[lordnacho]

On this site, "startup" is short for "high-growth startup". Of course you can open a neighbourhood restaurant and it will be a startup, just not the kind people like to talk about here.

On HN "startup" means the kind of business whose ambition is to be a household name, used by millions of people if it's in the consumer space, or all the major customers if it's in B2B.

That kind of thing tends to require a business that grows a lot while generally not making free cash, which is why it needs outside investors. Those investors see a lot of these firms and this is one take on the accumulated learnings.

[Nokinside]

That's what startup originally means. The term is watered down, but startup = growth and big failure rate.

Startup is not same as new company or new tech company.

http://www.paulgraham.com/growth.html

> A startup is a company designed to grow fast. Being newly founded does not in itself make a company a startup. Nor is it necessary for a startup to work on technology, or take venture funding, or have some sort of "exit." The only essential thing is growth. Everything else we associate with startups follows from growth.

[robotresearcher]

The OED keeps track of original usage. Here's the entry:

orig. U.S. A business or enterprise that is in the process of starting up, or that has just been established; a startup company, venture, etc.

They cite these early usages in print:

1975 Chicago Defender 20 Sept. 23/1 The many problems faced by any new start up, but most assuredly by a black financial institution.

1986 Your Business Mar. 11/3 There are the small businesses; the heroic little start-ups in their garages and garden sheds.

[Nokinside]

There is difference of start-up and start-up company.

Start-up company in the modern sense was first used in 70's