by Lindsay Amos3/30/2021

We’ve been talking about the unique challenges facing women founders for years, but the pandemic was particularly hard for women looking to start their own companies. According to recent data, funding to women-founded companies dropped from 2.8% in 2019 to 2.3% in 2020.

by Lindsay Amos3/26/2021

Pheadra Ellis-Lamkins, Co-Founder and CEO of Promise, had witnessed technology’s impact on the work communities in which she’d been a part — and not always for good. In the labor force and the environment sector, she’d seen technology replace jobs, relegating janitors and receptionists to contract work. In the music industry, she’d seen artists’ content devalued with advances in digital innovation. “I went into tech to understand it,” she said.

by Lindsay Amos2/25/2021

Edlyft co-founder and CEO Erika Hairston never imagined herself as a “techie,” but was drawn to computer science while at Yale University—not that it was a cinch for her. “I actually really struggled through the major and almost dropped it,” she says. While she ultimately persevered and graduated with her computer science degree from Yale in 2018, she also built appreciation for what it’s like to be truly intimidated by a subject matter.

by Geoff Ralston11/19/2020

YC was founded around the idea that technologists should be at the center of tech innovation. It seems obvious today, but it wasn’t always that way. We believe that technology startups should include a technical founder because it is critical that a CTO have a seat at the table where key decisions regarding the future of the startup are made. When it comes to deciding what to do with technology, technical founders know what the options are and what kinds of problems are hard and which are easy.1 Because of this core thesis, over the years we have actively done outreach to computer science majors in order to explain the advantages of being a startup founder.

by Kat Mañalac10/15/2020

On November 18, we are hosting our first Future Founders Conference for women who aspire to become a startup founder. The event will be online, and whether you are curious about launching your own startup or are in the early stages of building one, you’ll walk away with the knowledge to define your own path.

by Geoff Ralston9/21/2020

We recently launched the YC Directory. The directory lists 2,000+ publicly launched YC companies and makes it simple to filter by batch, industry, status, region, and company size. Potential investors and partners can use the directory to easily find and contact the companies with whom they’d like to work. The directory also has a filter for discovering YC companies that are hiring. We hope this tool helps job seekers find their next role.

by Kat Mañalac6/25/2019

We’re hosting group office hours and a happy hour for female founders on Friday, July 26 at the YC office in Mountain View, California.