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Requests for Startups — A place to discover ideas that VCs & angels want to fund
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If you are looking for an idea to build and you need to look at a VC's website for ideas I think you are already basically fucked.
@aseidman Thanks for the feedback. This is meant to help entrepreneurs explore larger ideas and verticals - and for investors to share ideas they're thinking about. Good luck!
@ao619 thanks Armando! Would love to hear your thoughts on the project sometime.
Good idea but why asking only VCs & angels ?
Why not asking anyone on what kind of new products they need?
@jberrebi Agree, could be interesting to have companies/influencers from different industries submit their own requests.
@jberrebi Great idea and 100% agree. We are starting with asking VCs and angels and will eventually open the platform for everyone to add their own ideas.
@jberrebi @pieterpaul We love this idea and have seen many large companies create their own Requests for Startups - it's inspiring to see. Thanks again for the feedback guys!
@jberrebi asking VCs / angels to start is a good idea as at least it proves the ideas have some validation to begin with.
I looked at Homebrews list and they had a request for something we'd been considering here. So in some ways these lists may help drive direction for new work. Other people will just look for ideas they think they can get $ for. But as @hunterwalk said "your passion for it has to be greater than my passion for it". Doing something only for the money will show.
@golocalapps agree 100%. These lists are awesome for driving direction. Thanks for sharing your thoughts!
Please, please, please have this be just an autoresponder with 'it is all about the team, stupid.'
Please.
I think there are a lot of VC's and Angels that know what they want and have the vision, but maybe no longer have the energy or desire to execute and they aren't running an incubator or accelerator either.. This could be a good way to get people to pitch why they are the right ones to own and execute on a concept.
@joshbarkin Great thoughts, Josh. During our conversations with VC's, they all shared similar sentiments. Many of them have great ideas that they have no intention of building themselves. We want this to help facilitate a more open dialogue between entrepreneurs and investors/companies.
This is one of those ideas that as soon as you read it you say "Duh! Why didn't I think of that?!"
Great job @isaac_madan, @shauryasaluja, & @jmj.
@NYDrewReynolds thanks Drew! We really appreciate the feedback. Hope everything is great in NYC.
@rrhoover Thanks for sharing Homebrew's RFS - first time reading it tonight and it's fascinating.
We want to build a community where VC's and entrepreneurs can exchange ideas and communicate more effectively.
We're still working on the mechanics, but our goal is to give "pre-idea" founders a place to find inspiration & to also give existing startups a place to find the right investors for their projects.
On the investor side: we want to help VC's, angels, and incubators share concepts and find the right founders to build their ideas - or to find startups who are already working on the problems they want to solve.
Agree that email-first projects are a great place to start!
Requests for Startups (RFS) is a project created by @isaac_madan, @shauryasaluja, and myself.
We are building a community where venture capitalists and angels can inspire entrepreneurs to think about ideas.
The concept was inspired by YCombinator, who created a Requests for Startups site in September: https://www.ycombinator.com/rfs/
“There are a lot of startup ideas we’ve been waiting for people to apply with, sometimes for years. In an effort to be more direct, we’re introducing the RFS (Requests for Startups).” - YCombinator
YC’s Request for Startups was a defining moment in the relationship between venture capitalists and entrepreneurs.
Rather than waiting for pitches, YC made the decision to be proactive process by telling entrepreneurs about ideas that they would be excited to fund.
Yesterday, Andreessen Horowitz followed YC’s lead by releasing their own Request for Startups - and it was a fascinating list: http://a16z.com/2015/01/22/16-th...
We believe that every venture firm, angel investor, and incubator should create a similar list, which is why we built Request for Startups.
We are creating a place where investors can post a Request for Startups and tell entrepreneurs about concepts and verticals that they would fund.
RFS will help existing startups find the right investors for their ideas, and will also help entrepreneurs discover their next big idea. Likewise, it'll help investors manage opportunistic inbound and proprietary dealflow.
We are starting with a curated newsletter that features Request for Startups from some of the brightest investors in the world - and we have plans to create something much bigger very soon!
@isaac_madan @shauryasaluja @jmj This is absolutely fantastic.
Having been on 'both sides of the table' (h/t @msuster), I totally believe the world is a better place with both 'push' (PH/Angellist) and 'pull' (RFS)
Subscribed!
Good luck and cheers.
@isaac_madan @shauryasaluja @msuster @kartikparija Thanks for the support Kartik! We are excited to have you on the list and hope you enjoy the content. Have a great weekend!
@isaac_madan @shauryasaluja @jmj I am late to this but got to say that it's a great idea. I really love this idea.
@joe_blau We are thinking of this more as a source of inspiration for entrepreneurs who are exploring new ideas. Thanks for the feedback!
@jmj Right but the VC's aren't the source you want. Even YC's RFS's weren't that good. I remember YC was looking for some service built on Twitter even after Twitter shut down it's developer API. In that same time, apps like SnapChat, WhatsApp, Tinder, and other rapidly growing applications blew up and no investor was asking for them.
The whole thing seems backwards, but hey other people in this thread seem to love it. I'm definitely interested to see where this goes.
Excited to see more transparency about what all people are thinking/curious about. Let us if we can do anything to help @homebrew.
@sarahbuhr Hey Sarah, it definitely has elements of all 3. Would love to tell you about our next release. Let me know if you want to chat.
Jeffrey.
1. Love you.
2. Can we hook this up to a VC On Demand App? Ya know, an Uber for VCs. When you want to have them just come over right now and give you the money for an idea they've said they like.
3. Also, we can build the entrepreneur version. Entrepreneur On Demand. When they have an idea and the money, there can be a pre-vetted pool of entrepreneurs that have had background checks and passed a general competency test to just come over and start working on it.
Basically, let's use this to see just how far up the on demand ladder we can go. I've been thinking about which services should be commoditized, this seems like a nice place to start. :)
4. More seriously, does anyone know if there's been large company born in the last 20 years that the founders would legitimately claim to have been created based on an investors idea? I'm quite curious as to whether or not that's a thing. I'm not quite sure that VCs have good ideas, and when most of the angels that I know actually have a really really good idea they go start it themselves.
XO.
Bowman
@bowman Haha! Entrepreneur on Demand has promise ;)
I agree that most ideas start with the founders, but think that VC's should be more proactive about telling entrepreneurs about verticals/ideas they are interested in funding.
YC's RSF was a valuable resource for entrepreneurs to frame their ideas - and was an interesting approach!
I love the idea! Excited to see how this develops as more industries are allowed access to make requests.
@danielpearson thanks DP! I am very excited about that possibility too. Perhaps the best ideas will come from companies and industries outside of the VC space. This will provide them better access to entrepreneurs.
Great idea. Well done! Glad Ryan added Homebrew's RFS. Here is a link to one by @Jason: http://blog.launch.co/blog/rfp-r...
@tabishis Exactly! We thought YCombinator's RFS was a very important moment and we want to encourage investors everywhere to do the same.
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