Citing concern over COVID-19, Y Combinator moves demo day online

Startup accelerator Y Combinator has moved its famed demo day online, citing a “growing concern over COVID-19,” or coronavirus. The demo day has historically drawn crowds of Silicon Valley elite, journalists, and both national and international venture capitalists to watch more than 100 startups come out to the world. 

“While we won’t be able to recreate every aspect of Demo Day, we’ll try our best to create an amazing experience for our founders and investors,” Y Combinator said in a memo. Y Combinator’s 30th annual demo day will be pre-recorded and released to investors on Monday March 23, per the memo.  

Thanks to a mix of history and glamour, for Y Combinator startups, demo day is the culminating day of their accelerator experience. It’s a big audience full of check writers and fast typers, and at the least, they’ll get a tweet or a couple of sign ups. The move to remote, in some way, dims that excitement. 

Beyond digital presentations, YC has said it will “provide additional written background information on each company and access to their decks.” It also will provide software to help investors and founders arrange one-on-one meetings. 

The blog post ends with this: “For 15 years, startup investors have supported every new batch of YC companies, and we know the same will be true for this batch.”

https://ift.tt/eA8V8J Citing concern over COVID-19, Y Combinator moves demo day online https://ift.tt/3axbSSQ