[HN Gopher] Launch YC S21: Meet the Batch, Thread #8
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Launch YC S21: Meet the Batch, Thread #8
Here's another batch of S21 startups for you all. The previous
thread was https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28209928. The
original description is at
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27877280. There are 6
startups in this thread. The initial order is random:
AlgoUniversity (YC S21) - Job-driven virtual education hub for
engineering students -
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28233917 Enerjazz (YC S21) -
Battery swapping stations for EVs and e-rickshaws -
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28233919 Astek Diagnostics
(YC S21) - Determine antibiotic treatment in one hour -
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28233918 DigiBuild (YC S21) -
Construction software powered by blockchain -
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28233920 Karbon Card (YC S21)
- Corporate credit cards for Indian Startups and SMBs -
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28233924 Sequin (YC S21) -
Debit card that builds credit for women -
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28233922
Author : dang
Score : 71 points
Date : 2021-08-19 14:01 UTC (8 hours ago)
| mattgreg wrote:
| I'm curious what the recent data is on the success of YC
| companies - beyond raising large seed rounds. How are YC co's
| doing at the growth stage now, vs early batches.
| herodoturtle wrote:
| I too am curious about this.
|
| I imagine those at growth stage would comprise a refined batch
| of investment opportunities.
|
| And perhaps also serve as good business case studies for
| Stanford et al.
| iamstg wrote:
| Hi HN, we are Manas, Swapnil and Sailesh, co-founders of
| AlgoUniversity (https://www.algouniversity.com/). We bridge the
| gap between the CS curriculum taught at universities in India and
| the skills that are required by the tech industry. We offer live
| classes, industry-relevant projects, and learning products that
| prepare students for software engineering jobs at top tech
| companies.
|
| We started AlgoUniversity in our final year of college. Both
| Manas and I (Swapnil) were interested less in our academics and
| more in software engineering, products and things going around
| us. After securing internships/placements at Alphagrep and Apple
| respectively, we started working on side ideas/jobs. Manas taught
| a dozen students during college for interviews that helped them
| to land jobs, and realized that he could scale it. I had started
| working in an ed-tech startup where I was training students to
| get into Google through Google's own program for these students
| called WTEF. After successfully placing 2 students at Google and
| helping the rest get offers from other tech companies like
| Microsoft, Gojek, Oracle etc., I realised that there was a gap
| between what edtech startups were doing and what could be
| achieved if proper focus were put on quality education,
| upskilling and first-principle problem solving. There is a better
| way to prepare for interviews and be a natural problem solver
| (and hence good at job) than mugging up GFG and Leetcode
| problems!
|
| We went on to start AlgoUniversity, starting from one batch of 25
| students last year from two tier II colleges in India, and
| achieved good placement results for our first batch: 100%
| placement, 21 LPA avg CTC (1.5x more than top universities in
| India), 3 people placed in Google, 3 getting Bytedance Intl
| offers. The international offers were big for us as students
| apart from tier 1 colleges in India don't have exposure to
| international jobs and their hiring process. We have now started
| to take in more students and multiple batches from this year
| onwards.
|
| The thing that differentiates us from existing solutions in this
| space is our product-led approach: we have built a suite of
| microproducts that develop this problem solving attitude from
| scratch, simulate the actual interview experience and so on. We
| still have a lot to do in terms of scaling our teaching
| infrastructure to multiple batches, partnering with companies for
| hiring and hitting product-market fit. We have described some of
| our experiences here: https://www.algouniversity.com/blogdetail/,
| if anyone is interested.
|
| Thanks for reading. We would love to hear your thoughts and
| experiences regarding the above, or finding jobs or interview
| prep or hiring candidates. We are also live on
| https://www.algouniversity.com. Please share your feedback with
| us!
| adityadsr5 wrote:
| Congrats guys!! AlgoUniversity is great!
| iamstg wrote:
| Thanks Aditya :)
| ravi_b wrote:
| Congrats guys.
| MustafaAlAdhami wrote:
| Hi HN. My name is Mustafa Al-Adhami. I am the founder and CEO of
| Astek Diagnositcs Inc. (https://astekdx.com). We have a platform
| to determine antibiotic sensitivity in one hour.
|
| Every year, 1.7 million Americans are evaluated for sepsis - and
| too many die while waiting days for the correct antibiotic.
| Imagine a one-day-old baby having to wait twice as long as they
| have been alive to receive accurate treatment. Or a cancer
| patient with bad immunity receiving 3 random antibiotics that
| might or might not work. This is a huge problem and I had an idea
| on how to fix it.
|
| Every product in the market relies on identifying the bacteria to
| know what kills it. We thought, why care what the antibiotic is
| if you know what is killing it? We can do that by detecting the
| metabolic rate of the bacteria rather relying on phenotypic or
| genotypic methods--and, believe it or not, by mimicking the
| digestive system of mosquitoes.
