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Y Combinator

All the world is changing around technology and you may contribute a line of code. What will yours be? Subscribe for startup advice, founder stories, and a look inside Y Combinator. What is Y Combinator? We invest $500,000 in every startup and work intensively with the founders for three months. For the life of their company, founders have access to the most powerful community in the world, essential advice, later-stage funding and programs, recruiting resources, and exclusive deals. Visit ycombinator.com to learn more.

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Thesis calls
149
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Past bets that played out

These are the clearest thesis calls with observable outcomes, linked back to the original videos.

XAIopen

...C batches I agree on both those points. We have PE this guy with a MIT PhD in nuclear the MIT nuclear PhD to the the um the that have like API money to actually uh long, but you know, we do four batches a votes, launch two up votes, launch sell to XAI for $60 billion. hypothesis very very quickly and then hypothesis or not and if not you change normally for an LLM it's mostly about PLG you talk to customers not all of advice from YC that you should pivot. Uh specifically even if you have reve

Mentioned: Jul 25, 2026, 10:00 AM EDTConviction: 100 / 100
Source: What Actually Makes A Startup Durable
ANTHROPICopen

...om have um about the AI native company. I fully understand and I think everyone understood because of your presentation. However, how can you actually practically start and building the structure to build that AI native company? Like do you go on claude code and tell him exactly everything that you told us? Because we understand the idea, the concept, but in terms of how do you actually do it? Um, so thank you. >> Thanks. [snorts] Um, I'd pick a single loop basically. So I' presumably your co

Mentioned: Jul 25, 2026, 10:00 AM EDTConviction: 100 / 100
Source: What Actually Makes A Startup Durable
ASMLopen

Content is a YC Startup School talk about building durable startups in the AI era. The actionable market-relevant bits are mostly high-level: (1) intelligence/AI inference is getting much cheaper, (2) moats shift away from “model choice” toward distribution, product loops, data/workflows, and founder execution, and (3) US export restrictions on frontier AI matter. No explicit company mentions or investable calls, so tickers are inferred by theme (AI compute stack, hyperscalers, and export-contro

Mentioned: Jul 25, 2026, 10:00 AM EDTConviction: 42 / 100
Source: What Actually Makes A Startup Durable

Latest videos and market context

Recent source posts from this author. Create an account to inspect the complete persisted research trail.

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Sep 12, 2026, 10:00 AM EDT

Mass Magnetics: USA-made magnetics for robotics and defense

Sep 11, 2026, 3:06 PM EDT

Happy Alumni Demo Day!

Sep 8, 2026, 6:28 PM EDT

Proof-backed call history

These are recent thesis calls tied to original source content where available.

XAIopen

...C batches I agree on both those points. We have PE this guy with a MIT PhD in nuclear the MIT nuclear PhD to the the um the that have like API money to actually uh long, but you know, we do four batches a votes, launch two up votes, launch sell to XAI for $60 billion. hypothesis very very quickly and then hypothesis or not and if not you change normally for an LLM it's mostly about PLG you talk to customers not all of advice from YC that you should pivot. Uh specifically even if you have reve

Mentioned: Jul 25, 2026, 10:00 AM EDTConviction: 100 / 100
Source: What Actually Makes A Startup Durable
ANTHROPICopen

...om have um about the AI native company. I fully understand and I think everyone understood because of your presentation. However, how can you actually practically start and building the structure to build that AI native company? Like do you go on claude code and tell him exactly everything that you told us? Because we understand the idea, the concept, but in terms of how do you actually do it? Um, so thank you. >> Thanks. [snorts] Um, I'd pick a single loop basically. So I' presumably your co

Mentioned: Jul 25, 2026, 10:00 AM EDTConviction: 100 / 100
Source: What Actually Makes A Startup Durable
ASMLopen

Content is a YC Startup School talk about building durable startups in the AI era. The actionable market-relevant bits are mostly high-level: (1) intelligence/AI inference is getting much cheaper, (2) moats shift away from “model choice” toward distribution, product loops, data/workflows, and founder execution, and (3) US export restrictions on frontier AI matter. No explicit company mentions or investable calls, so tickers are inferred by theme (AI compute stack, hyperscalers, and export-contro

Mentioned: Jul 25, 2026, 10:00 AM EDTConviction: 42 / 100
Source: What Actually Makes A Startup Durable
NVDAopen

Content is a YC Startup School talk about building durable startups in the AI era. The actionable market-relevant bits are mostly high-level: (1) intelligence/AI inference is getting much cheaper, (2) moats shift away from “model choice” toward distribution, product loops, data/workflows, and founder execution, and (3) US export restrictions on frontier AI matter. No explicit company mentions or investable calls, so tickers are inferred by theme (AI compute stack, hyperscalers, and export-contro

Mentioned: Jul 25, 2026, 10:00 AM EDTConviction: 44 / 100
Source: What Actually Makes A Startup Durable
GOOGLopen

