Most of the information it requests is pretty generic. If you've raised a round and haven't announced it yet, then by all means, don't give it out.
However, for many startups, funding details will be public (and available via crunchbase or startupsearch) -- and generic ownership percentages can be pretty easily inferred. Asking whether investors own <10% or 10-40%, etc, isn't really saying much.
As for the rest of the information (mostly how the team relates to each other, their background, and previous work experience), I can't imagine this would be sensitive either, but if it is, by all means, don't give it out.
On a side note, and without wanting to be negative, at times I am not really sure they care about many things apart from growing really fast and getting momentum/exposure/traction (which is understandable).
You can gauge how much they (or anyone for that matter) care by the response you get when you try and engage with them. In this respect, my past experience has not been good (no response to emails/queries/etc), but maybe that is because I am not significant to them as an individual.
* The connections-drawing tool is somewhat broken: First it wouldn't show for me at all ("Loading..."), and then when I wanted to correct something, the eraser didn't remove the lines (although I think it did invalidate them, because I could draw new lines on top of the old ones)
* Entering team details is very tedious when every single question is on its own page. I got tired of clicking next, and would very nearly have quit the process there.
I can't figure out what's wrong with the flash not loading - several people have reported this now. Can one of you guys hack it and reply with the answer? I'll buy you a pizza (no seriously, I will)
Apparently my startup (tarsnap, online backups for the truly paranoid) will be worth $3.71M in September 2009. Given that I'm a sole founder and tarsnap is pre-revenue, I can only guess that YouNoodle is giving me very high marks for (a) having a doctorate from Oxford, and (b) having started university when I was 13 years old.
Of course, I'd be happy if YouNoodle was correct in their assessment... but if someone offered to buy tarsnap for $3.71M right now -- or offered to buy any fraction of tarsnap for a corresponding fraction of that amount -- I'd have no hesitation in accepting the offer.
EDIT: Yes, I do realize that the assessed value is effective a year from now -- but I still think $3.71M would be a generous amount to pay for tarsnap. Of course, tarsnap might take off faster than I expect...
I understand where you are coming from. Some of those calculations might be based on, for a lack of a better term, VC math, meaning if you are in the process of raising a series A, the VC might value your company (pre-money) at say 4 million, give you a A round of 2 million and own 50% of the company.
These tools are really only as good as the information they are provided or access, and without looking at failure rates/reasons in the model do seem fundamentally flawed to me.
As mentioned by others, the results provided do look very optimistic (at least from what I can tell based on the values it provides for things I am involved with) and with refinement once they get the datasets will probably go down significantly in most cases.
Time will be the real judge. It will be interesting is to see what they predict and what actually happens in the next years. Hopefully they will provide this information (semi-)publically, but it seems unlikely.
[+] [-] flipbrad|17 years ago|reply
Preying on the vulnerability/need for validation of most startup founders?
[+] [-] tlrobinson|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] drusenko|17 years ago|reply
However, for many startups, funding details will be public (and available via crunchbase or startupsearch) -- and generic ownership percentages can be pretty easily inferred. Asking whether investors own <10% or 10-40%, etc, isn't really saying much.
As for the rest of the information (mostly how the team relates to each other, their background, and previous work experience), I can't imagine this would be sensitive either, but if it is, by all means, don't give it out.
[+] [-] dcurtis|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] fiaz|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] demandred|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] babul|17 years ago|reply
You can gauge how much they (or anyone for that matter) care by the response you get when you try and engage with them. In this respect, my past experience has not been good (no response to emails/queries/etc), but maybe that is because I am not significant to them as an individual.
When I compare this to the engaging experiences I find with many YC start-ups (http://www.socialbrowse.com springs to mind) and others (e.g. http://www.huddle.net and http://www.freshbooks.com), the difference is night and day.
Maybe this is just my experience. Still, I’d be more likely to provide sensitive information to sites I trust and that seem to ‘care’.
[+] [-] dcurtis|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sdpurtill|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mixmax|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] c3o|17 years ago|reply
* The connections-drawing tool is somewhat broken: First it wouldn't show for me at all ("Loading..."), and then when I wanted to correct something, the eraser didn't remove the lines (although I think it did invalidate them, because I could draw new lines on top of the old ones)
* Entering team details is very tedious when every single question is on its own page. I got tired of clicking next, and would very nearly have quit the process there.
[+] [-] sdpurtill|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sdpurtill|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Tichy|17 years ago|reply
Brilliant generic tag line.
[+] [-] jfornear|17 years ago|reply
The entire YouNoodle process feels like a phishing scam.
[+] [-] cperciva|17 years ago|reply
Of course, I'd be happy if YouNoodle was correct in their assessment... but if someone offered to buy tarsnap for $3.71M right now -- or offered to buy any fraction of tarsnap for a corresponding fraction of that amount -- I'd have no hesitation in accepting the offer.
EDIT: Yes, I do realize that the assessed value is effective a year from now -- but I still think $3.71M would be a generous amount to pay for tarsnap. Of course, tarsnap might take off faster than I expect...
[+] [-] prakash|17 years ago|reply
BTW: When are you launching?
[+] [-] rw|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] create_account|17 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] babul|17 years ago|reply
As mentioned by others, the results provided do look very optimistic (at least from what I can tell based on the values it provides for things I am involved with) and with refinement once they get the datasets will probably go down significantly in most cases.
Time will be the real judge. It will be interesting is to see what they predict and what actually happens in the next years. Hopefully they will provide this information (semi-)publically, but it seems unlikely.
[+] [-] jonmc12|17 years ago|reply
Anyone ambitious enough to survey a set of Younoodle inputs and outputs so we can estimate the valuation formula?
[+] [-] hooande|17 years ago|reply
We're experiencing lots of activity so we can't handle your request just yet. Please click the refresh button and try again.
scaling = fail
[+] [-] sdpurtill|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] plusbryan|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dkasper|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] helveticaman|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] thenextweb|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|17 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] stats101|17 years ago|reply