|
| I have a PhD in mechanical engineering with a focus on blood
| mechanics. Prior to my PhD I did customer discovery for 7 years.
| One day (my first day on a jet ski!) I got attacked by mosquitoes
| and had to rush home. The next day I went to the lab where I got
| bit by a mosquito again. I looked at the bite and noticed a
| sparkle on the bite spot. I looked it up and realized it was my
| blood plasma because mosquitoes urinate the plasma after
| digesting the red blood cells. This is exactly what I had been
| trying to do for years. I mimicked the digestive system of the
| mosquito and I got the missing piece of the product.
|
| Astek's first product will be the Eugris, a benchtop analyzer
| that can identify the presence of a bacterial infection in the
| blood and then perform antibiotic susceptibility testing (AST) of
| the bacterium in one hour. To accomplish this, a microfluidics
| device removes the blood cells from the plasma that would contain
| bacteria and adds resazurin, a fluorescence indicator. These
| steps take 25 minutes. In the presence of live bacteria,
| resazurin is reduced to resorufin, which is higher in
| fluorescence, by reacting with NADH, a ubiquitous intermediate in
| the metabolic process. The sample is monitored fluorometrically
| for 15 minutes, and metabolic activity is shown by an increase in
| fluorescence. The technique has been shown capable of detecting
| bacterial infection at a level of 10 CFU/mL (colony-forming-
| units). Antibiotic susceptibility can be assessed by incubating
| the plasma with antibiotics, where ineffective antibiotics fail
| to reduce metabolic activity while effective antibiotics diminish
| metabolic activity.
|
| We have a prototype in testing in a clinical setting. Our initial
| target market will be clinical labs tasked with performing
| diagnostic tests for patients suspected of sepsis or septic
| shock. For these patients, rapid initiation of the correct
| antibiotic therapy is crucial: every hour of delay increases
| mortality by 7-8%. Currently, the gold standard for AST relies on
| blood culture, and takes 2-7 days to deliver results to the
| clinician. Most patients don't have that long.
| gregwebs wrote:
| Are you familiar with Karius? They turnaround a diagnosis in a
| day (genomic). I could imagine both assays being run on the
| same sample.
| MustafaAlAdhami wrote:
| Yes! Karius is great. They detect resistance genes to provide
| antibiotic sensitivity. We monitor the metabolic rate, that
| is how we do it faster.
| quickthrower2 wrote:
| I love the mosquito story, your equivalent of Newton's apple i
| guess!
|
| Will this tell you what type of bacteria it is? Will it tell
| you for example if you have Limes disease? I think the current
| tests for that (at least available to me) aren't too accurate.
| MustafaAlAdhami wrote:
| It won't tell you what the bacteria exactly is. It only tells
| you whether it is a bacterial infection and what antibiotic
| you should use to treat it.
| treme wrote:
| real innovation saving lives. best of luck to you & your team
| MustafaAlAdhami wrote:
| Thank you!
| giantg2 wrote:
| Wow, very cool.
| MustafaAlAdhami wrote:
| Thank you!
| ravi_b wrote:
| Hi HN, we're Ravi and Pratik of Enerjazz
| (https://www.enerjazz.tech/). We make battery swapping stations
| (like gasoline stations) for electric vehicles, swapping
| discharged batteries with charged batteries in 2 minutes for
| light commercial EVs.
|
| Commercial EVs or electric rickshaws have 2 pain points. One high
| upfront cost of battery (can be up to 50% of the total cost of
| vehicle). Two, high charging downtime resulting in loss of
| revenue.
|
| While working as an analyst covering renewable energy
| developments at Shell, I (Ravi) came to the conclusion that
| anything that makes energy storage more affordable will have the
| most impact in the next couple of decades. That simple thought is
| how the idea of Enerjazz was born. Pratik is an expert in
| lithium-ion batteries (PhD from German aerospace center). In
| 2017, we moved from Europe to India to work on developing a
| battery for storing solar energy.
|
| One day, we were walking back to our office after having lunch at
| a restaurant. We saw an e-rickshaw get on a footpath and drive
| into a narrow lane. We followed the driver and found that there
| were more than 20 e-rickshaws charging there in an open area. All
| of those e-rickshaws had lead acid batteries. On talking to the
| drivers, we realized the pain they had was far greater than the
| pain of storing solar energy. We started talking to e-rickshaw
| drivers every day after lunch and decided to do something about
| it. We started with making affordable lithium-ion batteries for
| e-rickshaws. Since we joined YC in June, we have done more than
| 2,500 battery swaps.
|
| We enable e-rickshaw drivers to increase their earnings by 80%
| because their downtime effectively becomes zero. We require just
| a 70 dollar refundable deposit (cheaper than lead acid battery)
| for e-rickshaw drivers. We also have a patent-pending technology
| that reduces the cost of lithium-ion batteries by 50%. The
| technology is already proven as Enerjazz batteries have completed
| 4M+ kilometers.
