Comment by avarun
1 year ago
> The only thing YC has to do is produce a portfolio of companies that looks good enough that other VCs invest into that.
This is completely incorrect. They need liquidity events. Simply getting to follow on funding without ever making it to an exit is a negative outcome for YC.
Liquidity event != exit.
While an exit (= aquisition, IPO and similar) is obviously always the optimal end-goal, every round of fundraising is a potential liquidity event for all existing stakeholders.
It's very common to have partial liquidation from roughly Series B-C onwards on the side of founders (e.g. wanting to keep up lifestyle with your C-level peers; removing personal financals as stress factor) and earlier investors (e.g. their funds entering the liquidation period of their lifecycle).