Review of YC Startup School’s Co-Founder Speed-dating event (detailed ver.)

I attended YC Startup School’s Co-Founder Speed-dating event today and wanted to share my experience. This post is a detailed version. If you want to read a short summary, check out this post instead.

Why I tried

1. Even though I have been able to run my product (https://www.lookscopeapp.com/) solo so far, I am open-minded about finding a business partner or collaborating in the future to expand the potential of my product/company.
2. Running my company solo as an engineer/builder has largely neglected the marketing side of the project, which I see as a major area for improvement moving forward.
3. Related to No. 2, I have benefited a lot from having an engineering background but being a successful founder or building a successful business is totally another thing. I thought meeting other people with more or different experiences/perspectives would help me improve my ability to think like a more balanced/holistic entrepreneur/founder.

How it works

• You first need to sign up for the YC Startup School (https://www.startupschool.org/) and gain access to its portal. Once you do that, you need to sign up for the Co-Founder Match feature inside the portal. I needed to apply additionally after preparing my co-founder profile and then wait for about a day to get accepted. Afterwards, you will see info on speed-dating events in the dashboard section if there is any coming up. There were multiple ones based on sector and I signed up for the one for the Consumer sector.
• The event started at 1pm EST. At the start time, the event page showed a button to jump in and get started.
• Each found of matching followed this procedure:
  1. The system tries to find a good match based on the criteria you set prior to the event. (e.g., Do you prefer either technical or non-technical profiles?)
  2. You get matched with another participant and the screen shows you the person’s profile.
  3. You can choose to enter a video call with the person or not. If you are not interested in talking to the person, you can skip and go back to Step 1. If you are interested, you can join the call. If both people joined, you get to talk to each other for 5 min.
  4. After 5 min, the video call will automatically end and you will be prompted with an option to either send an invite to re-connect later. After you make a decision to either send an invite to reconnect or not, you go back to Step 1.
  5. This process repeats until the event end time (i.e., for 1 hour)

Result

• I got “pre-matched” with probably about 15 profiles but 8 of these led to a video call and actual chat. Among these 8 other participants, I was able to reconnect with 6 of them afterwards. They became my “active matches” and appeared in an inbox screen.
• I skipped many people because their profile didn’t look interesting to me and there were also many instances of the other situation where I wanted to chat but the other participant skipped.
• The feature shows the current number of participants of the event real-time and the number stayed between 70 and 120 throughout the event, if I remember correctly. This definitely was more than enough potential matches.

Takeaways

• About how the platform functioned, I really liked that you could skip to another match immediately if you don’t find someone’s profile interesting or relevant to what you are looking for. This allowed me to use my time efficiently during the event. This was possible because the number of participants was big enough throughout the event (at least 70 this time).
• I definitely met interesting people, some of whom had a different background and/or very qualified (e.g., serial entrepreneurs with many exits, ex-big name companies in different domains like FAANG or investment banking firms). After this event, I kinda feel humbled and reminded that I better continue to work my ass off 😅.
• Another great thing was that during my intro I was able to give an elevator pitch about my product and check whether the idea sounded appealing to my matches. It was interesting to see that some people got totally excited about the product while others didn’t find that interesting. For instance, a serial entrepreneur found my idea interesting and suggested that we reconnect. As a novice entrepreneur, I found such reaction interesting (and maybe even validating as a potential business idea) because I have often wondered whether my product could eventually become a substantial, profitable business.
• In summary, for those who are interested in meeting founder-type people either with a strong intention of finding a co-founder or not, I’d definitely recommend giving it a try. You get an opportunity to meet many highly qualified people for free. Like Indie Hackers, it also comes with an opportunity to get reminded of the fact that there are many others out there who are as hard working and believing in a unique vision as you. :)

Questions for you

• Has anyone else tried the product? If so, what was your take?
• Does anyone have experience in finding a co-founder online? Any advice you can offer?
• Would you be interested in hearing about the post-event conversations and activities I had/will have with my matches?

Cheers!