|
| We look forward to your feedback!
| jeswin wrote:
| Good idea, and extra credits for not being another software and
| services platform. India needs more companies who actually
| build/manufacture, will be rooting for you.
| ravi_b wrote:
| Thank you so much. Unlike a traditional manufacturing
| company, we are going to be asset light though which will
| enable us to grow fast.
|
| We started Enerjazz with the simple goal of solving our
| customer's problems. We kept talking to customers just like
| what YC recommends. After living for many years in Amsterdam,
| I often had to go to many e-rickshaw driver houses in
| renowned ghettos (godforsaken places) of Noida to fix their
| chargers in the early days. This is because they did not have
| proper charging infrastructure and their chargers will often
| go bad. With swapping, we also address this issue of bad
| quality power access to e-rickshaw drivers.
| sunil_loanmeet wrote:
| Congratulations guys !
| ravi_b wrote:
| Thanks so much, Sunil.
| thoughtstheseus wrote:
| Super cool! I'm always super skeptical of people claiming
| battery improvements. Is the benefit more of the lithium ion to
| lead acid switch? Or swapping batteries between use? Keep up
| the good work. I'd love to see videos of the e-Rick shaws.
| ravi_b wrote:
| You mean another start-up by another professor in another
| university on another battery chemistry :). we get that a
| lot. You are spot on. Almost 96% of 2M e-rickshaws in India
| still run on lead acid battery (because of lower upfront
| cost). The only way to switch them to better tech (lithium-
| ion) is by making it more affordable for them.
| uranium wrote:
| Yeah, everything here sounds great except for "We also have
| a patent-pending technology that reduces the cost of
| lithium-ion batteries by 50%." That's a huge claim, which
| would immediately be many times more valuable than your
| swapping business. Is this cost reduction perhaps just vs.
| small-volume retail prices, in India, for specific battery
| formats, or some other reasonable limitation?
| ravi_b wrote:
| Even with half cost, we are more expensive than lead acid
| batteries. Typically lithium ion batteries are three
| times in price compared to lead acid batteries. Erickshaw
| drivers are very cost sensitive to upfront battery cost.
| We wanted to give them the most affordable battery
| solution.
| uranium wrote:
| Sure, but if you can reduce the cost of lithium-ion
| batteries by 50% in general, why are you not just
| licensing that technology to Tesla and others for
| gigabucks? Or is your cost reduction quite specific to
| the batteries that eRickshaw drivers need for some
| reason?
| roshansingh wrote:
| Very cool. Are you working with electric scooters as well? Ola
| recently launched electric scooters and have heard that the
| battery is not swappable on that.
| ravi_b wrote:
| Thank you so much. We are only working with e-rickshaws at
| the moment but plan to take the model to electric scooters
| (Zomato/Swiggy delivery fleets) soon. We believe commercial
| EVs will be the first ones to adopt swapping because they
| loose revenue when they have to charge in the day time.
| uranium wrote:
| $70 < [cost of lead-acid battery] < [cost of lithium-ion
| battery], so how often does a customer trade the deposit for a
| battery?
| ravi_b wrote:
| $70 is a refundable deposit they give us when they join us.
| They pay us per swap. We sometimes get customers who had
| their lead acid batteries stolen and who now have no money to
| buy a new battery. With us they pay as they earn.
| uranium wrote:
| What I was getting at was, if $70 is a lot less than a
| lithium-ion battery costs, do people just steal the
| batteries and give up the $70?
| ravi_b wrote:
| Great point. If erickshaw drivers steal the battery, we
| can remotely lock the battery. So these batteries will
| not charge or discharge and will essentially become
| useless. We also take documents (similar to social
| security in the us) from each customer before we onboard
| them.
| uranium wrote:
| Ah, that makes sense. Thanks.
| robdigibuild wrote:
| Hi, we're Rob, April and Ivan, cofounders of DigiBuild
| (https://digibuild.com/). We build construction software powered
| by blockchain. Our tools help large companies, like VCC
| Construction, improve the schedule and budget on projects and
| save over a million dollars annually.
|
| I grew up in construction with my dad and saw first hand the
| issues companies face everyday. The building process involves
| 50-100 stakeholders (ie. suppliers, contractors, architects) who
| suffer from low margins and work on projects that fail 70% of the
| time. Large builds create upwards of 750,000 documents. It is
| very complex and costly to manage them.
|
| For every physical construction process that occurs, an
| "intangible asset" like a workflow or piece of data is created as
| well. Current software solutions offer some efficiency but fall
| short because they're centralized databases or data silos with no
| transparency. From a risk management perspective, each
| construction stakeholder needs to review, verify, or otherwise
| build trust manually to make sure they're protected (i.e. let me
| double check that document so I know you didn't screw me over).
