HackPad YC Application

Winter 2012Acquired

HackPad went through Y Combinator in the Winter 2012 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 2012
Industry: B2BProductivity
Team size: 2
Status: Acquired
Launched: 2011

Founders

Igor KofmanFounder

What HackPad does

Smart collaborative documents. Company wiki. Personal notes. Event planning. Classroom collaboration.

HackPad's YC application, reconstructed

Y Combinator application

HackPad, Winter 2012 batch. The real form questions, answered from public data.

Founders2
Company7
Progress7
Idea4
Equity3
Curious2
Batch Preference1

Company

Company name

HackPad

Describe what your company does in 50 characters or less.

A realtime wiki for getting things done.

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

We built HackPad, a set of smart, collaborative documents that function as wikis for teams to manage projects, plan events, take personal notes, or collaborate in classrooms. It updates in real time so everyone can edit and see changes instantly, making group work faster and less chaotic.

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

We live in San Francisco, CA, and after YC the company will be based here as well.

Explain your decision regarding location.

San Francisco is where we both live and work now, and it's the best place to connect with early users, investors, and other startups working on productivity tools.

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 HackPad YC application?

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