Talked to ~20 YC founders: the biggest raises go to teams with zero traction
vaibhavbetter · x · 2026-09-23
After YC Demo Day, the author interviewed 20 founders and found a brutal pattern: startups raising the most ($5-10M) often have zero traction but fresh, huge-if-true ideas, while those struggling at $1-3M have tons of traction but boring, incremental ideas. Strong numbers can even hurt — they signal a competitive market with an incumbent. The golden rule: raise on promise, not reality — selling a dream to VCs is easier than justifying numbers.
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