Crack the code of Y-Combinator: Look behind the facade of the worlds most successful startup accelerator

📌 Key facts

• Mission: Collecting & comparing data on venture performance. • When: Start date is flexible Applications are open! • How to apply: Send us an e-mail (at the end of this page) with your CV and grade report IMPORTANT: The project language is partly German. We can, therefore, only accept applicants who speak German.

Contents

• 💡 Background
• 🦾Who We Are
• 🧠 Topics of Interest
• 🎓 Expectations
• 📬 How to Apply

💡 Background

In Q2 2022 alone, more than 700 startups were founded in Germany (Statista, 2022). Most of these startups consist of a founding team with more than one founder. While this brings advantages, e.g., in terms of different previous experiences, it also increases the risk of leaving the team due to team conflicts (Howarth, 2022).

To find out more about what makes a startup team thrive, we founded “The Gottman Initiative”.

Your role will be to take a deep look into Y-Combinator. You’ll conduct multiple statistical analyses to find a significant relationship between selected entrepreneurship variables and venture performance. Your responsibility is to continue collecting publicly available data where we will support you. VCs will be quite interested in the findings of your master thesis…

Sounds interesting?! It definitely is!

🦾Who We Are

The Chair for Strategy and Organization is focused on research with impact. This means we do not want to repeat old ideas and base our research solely on the research people did 10 years ago. Instead, we currently research topics that will shape the future. Topics include Agile Organizations and Digital Disruption, Blockchain Technology, Creativity and Innovation, Digital Transformation and Business Model Innovation, Diversity, Education: Education Technology and Performance Management, HRTech, Leadership, and Teams. We are always early in noticing trends, technologies, strategies, and organizations that shape the future, which has its ups and downs.

🧠 Topics of Interest

• Entrepreneurship/ Start-ups
• Venture performance
• Statistical analysis/ SPSS
• Personality

🎓 Expectations

• You are interested in both statistics (SPSS) and entrepreneurship and want to combine it within your thesis. Your work will have a real life impact on VCs and founders.
• Your work is super accurate. In data collection, there is no room for the 80/20 principle. Thus, your academic track record is excellent!
• Since the data is mostly in German, German language skills are preferred.

📬 How to Apply

• Please send your complete application documents (CV, Transcript of Records) in one pdf file to felix.kuhn@tum.de.
• Please indicate your preferred start date and motivation in your application in German.
• Please don’t use ChatGPT within your application. Please write briefly and precisely, as you will do in your thesis.

You’re interested in a related Hiwi job?! Check out this posting 👑[Hiwi] Venture Capital Associate

After reading the thesis description, you still have questions? Feel free to contact your potential thesis supervisor Felix Kuhn

… and let’s look into more successful founders.