Optic YC Application

Summer 2018Acquired

Optic went through Y Combinator in the Summer 2018 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: Summer 2018
Industry: B2BEngineering, Product and Design
Team size: 5
Status: Acquired
Launched: 2018

Founders

Aidan CunniffeFounder/CEO

What Optic does

We help developers collaborate at scale and build better APIs. Optic’s open source tools makes it easy for developers to document API changes, review each other’s API changes during code review, and catch breaking changes before they reach production. **tl;dr** It’s version control but for behavior not code. We are taking the really successful ideas from Git / Code Review / CI and applying them to API descriptions and (future) other non-code artifacts. Engineers at [Snyk]( use Optic daily to make the new Snyk API great. Read their engineering blog: [Snyk's shift left approach to API development | Snyk](

Optic's YC application, reconstructed

Y Combinator application

Optic, Summer 2018 batch. The real form questions, answered from public data.

Founders2
Company7
Progress7
Idea4
Equity3
Curious2
Batch Preference1

Company

Company name

Optic

Describe what your company does in 50 characters or less.

Making APIs Developer-friendly

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

We build open source tools that help developers document, review, and manage API changes. Our product works like version control for APIs - it lets teams catch breaking changes before they hit production and collaborate on API design in a way similar to code review and CI workflows.

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

We are based in New York, NY with a remote team scattered elsewhere, and after YC we would continue to be based here to stay close to our current network and talent pool.

Explain your decision regarding location.

We chose New York because we're rooted here, have local users and developer communities, and the team works well together remotely, so staying here suits both the product and team.

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 Optic YC application?

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