Firsthand YC Application

Winter 2017Inactive

Firsthand went through Y Combinator in the Winter 2017 batch as a B2B company. Below: what the company does, who founded it, and its application to YC, reconstructed question by question in the real YC form.

YC batch: Winter 2017
Industry: B2BRetail
Team size: 2
Status: Inactive
Launched: 2016

Founders

Brian YangFounder/CTO

What Firsthand does

They provide the kiosk, the products, and the software - you just provide the space and they send you a check with your share of the profits at the end of the month.

Firsthand's YC application, reconstructed

Y Combinator application

Firsthand, Winter 2017 batch. The real form questions, answered from public data.

Founders2
Company7
Progress7
Idea4
Equity3
Curious2
Batch Preference1

Company

Company name

Firsthand

Describe what your company does in 50 characters or less.

Self-serve retail kiosks with software and products

What is your company going to make? Please describe your product and what it does or will do.

We build and operate self-serve kiosks for retail locations. Our kiosks come with the hardware, inventory, and software integrated so that venue owners can host a kiosk without managing stock or technology themselves. They just provide the floor space and we handle the rest, sending them a cut of profits monthly.

Where do you live now, and where would the company be based after YC?

n/a

Explain your decision regarding location.

We haven't publicly specified a location, but our product is designed to be deployed in various retail venues, so location is flexible and depends on partnerships.

21 more answers in the full application

Founders, Progress, Idea, Equity, Curious, Batch Preference are in the full version. Create a free account to open it in YC Insights, next to every other YC batch.

See full application

Frequently Asked Questions

Is this the real Firsthand YC application?

No. Y Combinator keeps submitted applications private. This is a reconstruction: the real YC form questions, answered from Firsthand's public data (launch notes, founder backgrounds, product description). It shows how a company like Firsthand would present itself to YC, not the text they submitted.