| The trust established with blockchain allows us to codify many of
| those processes and touch points, making them automated and
| giving more line of sight to construction teams. This is possible
| because unlike a centralized database, the blockchain is not
| owned/monopolized by any party and it is auditable so
| transactions can be verified by all the stakeholders. This meets
| their risk management requirements to do business.
|
| We have multiple tools solving customer pain, including a
| construction management platform for managing any project
| workflow; a procurement product to find, order, and track
| building material; and a payment product to streamline the
| collection of payment documentation and disbursements. Without
| blockchain, these workflows involve suppliers, subcontractors,
| general contractors all sending contracts, invoices, and data
| sheets back and forth. This is manual trust-building which adds
| time, costs, and risk. Using smart contracts allows us to codify
| these processes, automating 90% of them for all of the parties
| and providing more transparency.
|
| Our team has managed over $5B in construction projects. I'm also
| the former CEO of a nationwide construction company and our
| engineering team has worked on projects alongside Coinbase, IBM,
| Iota, and Linux.
|
| We would love to hear from you and hear feedback. We're
| especially excited to be challenged and to brainstorm around our
| use of blockchain in this market - we know HN has a wide spectrum
| of views on that, on both sides of the ledger!
| quirk wrote:
| DigiProcure seems like it would be useful outside of the
| construction industry - really any manufacturer that has
| multiple stakeholders. Do you have any competitors in that
| product market?
| robdigibuild wrote:
| We've heard that a few times. In the future, there definitely
| could be usage in other markets. Right now we're lazer
| focused on our construction customers though:)
|
| Competitor wise there are 2 types: -Companies who still use
| pen and paper, email, spreadsheets or otherwise paper laden
| processes. -A few "generation 1" software solutions exist
| that are basically material market places that pair suppliers
| and contractors (Joyne, Agora, etc.).
|
| We're different than those in that we do most of the work for
| the user.
|
| Without blockchain, these workflows involve multiple
| companies all sending contracts, invoices, and data sheets
| back and forth. This is manual trust-building which adds cost
| and risk. Using smart contracts streamlines many of these
| processes and provides more transparency.
| frakkingcylons wrote:
| > From a risk management perspective, each construction
| stakeholder needs to review, verify, or otherwise build trust
| manually to make sure they're protected (i.e. let me double
| check that document so I know you didn't screw me over).
|
| Is fraud a common problem in construction?
| robdigibuild wrote:
| Yes fraud or bad information is a $1 trillion dollar problem
| in construction globally.
| hanniabu wrote:
| General rule of thumb is that if there's high cash then there
| will be fraud.
| quadcore wrote:
| I think this is revolutionary though my guess is it will not
| please everyone.
| robdigibuild wrote:
| Thanks! Yes we believe it is revolutionary as well. However,
| blockchain + construction is not the first use case you think
| of here and we know lots of companies have tried to slap
| blockchain on any use case.
|
| It makes sense here though because The building process
| involves 50 dis-trusting stakeholders who suffer from low
| margins and work on projects that fail 70% of the time. They
| also create upwards of 750,000 documents which is complex and
| costly to manage. Companies on these projects send a lot of
| important information, and data to each other; blockchain
| creates a trusted digital environment that these companies
| can collaborate in.
| diskzero wrote:
| I am excited to see this. I have been involved in both the
| physical and software side of large construction projects. This
| is an actual good use of a blockchain.
|
| How will you respond when another vendor wants to participate
| in transactions? Is there a 3rd party API?
| robdigibuild wrote:
| Yes we currently offer integrations into some of the current
| major software vendors out there so our tools can be utilized
| along side a customer's existing stack.... Our long term goal
| is that customers use DigiBuild across the board. But we
| needed a low friction way to let them try us on a smaller
| scale first. APIs like that do dilute the effectiveness of
| the blockchain a little bit, but the tech is still effective
| in removing uncertainty around information so it works.
| DerekHase wrote:
| This is technology is going to disrupt the construction
| industry! Looking forward to increased adoption as DigiBuild
| continues the momentum they have developed.
| seibelj wrote:
| Which blockchain did you use? If it's privately run, wouldn't
| this be the same as a centralized DB? And if a public chain,
| how did you encrypt the data? Thank you
| robdigibuild wrote:
| Right now, our products are built using Hyperledger Fabric or
| R3 Corda. In the future, as public blockchains like Ethereum
| and Avalanche scale and become proven in business use cases,
| we will migrate over to them, becoming fully decentralized
| and utilizing a consensus mechanism like Proof of Stake or
| Gossip Networks. Short term, we needed to use enterprise
| blockchain that was proven in a business setting and doesn't
| have scaling issues; our customers risk management needs
| dictated our decisions. Hyperledger Fabric and similar
| blockchains use a consensus called PBFT that serves our
| purpose of "trust minimization" needed to provide benefits to
| construction end users that can't be done in a system that
| has no trust.
