{"678694":{"#nid":"678694","#data":{"type":"news","title":"Adapt to Thrive: Y Combinator and Greptile Talk Startups Georgia Tech","body":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003EOn Nov. 12, CREATE-X hosted a panel discussion featuring Y Combinator (YC) partner \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/www.ycombinator.com\/people\/brad-flora\u0022\u003EBrad Flora\u003C\/a\u003E and Georgia Tech and \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/create-x.gatech.edu\/launch\/startup-launch\u0022\u003EStartup Launch\u003C\/a\u003E alumni. In addition to sharing experiences, panelists offered practical advice and feedback for aspiring entrepreneurs, and attendees enjoyed the opportunity to network.\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EY Combinator, which has produced companies like Twitch, Reddit, AirBnB, and Coinbase, has funded over 143 Georgia Tech alumni, surpassing institutions like the University of Michigan, Duke, and Princeton. YC recruits startups four times a year and provides a $500,000 investment.\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003ESpotlight on Founders\u003C\/strong\u003E\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EFlora, the event\u0027s keynote speaker, shared his journey from a YC founder to a partner, emphasizing the accelerator\u0027s commitment to supporting college-age founders. He also spoke about finding ideas, meeting co-founders, knowing when to persist and when to pivot, and more.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cA lot of people think you have to have a great startup idea before you start working on a startup,\u201d Flora said. \u201cThe theme you find again and again for the best YC founders is that they were doing something that was interesting to them.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EFlora encouraged students to explore their interests and identify problems they are passionate about solving. He also spoke about \u0022tar pit ideas,\u201d or ideas that seem interesting and novel but don\u2019t translate to a wider audience and wouldn\u2019t be widely used. He advised them to focus on ideas with clear, demonstrable demand.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cThe best way to avoid tar pit ideas is to get feedback from your users and find out if they\u2019re actually using them,\u201d Flora said.\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EGeorgia Tech alumni and Greptile founders SooHoon Choi and Vaishant Kameswaran talked about the origins of their company. Choi and Daksh Gupta, their other co-founder, participated in \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/create-x.gatech.edu\/make\/create-x-capstone\u0022\u003ECREATE-X Capstone\u003C\/a\u003E\u0026nbsp;and then in\u0026nbsp;CREATE-X Startup Launch to develop Tabnam, which initially was an AI shopping assistant that scraped the internet to tell users what people think about their product.\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThe founders discussed starting Tabnam in a course and moving across the country to work on it in their apartment to getting rejected by YC, pivoting the startup at a hackathon, and developing Greptile. This AI product enables large software teams to review core changes before merging, find issues in their code, understand the source of bugs, and perform other related tasks. That iteration proved successful, gaining millions in funding and hundreds of customers.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EGupta spoke about a framework that kept the co-founders open to pivots. \u201cStartups aren\u2019t small companies. They\u2019re a hypothesis that asks if a company should exist in this space. That means your job is to prove or disprove that hypothesis,\u201d he said.\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EFor more insights, \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/youtu.be\/M9kDzDAlFyM?si=ztTTcywgd0Hppdv7\u0022\u003Ewatch the video of the event\u003C\/a\u003E.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003EOpportunities for Entrepreneurs\u003C\/strong\u003E\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EStudents, faculty, researchers, and alumni interested in developing their own startups are encouraged to apply to CREATE-X\u0027s \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/create-x.gatech.edu\/launch\/startup-launch\u0022\u003EStartup Launch\u003C\/a\u003E. The program provides $5,000 in optional seed funding, $150,000 in in-kind services, mentorship, entrepreneurial workshops, networking events, and resources to help build and scale startups. The program culminates in Demo Day, where teams present their startups to potential investors. The deadline to \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/create-x.gatech.edu\/launch\/startup-launch\u0022\u003Eapply for Startup Launch\u003C\/a\u003E is March 19, 2025. Spots are limited. \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/create-x.gatech.edu\/launch\/startup-launch\u0022\u003EApply now\u003C\/a\u003E for a higher chance of acceptance and early feedback.