#137 - Startup School Podcast Preview with Kevin Hale

Today’s episode is a preview of the Startup School podcast. We’re putting all the Startup School lectures on their own podcast feed. You can subscribe here:   iTunes  RSS  This is the first lecture from Startup School 2019. It’s Kevin Hale on How to Evaluate Startup Ideas.It’s also not too late to sign up for Startup School. The course just started and the deadline to sign up is August 4th. Select companies who complete the course will also receive 15,000 dollars in equity-free funding.Y Combinator invests a small amount of money ($150k) in a large number of startups (recently 200), twice a year.Learn more about YC and apply for funding here: https://www.ycombinator.com/apply/***Topics00:00 - Intro00:42 - Why we're starting with evaluating ideas2:07 - YC doesn't just fund companies with traction3:31 - How can I predict if an investor will like my idea?5:57 - A startup idea is a hypothesis7:37 - The problem11:37 - The solution13:07 - The insight14:42 - Founder's unfair advantage15:42 - Market growing 20% a year16:22 - Product 10x better17:12- Acquisition model18:37 - Monopoly19:32 - Threshold belief19:52- Miracle belief20:42 - Example: YC24:02 - Example: Wufoo