|
| A centralized database wouldn't work here because: 1)It is
| owned by 1 company, there is no transparency into what is
| happening with the data. Lack of immutability and provenance
| of data matters here. 2)Not auditable. No way to prove or
| verify the transactions without the database owner approving.
|
| These issues prevent that centralized database from giving
| end users from both a behavioral and technical perspective.
| verdverm wrote:
| +1 for chosing fabric
|
| Consensus can be called Proof of Authority, established
| through negotiations. Highly scalable. This could be
| achieved without Fabric, or Blockchain, but Fabric has a
| lot of the common features needed for such a system anyhow.
| spencerXsmith wrote:
| From what I understand about blockchain, these databases are
| append-only, right? Meaning someone can't go back and alter the
| past entries? That kind of assurance could be really useful in
| this space.
| robdigibuild wrote:
| Yes correct. The immutability and provenance of data are key
| characteristics that make blockchain useful here.
| verdverm wrote:
| What happens if someone adds incorrect entries by accident
| or intentionally?
|
| How do you ensure parity between the real world and the
| Blockchain?
| beaconstudios wrote:
| you can build document versioning into a blockchain-
| backed protocol - I would assume that Digibuild have done
| this as documents can be both corrected and extended over
| time. The important factor being that the old version is
| not erased and thus you can see the history of the
| document, which could be beneficial.
| spencerXsmith wrote:
| Thank you!
| alexeyshurygin wrote:
| Congrats on the launch! The idea is very attractive. Btw how do
| you solve the confidentiality problem where you have to put
| private data into public blockchain?
| robdigibuild wrote:
| Thanks! And great question.... So we're currently built on
| Hyperledger Fabric which allows us to insert permissions to
| the data. So certain parties can't see the private data of
| others on a construction project that they shouldn't. When
| needed, we can guarantee the accuracy of data without
| exposing a customers. This means you know the data comes
| straight from the source and isn't tampered with but not the
| identity of the user.
|
| In the future, if/when me migrate to a public chain, that
| functionality will be there as well with implementations like
| ZK Snarks and other zero knowledge proof solutions.
| Sharife76 wrote:
| Proud to be a part of the Digibuild family
| Sharife76 wrote:
| Proud to be part of the Digibuild family
| 41209 wrote:
| This seems like a great idea.
|
| I assume a forward looking city could hook directly into your
| apis to process things faster.
|
| By fair housing will become the biggest issue in the next 50
| years or so.
|
| Would love to see case studies where your shown to reduce costs
| by a significant amount. Good luck !
| robdigibuild wrote:
| Thanks!
|
| Yes we definitely see a major use case in public projects
| which are notoriously wasteful and (sometimes) corrupt.
| Blockchain allows provenance of the data and the ability to
| have a better view of where the money goes. The audit
| capabilities are major benefit in situations like the one you
| describe....We're putting together some official case studies
| and we will share them. One of our clients is a billion
| dollar construction company that is using 2 of our products.
| They anticipate we will save them $1M+ this year as well as
| improving the budget and schedule outcome on their projects.
| Construction has over 150 typical workflows so the results
| here are significant.
| avernon wrote:
| Is the chain open source with permission-less validators?
| robdigibuild wrote:
| We built on Hyperledger Fabric. I'll explain that piece in
| the question below......Users in our network can seamlessly
| become validators and also verify transactions or interact
| with the blockchain using a block explorer we've built out.
| bnj wrote:
| O
| VrindaGupta wrote:
| Hi, I'm Vrinda Gupta. I worked at Visa Inc. for years, launching
| popular credit cards. But when I applied for the Chase Sapphire
| Reserve (the credit card I helped develop), I was rejected! I'm
| now the CEO and Co-Founder of Sequin, a debit card that builds
| credit for women risk-free with no credit history required. My
| co-founder, Mark Thomas, spent over a decade at PayPal leading
| ACH products in various EM roles.
|
| I was rejected from the credit card I helped launch because,
| despite having a high income, I lacked credit history. I had been
| using my debit card and was an authorized user on my dad's card -
| neither of which was building my personal credit history.
|
| I saw in Visa data that 70% of women's spend (concentrated around
| young women), was similarly on debit or cards in other people's
| names. As a result, women were disproportionately being rejected
| by credit cards or getting lower limits and higher interested
| rates - even though we are shown to be better to lend to. Young
| women have the largest spending power of any demographic in
| history, yet there is a clear gender gap in financial services.
| We're leveling the playing field.
|
| Our first product, the Sequin Card is the first debit card that
| builds credit for women. Unlike traditional debit cards (which do
| not build credit), Sequin fronts the money for purchases in the
| background and repays ourselves automatically from a linked bank
| account daily. We then report repayment history to credit bureaus
| - and voila, you're building credit.
|
| Sequin users are primarily young women who are new to the
| workforce, and are looking to establish or build credit more
| effectively (towards a higher value credit card). Soon, we'll
| launch our own suite of credit cards geared towards women with
| smarter underwriting, targeted rewards, and safer repayment
| options.
