David Hsu, founder and CEO of Retool, details the investment structure of Retool's Series A financing.
Opinion
Hsu claims 95% of Y Combinator advice is in Paul Graham essays
“Almost everything YC tells you is available online. If you just go read every PG essay, you know, you could probably become a YC partner, basically, if you read every essay, and just maybe that's being a little bit uncharitable, but, you know, I think you coul…”
Opinion
Hsu argues Y Combinator adds no value after product-market fit
“Once you have product pocket fit, you don't really need to be talking to anybody who's just kind of heads down, just executing, just writing code, talking to customers, you know, for as many hours a day as you can, really. And so once that does happen, You kno…”
Opinion
Hsu argues VC help for struggling startups rarely yields real results
“I think, you know, it is true that when companies are not doing well, they'll sort of ask for more help, ask for more advice or whatever else. But I think in the end, it doesn't actually make that much of a difference. You may sort of spend more time with the …”
Opinion
Hsu claims venture capital advice is unhelpful prior to product-market fit
“I think pre-proto market fit, I would hope you know your market better than your VC does. If you don't, you probably have some problems. It's got other issues. And so in that case, I really don't think the advice that a VC offers you is going to be that helpfu…”
Insight
Hsu argues burnout is driven by lack of results, not hard work
“I think if you try to really increase the clock speed and sort of cadence at which you move, but there are no results, I think that leads to burnout very quickly. At least for me, and potentially for you as well, and for many people I've talked to, working har…”
Insight
Hsu argues founder conviction beats testing landing pages for startup ideas
“Yeah, so I think conviction is very important, and so I think when choosing ideas, I think conviction probably is sort of highest order you have to care about, basically, is do you actually get convicted about the idea? I have a bunch of friends now, and I'm s…”