Content is a YC Startup School talk about building durable startups in the AI era. The actionable market-relevant bits are mostly high-level: (1) intelligence/AI inference is getting much cheaper, (2) moats shift away from “model choice” toward distribution, product loops, data/workflows, and founder execution, and (3) US export restrictions on frontier AI matter. No explicit company mentions or investable calls, so tickers are inferred by theme (AI compute stack, hyperscalers, and export-contro

Mentioned: Jul 25, 2026, 10:00 AM EDTConviction: 53 / 100
Source: What Actually Makes A Startup Durable
AMZNopen

Content is a YC Startup School talk about building durable startups in the AI era. The actionable market-relevant bits are mostly high-level: (1) intelligence/AI inference is getting much cheaper, (2) moats shift away from “model choice” toward distribution, product loops, data/workflows, and founder execution, and (3) US export restrictions on frontier AI matter. No explicit company mentions or investable calls, so tickers are inferred by theme (AI compute stack, hyperscalers, and export-contro

Mentioned: Jul 25, 2026, 10:00 AM EDTConviction: 56 / 100
Source: What Actually Makes A Startup Durable
MSFTopen

Content is a YC Startup School talk about building durable startups in the AI era. The actionable market-relevant bits are mostly high-level: (1) intelligence/AI inference is getting much cheaper, (2) moats shift away from “model choice” toward distribution, product loops, data/workflows, and founder execution, and (3) US export restrictions on frontier AI matter. No explicit company mentions or investable calls, so tickers are inferred by theme (AI compute stack, hyperscalers, and export-contro

Mentioned: Jul 25, 2026, 10:00 AM EDTConviction: 58 / 100
Source: What Actually Makes A Startup Durable
OPENAIopen

..., "Okay, I the legal team, you know, they will never ever uh want to have this discussion with me." And so we knew we cannot release it. It's just an example. Um and so OpenAI could do could take some risks with with GPT-1, 2, 3, you know, until ChatGPT. That that no one else could could do. So they have the ability to they have enough money and resources to scale this training. >> [snorts] >> And but the ability to take risk at because yes, they they had this combination they they made it wh

Mentioned: Jul 25, 2026, 2:00 AM EDTConviction: 100 / 100
Source: What Big Tech Missed And How Startups Can Still Win
METAopen

Talk-level, largely qualitative discussion about AI startups vs Big Tech, with mentions of LLM limits, “world models,” robotics, and continued need for large-scale GPU compute. Actionability is low because there are no concrete catalysts, numbers, or near-term company-specific claims; the most tradable takeaway is a continued AI compute/infra demand narrative (GPU/accelerators, foundry, advanced packaging).

Mentioned: Jul 25, 2026, 2:00 AM EDTConviction: 45 / 100
Source: What Big Tech Missed And How Startups Can Still Win
AMZNopen

Talk-level, largely qualitative discussion about AI startups vs Big Tech, with mentions of LLM limits, “world models,” robotics, and continued need for large-scale GPU compute. Actionability is low because there are no concrete catalysts, numbers, or near-term company-specific claims; the most tradable takeaway is a continued AI compute/infra demand narrative (GPU/accelerators, foundry, advanced packaging).

Mentioned: Jul 25, 2026, 2:00 AM EDTConviction: 50 / 100
Source: What Big Tech Missed And How Startups Can Still Win
ASMLopen

Talk-level, largely qualitative discussion about AI startups vs Big Tech, with mentions of LLM limits, “world models,” robotics, and continued need for large-scale GPU compute. Actionability is low because there are no concrete catalysts, numbers, or near-term company-specific claims; the most tradable takeaway is a continued AI compute/infra demand narrative (GPU/accelerators, foundry, advanced packaging).

Mentioned: Jul 25, 2026, 2:00 AM EDTConviction: 52 / 100
Source: What Big Tech Missed And How Startups Can Still Win
TSMopen

Talk-level, largely qualitative discussion about AI startups vs Big Tech, with mentions of LLM limits, “world models,” robotics, and continued need for large-scale GPU compute. Actionability is low because there are no concrete catalysts, numbers, or near-term company-specific claims; the most tradable takeaway is a continued AI compute/infra demand narrative (GPU/accelerators, foundry, advanced packaging).

Mentioned: Jul 25, 2026, 2:00 AM EDTConviction: 56 / 100
Source: What Big Tech Missed And How Startups Can Still Win

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All the world is changing around technology and you may contribute a line of code. What will yours be? Subscribe for startup advice, founder stories, and a look inside Y Combinator. What is Y Combinator? We invest $500,000 in every startup and work intensively with the founders for three months. For the life of their company, founders have access to the most powerful community in the world, essential advice, later-stage funding and programs, recruiting resources, and exclusive deals. Visit ycombinator.com to learn more.

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