|
| Anyone can apply for Sequin - we designed the product to center
| women's financial needs (for the first time in history - women
| could be denied a credit card without a male co-signer until
| 1974)!
|
| Looking forward to your comments!
| hn_user82179 wrote:
| I wouldn't have expected a need for a "gendered" debit card -
| it's pretty crazy that young women are so disproportionately
| "behind" in building their credit. I will admit I fell in that
| category a few years ago (didn't get a credit card until a few
| months before I graduated college) and I'm still regretting
| waiting so long to start building credit. I hope you can help
| other young women not make my mistake!
| VrindaGupta wrote:
| That's the hope!
| Geekette wrote:
| Congrats on launching. Seems the differentiating utility of
| your product is moreso about being _marketed to_ vs built for
| young women? I.e. there isn 't necessarily any product feature
| specific to female users but crucial effort is required to
| build effective channels to reach them.
|
| So, I assume your sales/market building process will be more
| front loaded with an info campaign, due to many being unaware
| of how they're underserved/under-rewarded relative to their
| spending power and also per lower levels of financial literacy
| and product awareness that you cited below.
| VrindaGupta wrote:
| Awareness is a key piece, yes - however, they product is
| designed for women in a few key ways: 1) women are putting
| 70% of spend on debit cards _which don 't build credit_, this
| is a debit card that gives them the same control, but builds
| credit.; 2) women are more likely to make avoidable credit
| mistakes - this is a risk free, interest free product;3)
| credit scoring - we don't report credit utilization which
| disproportionately impacts women's credit histories.
| hpagey wrote:
| Me and most of my friends had credit cards when we were in grad
| school. Amex had that student blue card issued. Most of my
| cohort used that card to build credit and move on to better
| cards. Universities also have a student union which issues
| credit card to students. Is this not the target market for this
| card?
| VrindaGupta wrote:
| Young women are less likely to sign up for those products or
| be pre-approved (b/c lowest financial literacy levels and
| thus,lower awareness of products). Target market is young
| professional woman who missed these opportunities to build
| credit early.
| danpalmer wrote:
| Congratulations! This sounds very exciting. I've heard about
| the inequality in financial products but didn't really
| understand why, thanks for the explanation of this particular
| bit.
|
| I could imagine that this is a problem that women may not
| realise until it's "too late" - when they get to opening that
| credit card or applying for a mortgage. While Sequin would help
| address that situation if used in advance, is there anything
| that can be done at the point that it's already too late?
| VrindaGupta wrote:
| That's exactly what we're trying to solve here with Sequin.
| We're targeting young professional women / new grads to
| address the problem at the source.
| zinodaur wrote:
| What a great idea!
|
| Why aren't debit cards normally hooked into the credit history
| system?
| VrindaGupta wrote:
| We built a credit reporting engine on top of a traditional
| debit card. Traditional debit cards are meant to access your
| checking account directly.
| simtel20 wrote:
| I'm the case of identity theft/card #theft, credit cards
| provide limited liability, while debit cards do not, at
| least in the USA. How do you plan on protecting your
| customers if they want to use the card for on-line
| purchases and are therefore exposed to this risk? Or can
| you even us debit cards for online purchases?
| VrindaGupta wrote:
| You can use Sequin anywhere Visa is accepted (online,
| offline, etc). A cool feature is, you can actually set
| your daily limit on the card which protects against fraud
| - over traditional debit and even credit.
| deburo wrote:
| >I saw in Visa data that 70% of women's spend (concentrated
| around young women), was similarly on debit or cards in other
| people's names
|
| That's so odd. Studies on this outcome would be interesting.
| mritchie712 wrote:
| When you report, what are you saying the credit limit is?
| Utilization is a huge factor in your credit score and you
| technically don't have a credit limit for this product.
| VrindaGupta wrote:
| We actively decided not to report credit utilization, as it
| was hurting women's credit more than helping (lower limits =
| higher utilization).
| fataliss wrote:
| Love the mission! It's also such a glaring light on how broken
| and stupid the credit system is.
| ashishk wrote:
| Love this idea! Have felt the problem myself and have seen my
| mother/MIL/wife struggle with the same thing.
|
| It's clear that you both have extensive experience in the
| space, too.
|
| How can I help / get involved? :-)
| VrindaGupta wrote:
| Spread the word, www.sequincard.com!
| cpach wrote:
| Cool startup! I like the name. In my locale, "sekin" is slang
| for money.
| VrindaGupta wrote:
| That was the origin of the name!
| binarymax wrote:
| Really cool! What's the biggest differentiator between Sequin
| and a secured credit card? Me and my wife used the latter as
| the first step to help build our credit history...but
| admittedly the limit was small.
