Jason Fan

CEO @ Finic (YC W23)

[Aaron Villalpando @aaronvi]

Final day of Launch Week, and we just crossed 2000 ⭐️ on Github 🚀

Today, we’re more than excited to unveil our vision and what you can expect from BAML 1.0 in 2025 — with a strong focus on enterprise scalability and developer experience.

And today the spotlight is on our team without whom none of this would be possible:

Read more 👇

[Jason Fan @jfan001]

@paulg @mettler We’re building this right now at Dealwise (YC W23).

Started by closing a few deals ourselves, now we’re building the platform for brokers to do M&A deals entirely online.

COVID really accelerated the trend of running distributed M&A processes through Zoom, but it’s still very painful.

[Jason Fan @jfan001]

Full post: https://t.co/8G6KsI1Wqk

[Jason Fan @jfan001]

Firebase started in 2011, raised a Series A in 2013, and got acquired by Google for a nine figure sum in 2014.

We sat down Firebase cofounder @startupandrew to learn how they did it.

🤸 The Firebase acquisition was an "overnight success" seven years in the making, and the result of several pivots.

🤝 Despite being 2000 times smaller than the tech behemoth, Andrew and his cofounder James dictated the terms of the deal.

🍀 The team created their own luck by positioning themselves as the only option Google had to get to market with a backend-as-a-service product.

📝 In a certified baller move, they wrote their number on a piece of paper and told their counterparts at Google "this, not a penny less" - and it worked.

🏎️ The entire process too just 9 months from initial conversations to close

These days, Firebase remains a core part of Google Cloud offering. Andrew is now the founder of Shortwave, the smartest email app on planet Earth, which our entire team uses to save hours each week on emails.

Full story below 👇

[Irvin Zhan @IrvinZhan]

🚨 Big announcement – after two years of beta, @SubframeApp is now open to everyone!

Subframe is the best way to build UI, fast. It's a design tool that lets you visually build UI using real components, then export it as React / Tailwind code 👇

[Jason Fan @jfan001]

@bykahlil @getivella Hey @bykahlil congrats on the success so far! We might be able to help depending on where you guys are at in terms of revenue. DM me if you'd like to chat.

[Jason Fan @jfan001]

@Teddarific About time! Can’t wait to use magic patterns and PHP to build my next killer idea.

[Jason Fan @jfan001]

At Dealwise, we run a 3-month process to get you acquisition offers. $999/month + 4% if you close. No long-term exclusivity agreements.

Check us out at https://t.co/HNBRkUs2S5 or DM me. Private & confidential.

[Jason Fan @jfan001]

In the past two months, we've helped 4 of the startups we work with get 7-figure acquisition offers from both financial and strategic buyers.

For founders starting out in their M&A journey, here's what we learned 👇

[Jason Fan @jfan001]

🕊️ LOIs
Signing an LOI transfers leverage to the buyside, so buyers will want you to sign ASAP.

You should delay signing until you're ready, but not so long that a buyer moves on.

[Jason Fan @jfan001]

We just overhauled our website - check it out here: https://t.co/iHs8pCp8ht

[Alex Lee @AlexLee611]

Last week, YC Group Partner Jared Friedman had this great tweet:

"The real reason startups do so much better in SF isn't because it's easier to raise money or hire employees, even if both of those of are true. It's because you become the average of the 20 people you spend the most time with. If you live in SF, those 20 people are probably successful startup founders. If you live anywhere else, they probably aren't."

I met @jfan001 and @mmirman, early in our YC journey together and became fast friends. Jason and I shared a coworking space office together for several months. Matthew and I did a podcast together. The friendships made during @ycombinator are real and enduring.

This is going to be a fun panel. We're going to talk about our reflections and learnings from our demo day, a year ago. We promise to keep it real 🙂

[Dev Shah @devlikesbizness]

Generally acquisition are much safer than starting from scratch

Involving debt obviously changes this risk profile

To me smaller acquisition plays make so much more sense

Smaller cash flowing SaaS businesses have so much potential for an experienced operator

with marketplaces like @acquiredotcom @godealwise @micronsio finding a deal has never been easier

Many of these businesses are under optimised or run by a mainly technical team and can benefit a lot from someone looking to aggressively grow the business

Taking $2-3m in debt should be considered after you’ve tried and proven your operational skills with smaller acquisition

You can start as small as $25k or even go for a larger business around $150-200k

It really depends a lot on the different type of business you want to acquire

What do you guys think?