[seats]

Im an MD for Techstars in Austin and happy to answer specific questions on this for anyone about our programs and results.

I don't know the details of this specific company, so I won't comment on any of those particulars, but I can for sure comment on the structure of our terms.

As I mention in another reply on this thread, the OP appears to have misunderstood the note terms as presented. Currently the 100k note offered is a 3mil-5mil cap note, 20% discount. What causes it to be 5 vs 3 is whether or not the company has had a prior financing event. In other words the cap by default is 3, but it'll float up to 5 if a prior financing is above 3 for a particular company. Those terms are written in stone for all time, but as of this exact moment that's what they are and that's what the were at the time of this blog post.

One other thing I'll point out that wasn't covered in the post, likely due to the timing of the event, is our first >= 100 million exit, which happened in the last month.

http://blogs.barrons.com/techtraderdaily/2014/09/23/stratasy...

[digitailor]

Is requiring the signing of an LOI over the weekend typical of TechStars?

[seats]

Nope.

Sam Altman had a great post recently about YC's indictment of timing pressure tactics on accelerator offers. We completely agree with that position and try very hard to not give that impression. Clearly sometimes that pressure is still felt even if it's not intended.

One issue that is relevant to us given our fixed class sizes is getting a definitive answer from an offer as quickly as we can so that we know if should move down the list and give an offer to the next team instead. Having 10 offers out and finding out that only 8 want to accept would mean we are giving out 2 offers potentially much later than the others.

Purely as a practical timing matter we hope to have a set of offers out around the same time and have everyone accept or dismiss them pretty quickly so we know who the class will be.

There was good discussion of this on a prior HN thread when @sama posted that blog piece. If I can dig it up I'll add it here.

EDIT: found it -

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8285994

[tptacek]

There's a goalposts-moving thing happening here. The claim in the post isn't simply that there was a time-limited offer made. The claim was that a complicated legal document was presented just before a weekend, with a demand that it be accepted or rejected by the following Monday.

I have no idea if that actually happened or not, but this thread isn't really addressing the claim in the post.

[seats]

Not evading here, just don't want to go into unnecessary detail, but here it is if you are interested -

Our LOI is not a complex document. It's one page long and covers 7 points.

1- agreeing to supply an official version of the cap table 2- representing that documents supplied to us are are accurate to the best of their knowledge 3- acknowledging that the team must relocate for the duration of the program 4- committing to fully participate in the program (show up and not have another job outside of their company) 5- agreeing to the dates of the program 6- agreeing to our equity exchange 7- confidentially clause regarding the offer

And a final clause states that while signing the LOI executes your agreement to our terms that "your acceptance of our offer is subject to your review and satisfaction with the formal contract provided". In other words signing the document is merely signaling your intent to participate in the program, but you aren't held to any specific clauses by signing.

This is not a document that is meant to be negotiated, there are really no terms here that we'd debate on, it's more of an outline of the deal so that you get it all in one place and have it in writing up front.

[Balgair]

Still, why Friday? Why not Monday? Why not a week time horizon? Yes it may be industry standard, but you aren't looking for industry standard people here. Why send such a thing to begin with? If it's not legally binding, negotiable, or really anything other than a 4th grade valentine's day card, why do it? Yes, again, the authors may have misread the boilerplate, but those are the people you are looking for, the ones that aren't 'normal.' If you want to do business with people, then do it. This isn't love notes in lockers stuff.

[prostoalex]

Why not just publish it online, so that companies know beforehand what to expect?

[tptacek]

This is a great response. Thanks!

[digitailor]

The following questions aren't meant to be antagonistic, but your PR has just taken a hit, and the specific claim made in this post about the LOI isn't a small one. Let's clear it up.

There was good discussion of this on a prior HN thread when @sama posted that blog piece. If I can dig it up I'll add it here.

Is Sam Altman involved with TechStars? If not, why is his name being evoked? It's great that you agree with him, but OP is saying that at least in his case, this point of view was not honored.

One issue that is relevant to us given our fixed class sizes is getting a definitive answer from a offer though as quickly as we can so that we know if should move down the list and give an offer to the next team instead. Having 10 offers out and finding out that only 8 want to accept would mean we have are giving out 2 offers potentially much later than the others. Purely as a practical timing matter we hope to give out a set of offers and have everyone accept or dismiss them pretty quickly so we know who the class will be.

I understand, but this is simply the universal rationale behind pressure tactics. Your desire for quick resolution is understandable, but the specific claim made in the post needs to be addressed.

[seats]

No worries at all, I don't take it to be antagonistic in any way. I'm hoping to accurately represent how we operate and I'm inviting your questions, so ask away!

>> Is Sam Altman involved with TechStars? If not, why is his name being evoked? It's great that you agree with him, but OP is saying that at least in his case, this point of view was not honored.

Sam is the president of YC. I'm invoking his name because it was a great post on a common accelerator tactic that we do not employ. The comments in that thread are very relevant. I wasn't invoking Sam so much as I was pulling in the context of that prior discussion on HN.

>> I understand, but this is simply the universal rationale behind pressure tactics. Your desire for quick resolution is understandable, but the specific claim made in the post needs to be addressed.

Actually not the case. As covered in the thread I referenced the reason that this pressure tactic is typically employed is that an accelerator is trying to force a company to make a decision before the deadline of a program that they view as a competitor, in essence front-running the selection process of another organization.

The point I'm making is that while we don't want to use that tactic, we can't afford to give an open ended offer up until the first day of the program because we'd risk having an 8 company cohort. It's less of an issue for YC to take an additional (or lose an additional) half dozen companies between their selection process and day one of the program because a) they don't offer workspace to their companies and don't have to do with those logistics and b) the uncertainty of +/- a few companies doesn't matter as much in a 60+ company batch as it does in a 10-12 company batch.

[digitailor]

The OP gets what you are saying:

In the meantime, Troy sent over a Letter of Intent and explained that it needed to be signed and returned by Monday. I was very frustrated by this. You don’t send a legal document to someone over the weekend when their is no time for a lawyer to review it and demand it back by that same Monday. Whether it was the intention or not, this was a high pressure sales technique and just one more red flag.

Which is well put- "whether it was the intention or not." So, why wasn't Talkroute simply rejected for taking too long? If Techstars was concerned about an undersized cohort, they could simply sign another startup with no ill will - Talkroute just missed the deadline. No harm no foul.

A Saturday -> Monday LOI signing isn't typically considered a reasonable expectation.

[seats]

Right and I don't know the specifics of this situation so I really shouldn't conjecture.

Clearly the company didn't feel they had the option to take more time to decide. If that's the case that's on us and we can do better. I will absolutely assert though that if they needed the time they could have had it.

[icelancer]

>Purely as a practical timing matter we hope to have a set of offers out around the same time and have everyone accept or dismiss them pretty quickly so we know who the class will be.

How can you say this in the same post you say this?

>Sam Altman had a great post recently about YC's indictment of timing pressure tactics on accelerator offers. We completely agree with that position and try very hard to not give that impression.

[seats]

Wanting to have a quick response is significantly different than using time pressure to influence the outcome.

We give companies time to decide if they need it, we just don't give them unlimited time.