TechStars Raises Fresh $24 M, Offers New Startups $100K Each

Re:TechStars Raises Fresh $24 M, Offers New Startups $100K Each by jot on Wednesday September 21, 2011 @11:24AM (#3022337)

"Y Combinator started the year before us, and it’s the same genre, but under the microscope, we could not be more different," said Mr. Cohen. "The fundamental difference between us and the other accelerator programs is they have a black box, while we have open sourced our model."

TechStars and YC are certainly different but having read:

What Happens At Y Combinator: http://ycombinator.com/atyc.html

and the TechStars equivalent:

Do More Faster: http://www.domorefasterbook.com/

YC doesn't seem like any more of a black box than they are.

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Re:TechStars Raises Fresh $24 M, Offers New Startups $100K Each by mkrecny on Wednesday September 21, 2011 @11:47AM (#3022438)

Cohen is referring to the fact that TechStars is essentially a franchise and YC is not.

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Re:TechStars Raises Fresh $24 M, Offers New Startups $100K Each by jedc on Wednesday September 21, 2011 @06:11PM (#3023907)

And that the first month of TechStars is a lot of back-and-forth, matching startups with mentors and mentors with startups. Where all three months of YC is build, build, build. (And getting ready to demo.) To stretch an academic metaphor, TechStars reminds me of a residential college (where you do everything with your cohort) and YC reminds me of the traditional Oxbridge model (some lectures, lots of independent study and regular one-on-one sessions).

Neither is particularly "right" or "wrong", they're just different models.

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