenAI's $122,000,000,000.00 raise will cover operations for just 18 months before they need more funding.
Create What People Want, Speed Over Access
All the old rules are gone, there is only making something people want and what you can do with the tools that now everyone has It's not about access, it's about what you can do, and whether you *want* to go...
Team Grit Turns Vision Into Shipping Reality
I went out for drinks with some engineers in the fall. I got really excited about an idea. Like REALLY excited about it. They also seemed pretty excited. I said, "we should just build this. Screw priorities, this is magic."...
Design Your Business, Then Let It Build Itself
Architects don't build the building themselves. They design it. Then hand off the work so it’s built whether they’re available or not. Are you the architect of your business?
Voltair Deploys Global Drone Network for Earth Monitoring
Voltair Launches a Global #Drone Network for Infrastructure and Earth Monitoring by @ycombinator #Innovation #TechForGood #EmergingTech #Technology #Tech https://t.co/ueS5Ot5HSW
Connecting Japanese Founders with Silicon Valley Opportunities
there are some really cool founders visiting SF from Japan to build their startups did my part this morning helping bridge US/Japan :)
Flat‑fee Model Could Disrupt Amazon’s Marketplace Dominance
The empower ride app (regulatory qs aside) is interesting for platform power Qs as it has a flat fee model for drivers. Could imagine the same thing for a marketplace app that would challenge Amazon marketplace
Serial Entrepreneurs Build $400M+ Empires with Grit
This is a Hampton Core group (based in LA). - One co-founded a K-beauty brand, ran it for 12 years, and exited at around $200M while the brand was valued closer to $600M. - Another quit her job as the on-set lawyer...
Prioritize 80% Impact, 20% Effort, Choose Right Features
ICYMI: Remastered classic article: Often we can and should accept 80% of the benefit if it means 20% of the effort. Customers generally prefer the right features over more features. But sometimes… sometimes we should just do what we think is cool… https://t.co/zeRESifPJs
Hire Outsiders to Spark Breakthrough Innovation
I met one of the cofounders of @neuralink last week at @hf0 (he's now building a new way to get cargo from China to USA a lot cheaper via autonomous dirigibles like the Goodyear Blimp, but designed and manufactured all...
VCs Vastly Underestimate Generational Unicorns Like Shopify
In Bessemer's original Shopify memo, the BEST case exit was $400 million. Shopify is worth $155 BILLION today. No VC model survives contact with a generational company. I imagine we will see this to an even greater extent over the next 5...
Find Your Dream Hardware Startup via Reverse Job Board
Today, I built the coolest thing I've ever made. It's a reverse job board: Tell it what interests you most in life, and you'll match with the world's most exciting hardware startups (from robotics to lasers) that are a dream...
Founders Becoming Automated: A Documentary-Worthy Revolution
Built startups with human founders. Built copilots for teams. Now watching founders get automated. What @marik and the @feltsensefund team are pulling off is unlike anything I have seen. There should be a documentary about this.
Success Requires Both Founder‑Market and Product‑Market Fit
Without founder/market fit, this team won't be able to execute. Without product/market fit, this product won’t be purchased. So it’s not “which one” or “it’s a balance.” It’s: Both.
Stablecoin Expert Sam Broner Plans New Venture
1/ I had the pleasure of working closely with @SamBroner for several years at @a16zcrypto, where he quickly became our go-to ‘stablecoin guy.’ Fascinated by the minutiae of the space, he could (and did) spend hours explaining the intricacies of...
Growth Metrics Can Be Deceptive; Watch These Danger Signs
7 danger signs that tell you if your growth is real: > CAC above 30% of AOV: margin gone before order ships > CPM above $15 sustained: losing the auction > New customer rate below 50%: reacquiring who you already have > Frequency...
Choose Builder or Investor: No Sidelines in 2026
Wealth creation has never been more attainable than in 2026. Right now everyone has two choices: 1) Be the builder - use the tools like Claude code and codex. Find problems, build apps, help with ai migration 2) Be the investor...
AI Turns Companies Into Solo Startups, Redefining Hiring
The Rise of the One-Person AI Startup: China’s Experiment and the Evolution of Hiring in the US Talent Market https://t.co/RuSZhkDbBC AI is compressing companies into solo startups. China is accelerating this shift while top talent goes independent and becomes harder...
Prioritize Effectiveness First, Optimize Efficiency Later
First, be effective. Then be efficient. A lot of startup founders worry about the second before the first. If you're a well-funded startup, be effective first. We can always optimize for efficiency later. But Lord help you if you...
VC Funding Turns Founders Into Investor‑Driven Time‑Sinks
Average day in the life of a VC backed founder: > wake up at 5am to “optimize” > check burn rate before checking texts > spend morning prepping board deck instead of building product > get on call with investor who's...
NFX Fuels $1.25B Q1 Growth Across Sectors
It was a very busy Q1 2026 for many companies in the @NFX portfolio 🚀 Across AI infrastructure, space, security, tech bio, fintech, and consumer — we’ve seen a wave of financings + M&A from companies where we led the seed...
Mateschitz’s Betrayal Turned Thai Tonic Into $80B Empire
In 1984, Dietrich Mateschitz orchestrated the coldest betrayal in business history… He erased the real founder and stole the Redbull empire. Then, through pure greed and deception, he turned a Thai tonic into an $80B monster. This is how Red Bull really started...