Startup is not same as new company or new tech company.
http://www.paulgraham.com/growth.html
> A startup is a company designed to grow fast. Being newly founded does not in itself make a company a startup. Nor is it necessary for a startup to work on technology, or take venture funding, or have some sort of "exit." The only essential thing is growth. Everything else we associate with startups follows from growth.
orig. U.S. A business or enterprise that is in the process of starting up, or that has just been established; a startup company, venture, etc.
They cite these early usages in print:
1975 Chicago Defender 20 Sept. 23/1 The many problems faced by any new start up, but most assuredly by a black financial institution.
1986 Your Business Mar. 11/3 There are the small businesses; the heroic little start-ups in their garages and garden sheds.
On HN "startup" means the kind of business whose ambition is to be a household name, used by millions of people if it's in the consumer space, or all the major customers if it's in B2B.
That kind of thing tends to require a business that grows a lot while generally not making free cash, which is why it needs outside investors. Those investors see a lot of these firms and this is one take on the accumulated learnings.