| VrindaGupta wrote:
| Secured cards have high deposits ($200+) and can still get
| you into debt if you don't pay back / pay min / pay late -
| affects women more than men.
| mike_d wrote:
| > can still get you into debt if you don't pay back / pay
| min / pay late
|
| How exactly is your card different? Is there no obligation
| to make payments? If so, how many cards can I open?
| VrindaGupta wrote:
| We connect to your existing bank account and make the
| payments automatically to build credit. Traditional debit
| cards do not do this.
| ryanisnan wrote:
| This is wild! I had no idea such discrimination existed, though
| on reflection, my partner has had quite a hard time building
| her credit for not too dissimilar reasons. Congratulations on
| the launch.
| VrindaGupta wrote:
| Thanks! The opportunity to evangelize the mission with Sequin
| is one of the coolest (and most challenging) bits.
| EMM_386 wrote:
| > Our first product, the Sequin Card is the first debit card
| that builds credit for women
|
| Serious question ... why only women?
|
| I know you list reasons such as "women were disproportionately
| being rejected by credit cards", but at the end of the day
| isn't this something that can help out anyone?
|
| I'm curious why you are throwing out 50% of your potential
| customer base. I don't fully understand what a "credit card
| _for women_ " is ... are you going to come up with clone
| targeted under a different name towards males?
| ecf wrote:
| Because this product doesn't seem to be doing anything
| different and the only way they can get buyers it is to try
| to proclaim that the service is made specifically for "insert
| underserved group here".
|
| It's a common trend with startups being accepted into YC
| nowadays.
| VrindaGupta wrote:
| I'll answer here. :)
|
| Banks spend 13x more advertising to men than women. Young
| women have the largest spending power of any demographic
| ever - this is a seismic shift in the market.
|
| Credit card rewards target where men are spending 60% more
| of the time, versus where women are spending 60% more (and
| control 85% of GDP).
| avarun wrote:
| Wow, those numbers are fascinating. I'd love to see the
| sources if you have them, so I can read up on the topic
| more.
| sillysaurusx wrote:
| I don't usually downvote comments, but this one is a
| combination of hubris (what are the chances you know better
| than YC plus the founders?) and snark ("common trend with
| YC startups...").
|
| The trouble is, you might be right! Maybe it is a trend.
| But if you phrase it as a question, it has a higher chance
| of being a substantive observation rather than a middlebrow
| dismissal.
|
| I used to do the same thing. Habits can change; I found it
| worthwhile to try.
|
| All that matters is whether the startup can grow. If these
| tactics lead to growth, can they be called mistaken?
| sillysaurusx wrote:
| I had the same thought, but (a) it's open to everyone, (b) no
| one minds when Axe makes a deodorant specifically for men,
| and (c) it's better to focus on a small group of customers
| that love you than a large group that might mildly like you.
| bredren wrote:
| Would you please contextualize your product against Apple Card
| Family?
| sillysaurusx wrote:
| > I was rejected from the credit card I helped launch because,
| despite having a high income, I lacked credit history.
|
| This happened to me. I got a job in Petaluma, CA where I was
| rejected _for internet service_ because my credit history was
| "Unknown risk", i.e. I had no credit history. I was in my early
| 20's.
|
| It was kind of a bummer to hear that this product is only for
| women, but seeing as it was a bummer to _be_ a woman for most
| of history, I can hardly complain. :)
|
| Best of luck! Looking forward to seeing where this goes.
| VrindaGupta wrote:
| Thanks for sharing your experience! We designed Sequin with
| women in mind but it's open to anyone to sign up.
| candu wrote:
| Another use case where this is potentially useful:
| relocation. I've been rejected for financial things before
| after international moves, since I have no credit history _in
| that place_. Income? Doesn't matter. Previous history
| elsewhere? Doesn't matter.
|
| This is _also_ an issue for self-employed people, contract
| workers, or...well, basically anyone who doesn't fit the "I
| stayed in one place and work full-time" mould.
| samstave wrote:
| Well gee... there should be a passport depository box for
| workers who go to a foreign country to work but are robbed
| of their passports and forced into slave labor.
| VrindaGupta wrote:
| Yes! Great point.
| raman162 wrote:
| Congrats on launching. I appreciate the mission you're on and
| bonus points for keeping it open to everyone!
| sunil_loanmeet wrote:
| Hi HN! We are a rather unusual team of six founders (Pei, Amit,
| Sunil, Jack, Bo, and Kartik) spread across India and China,
| building Karbon Cards (https://www.karboncard.com/). We help
| companies in India get instant access to a corporate card.
|
| We came across this problem separately while Amit was doing VC
| and Sunil was running his own fintech. We saw that a startup with
| $1M in the bank was facing mind-numbing issues in getting a card
| with a $5k limit. After speaking to finance managers in other
| companies of all ages and sizes, we realized the problem was
| massive. Seeing Brex at the same time growing so quickly gave us
| the kick to go out and figure out a way to solve this issue.