\u003C\/p\u003E","summary":"","format":"limited_html"}],"field_subtitle":"","field_summary":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003EOn Nov. 12, CREATE-X hosted a panel discussion with Y Combinator partner Brad Flora and \u0026nbsp;Greptile founders SooHoon Choi, \u0026nbsp;Vaishant Kameswaran, and Daksh Gupta, offering practical advice and networking opportunities for aspiring entrepreneurs. Flora shared his journey from YC founder to partner and gave tips on finding co-founders and brainstorming ideas, among other topics, and the Greptile founders spoke on their startup journey, including key pivots.\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E","format":"limited_html"}],"field_summary_sentence":[{"value":"On Nov. 12, CREATE-X hosted a panel with Y Combinator partner Brad Flora and Greptile founders, offering practical advice and networking for aspiring entrepreneurs, with Flora sharing his journey and tips, and the Greptile founders discussing their startu"}],"uid":"36436","created_gmt":"2024-11-27 18:30:23","changed_gmt":"2024-12-02 15:26:00","author":"bdurham31","boilerplate_text":"","field_publication":"","field_article_url":"","location":"Atlanta, GA","dateline":{"date":"2024-12-01T00:00:00-05:00","iso_date":"2024-12-01T00:00:00-05:00","tz":"America\/New_York"},"extras":[],"hg_media":{"675750":{"id":"675750","type":"video","title":"YC@GT Video","body":"\u003Cp\u003EBrad Flora and the founders of Greptile speak about Y Combinator and the startup journey at YC@GT\u003C\/p\u003E","created":"1733117908","gmt_created":"2024-12-02 05:38:28","changed":"1733117908","gmt_changed":"2024-12-02 05:38:28","video":{"youtube_id":"M9kDzDAlFyM","video_url":"https:\/\/youtu.be\/M9kDzDAlFyM?si=ztTTcywgd0Hppdv7"}},"675749":{"id":"675749","type":"image","title":"YC@GT.jpg","body":"\u003Cp\u003ECREATE-X hosted Y Combinator for a discussion on the accelerator and the entrepreneurial journey of the founders of Greptile. Pictured is Brad Flora speaking to Georgia Tech students.\u003C\/p\u003E","created":"1733117609","gmt_created":"2024-12-02 05:33:29","changed":"1733117609","gmt_changed":"2024-12-02 05:33:29","alt":"Brad Flora speaks to audience at YC@GT","file":{"fid":"259411","name":"54151419496_ee44094181_o.jpg","image_path":"\/sites\/default\/files\/2024\/12\/02\/54151419496_ee44094181_o.jpg","image_full_path":"http:\/\/hg.gatech.edu\/\/sites\/default\/files\/2024\/12\/02\/54151419496_ee44094181_o.jpg","mime":"image\/jpeg","size":7469610,"path_740":"http:\/\/hg.gatech.edu\/sites\/default\/files\/styles\/740xx_scale\/public\/2024\/12\/02\/54151419496_ee44094181_o.jpg?itok=bkBpIjzE"}}},"media_ids":["675750","675749"],"related_links":[{"url":"https:\/\/create-x.gatech.edu\/launch\/startup-launch","title":"Apply to Startup Launch"}],"groups":[{"id":"583966","name":"CREATE-X"},{"id":"655285","name":"GT Commercialization"},{"id":"1188","name":"Research Horizons"}],"categories":[{"id":"130","name":"Alumni"},{"id":"139","name":"Business"},{"id":"133","name":"Special Events and Guest Speakers"}],"keywords":[{"id":"194103","name":"Y Combinator"},{"id":"194104","name":"Brad Flora"},{"id":"137161","name":"CREATE-X"},{"id":"166971","name":"startup launch"},{"id":"3984","name":"panel"},{"id":"194105","name":"aspiring entrepreneurs"},{"id":"1144","name":"networking"},{"id":"166994","name":"startups"},{"id":"194106","name":"co-founders"},{"id":"2161","name":"founders"},{"id":"194107","name":"Greptile"},{"id":"194108","name":"SooHoon Choi"},{"id":"194109","name":"Daksh Gupta"},{"id":"194110","name":"Vaishant Kameswaran"},{"id":"194111","name":"pivots"},{"id":"167944","name":"seed funding"},{"id":"14601","name":"mentorship"},{"id":"5733","name":"application deadline"}],"core_research_areas":[{"id":"193658","name":"Commercialization"}],"news_room_topics":[],"event_categories":[],"invited_audience":[],"affiliations":[],"classification":[],"areas_of_expertise":[],"news_and_recent_appearances":[],"phone":[],"contact":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003EBreanna Durham\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EMarketing Strategist\u003C\/p\u003E","format":"limited_html"}],"email":["breanna.durham@gatech.edu"],"slides":[],"orientation":[],"userdata":""}}}