Simon Willison’s Weblog

Are there any YC startups based around open source software?

5th March 2014

My answer to Are there any YC startups based around open source software? on Quora

There have been a few.

Meteor.js is the most obvious example (YCS11, fully open source, raised $11.2 million): Meteor Raises $11.2M Round Led by Andreessen Horowitz.

Reddit have released all of their source code though I’m pretty sure they did that long after they went through YC: reddit on GitHub

DotCloud (YCS10) have pivoted to focus on Docker, which is fully open source.

If you browse through the list on Y Combinator Company List you’ll certainly find some others.

Posted 5th March 2014 at 11:16 am · Follow me on Mastodon, Bluesky, Twitter or subscribe to my newsletter

More recent articles

DeepSeek V4 - almost on the frontier, a fraction of the price - 24th April 2026
Extract PDF text in your browser with LiteParse for the web - 23rd April 2026
A pelican for GPT-5.5 via the semi-official Codex backdoor API - 23rd April 2026

This is Are there any YC startups based around open source software? by Simon Willison, posted on 5th March 2014.

y-combinator 52 quora 1005 docker 60

Next: What are some tips for improving public speaking skills quickly?

Previous: Aside from Google I/O, does Google organize any other conferences?

Monthly briefing

Sponsor me for $10/month and get a curated email digest of the month's most important LLM developments.

Pay me to send you less!

Sponsor & subscribe