Demo Days are held by the accelerator to celebrate each cohort of Y & Co startups. What happens next?

We used Crunchbase data to track the funding trajectory of these seed and pre-seed startups, starting with the AI-centric Winter 2024 batch which completed its demo day at the beginning of April. We grouped companies according to industry and noted who had announced funding. We also looked into which investors were most active in supporting these startups.

YC startups that have raised seed funding in the past have not all announced it publicly, but a few of them have. Some of the companies that have disclosed their investments are bringing AI-enabled technologies to sectors such as legal tech, recruitment, code development, and medical recordkeeping. They have received funding from active seed investors such as Pioneer Fund and SV Angel 1 as well as venture capital firms such as Benchmark, Khosla and General Catalyst.

A batch focusing on AI

Garry Tan said in a blog post announcing the second cohort of Y Combinator after COVID, that gathered in San Francisco’s Dogpatch neighborhood.

Tan took over the helm of YC over a year and moved it to the city. (He left Initialized capital, a firm he founded in 2012 with Reddit founder Alexis Ohanian.

The community has reportedly been strengthened by being in person and in the city.

“Hundreds of founders meet daily for office hours and other events, bumping in legendary people and surrounding themselves with people that will go deep on topics and celebrate hardwork,” said Lindsay Amos via email. “There is no place in the world that has the same density of startup founders per sq mile as the area surrounding the YC offices — and this is fostering growth and innovation.”

Crunchbase data confirms that San Francisco is experiencing a resurgence thanks to AI.

According to Jared Friedman YC Group partner, these companies are skewing younger — 30 percent of the last batch were college students or grads. Two years ago, they were around 10%. He said that AI has made it the best time for college students in a decade to start their own startups.

Around 11% are consumer-oriented — with AI as the driver for many of the consumer offerings. Around 11% of companies are consumer-oriented, with AI being the driving force behind for many offerings.

After 2021, YC batches are smaller. YC launches the most companies in a single cohort – 260 in the winter batch.

Seed funding

Emailing Jason Gray founder of Pioneer Fund, an active investor with YC, he said that interacting in person benefits founders as well as their rate of progress.

Gray says that Pioneer has a large network of portfolio companies, venture partners, and YC alumni. This totals 1,500 YC graduates who have a relationship with founders, either as a former colleague, friend, or customer. This allows for a front-loading of due diligence.

Gray clarified that while it is possible, it is not the norm for YC companies to raise money before demo day. He also said that many founders are selective in who they choose as investors prior to demo day.

YC also hosts an investor night and shares pitches online. Gray said that the in-person element creates a sense of urgency, which is beneficial to both investors and founders. “Minimizing fundraising distractions for founders’ is in everyone’s interest.”

According to YC the median raise is around $1.3M post-demoday.

According to Crunchbase data analysis, the most active multistage investors over time are Andreessen Horowitz Khosla Ventures, and Sequoia Capital. On the seed-fund side, Liquid2 Ventures is most active, followed by SV Angel, Pioneer Fund FundersClub and Garry Tan’s previous fund Initialized Capital.

The winter 2024 cohort includes:

• Leya is a Swedish AI assistant for attorneys that uses proprietary data along with cited legal sources. The company raised $10.5 million in seed funding led by Benchmark, with Chetan Puttagunta as a new board member. Hummingbird Ventures from Belgium and SV Angel also participated. Leya has a network of 70+ European law firms and plans to expand into the U.S.
• Greptile is a San Francisco-based company that has developed an API which uses large language models in order to answer questions regarding a company’s source code. It raised $4.1 million in seed funding led by Initialized Capital.
• The San Francisco-based YonedaLabs was built by a team of Cambridge University. It creates a foundation model that allows chemists to predict outcomes without the need for costly trials. The company raised $4 million in a seed round led by Khosla ventures, with participation from 500 Emerging Europe 468 Capital, and Fellows Fund.
• Pythagora is a San Francisco-based Pythagora that was built by a Croatian team. The team raised $4 million in order to build apps with natural language interactions. The tool is open source and used by 30,000 developers. Investors include Inovo, 500 Emerging Europe, Moonfire Ventures, Rebel Fund, and UpHonest capital.
• San Francisco-based Basalt tech, which develops spacecraft software, has raised $3.5 million in seed funding, led by Initialized Capital.
• Malibou, a Paris-based company, helps small businesses with payroll and compliance. It raised $3.1 million in seed funding led by European venture company Breega.
• San Francisco-based Honora AI raised $3 million in seed funding led by General Catalyst for its AI data platform to support healthcare records.
• Apriora is a San Francisco-based AI interviewer that screens job candidates. 1984 Ventures led the $2.8 million fundraising, with participation from HOF capital and Pioneer Fund.
• Manifold Freight is a Seattle-based logistics aggregator that aggregates spot freight. It raised a $2M seed round from New Stack Ventures as well as YC. The founders of the company were engineers from Convoy, which shut down last fall.

Related Crunchbase Pro searches and lists

Pro subscribers can export this list to track progress within their Crunchbase accounts.

Illustration: Dom Guzman