|
| Before Karbon card, our customers were either using personal
| cards for company's card expenses or put a fixed deposit at a
| bank to get an equivalent credit limit on a card. Both options
| are painful in the long run: using personal cards leads to
| compliance issues, and putting a fixed deposit for a card locks
| your growth capital. Since we are a free product (we make money
| on interchange fees) and onboarding is simple, it is better to
| get a no-hassle corporate card from us.
|
| Today we have a solution wherein a company completes a 10 minute
| application process and gets access to a virtual credit card
| right away. We are known across India's startup community for
| quick card issuance (10 minutes vs 5 weeks), 10x higher credit
| limits compared to banks, and self-serve controls that help reign
| in unnecessary spending. We've also launched a vendor payment
| product that makes banking less cumbersome moving towards our
| longer term vision of becoming the only financial product a
| company would need to run it's business aka India's first
| corporate Neo bank.
|
| Companies today use our product to run their marketing campaigns,
| infrastructure spends, pay SaaS vendors and take care of employee
| reimbursements. We work with clients who are as young as 2 weeks
| old to publicly listed companies in India. That alone shows the
| depth of the problem and the need for a company like us to help
| make corporate spending easier--it is the last thing a company
| should be blocked on.
|
| Some of our customers are creatively using our card in ways that
| we have not even imagined. Our customer, Rajat, runs a marketing
| agency, and he issued himself 120 Karbon cards. He gave these
| cards to his clients and asked them to top up their cards to run
| Facebook ads. Another customer, Akshay, uses his card and payment
| product to process salaries and make vendor payments.
|
| Please share your thoughts and questions and comments!
| adityadsr5 wrote:
| Congratulations guys!
| sunil_loanmeet wrote:
| Thank you Aditya
| d_burfoot wrote:
| Based on a quick glance at the name, I guessed your company
| sold some kind of carbon offset credits.
| ravi_b wrote:
| Congrats karbon cards.
| debarshri wrote:
| Me and my current co-founder did face this issues or atleast
| were discussing about this issues. It is a big problem. Also,
| problem is india is just simply incorporating a company.
|
| It becomes even more difficult when both the founders do not
| live in India. Relevant problem, huge market. Good luck! We
| will probably be a customer if you guys execute well. One of
| the things that I love about brex and if you could replicate
| would set you apart is customer experience. If you build some
| very customer centric that would completely change the game.
| sunil_loanmeet wrote:
| Thank you for your valuable feedback.
|
| It is difficult to incorporate a company in India, especially
| if you need it to make a subsidiary of an Indian company.
|
| We are planning to add bank accounts in the near future. Our
| existing customers use virtual bank accounts accounts to
| transfer salaries and vendor payments. https://karboncard.fre
| shdesk.com/support/solutions/articles/...
|
| In terms of our approach to customers, we are customer
| centric, and we try our best to get fast refunds and resolve
| transaction issues ASAP. We have used our test cards to do
| transactions on customer's behalf.
|
| When you need a card for an Indian company, do let us know at
| support@karboncard.com. We will get you the card on the same
| day, and you would love the experience.
| BilalBudhani wrote:
| This looks great.
|
| I run single person company (proprietorship), do you think
| KarbonCard can help me in running my business in any way? or it
| is designed for bigger companies?
| sunil_loanmeet wrote:
| We have a number of proprietorship as customers, and they
| like us. They use our card for digital marketing spends, SAS
| payments, and telecom payments. Few of our customers do not
| want to put their main bank's debit card on online portals,
| and they prefer to put our cards as it comes with numerous
| controls.
|
| Since our card is free of cost, there is nothing to lose and
| everything to gain.
|
| If you do not have a CIN, please enter your GST number in the
| field.
|
| Below are the steps to apply for the card. https://karboncard
| .freshdesk.com/support/solutions/articles/...
|
| If you face issues, do reach us via email at
| support@karboncard.com or via whatsapp at 828-756-9687.
| imharkunwar wrote:
| This is great guys. Indeed a very big problem.
| sunil_loanmeet wrote:
| Thank you very much. We love you guys.
| debarshri wrote:
| One of things I noticed that you guys have 6 founders. Could
| you elaborate a bit on that, how do you manage the role,
| segregate responsibilities and manage conflicts if any. I am
| asking just out of curiosity. I have noticed that in Indian
| start up you generally find alot of founder for eg. Housing.com
| sudhirj wrote:
| How're you handling the MasterCard suspension? Are you able to
| onboard new accounts now?
| Brajeshwar wrote:
| I believe, Kodo[1] is also another YC Company doing something
| similar - Brex for India.
|
| 1. https://www.kodo.in
| sunil_loanmeet wrote:
| That is correct. The problem and market is there for them and
| other players to take.
|
| Do let us know what you think of us. We would love to provide
| Karbon card to your company - https://valinor.earth/ .
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