[confiscate]

hey thanks for the answer. I get what you mean, but the math still does not make sense.

For example, if you made $100 million MRR, then a "stamp of approval" for 7% is probably too much right.

I guess what I mean is, yes stamp of approval, alumni network etc. is great value, but at some point you kind of have to look at the math and say "well where do you draw the line". With 800k MRR already and growing, does it really make sense to give up 7% for stamp of approval

7% is a ton of equity, especially for a company that's already doing 800k MRR. You can do a lot with 7% equity of a company that has 800k MRR

[kkt262]

What can you do with 7% that you would be better than getting into YC? The better valuation terms alone would be worth the 7%. Alumni network is priceless. Hiring becomes easier. Talent becomes greater.

[confiscate]

Ya you're right I didn't do the exact math so I don't know what the numbers are.

For 7% of a 800k MRR fast-growing rocket, you can probably get multiple really veteran execs from your industry (healthy snacks in this case), each bringing on their own industry connections (e.g. to wholefoods etc).

800k MRR is 9.6million ARR, so even if you don't grow monthly, that's a lot of money. With that ARR you can probably raise much more than 120k with 7%. Every dollar counts in a startup

Maybe they did the math and it looks to be worth it. Or maybe when they joined YC they had $0 MRR and YC helped them get to 800k by graduation day. I can only guess with limited info from Techcrunch so my guess may not be accurate!