ANNOUCEMENT

Y Combinator has an acceptance rate of just 1% (less than Harvard). So we decided to apply 100 times with 100 ideas. So we should get in... Right? We tweeted directly at YC’s CEO Garry Tan to let him know about our pretty unique application, so if you’re on Twitter like or retweet to help us get Garry’s attention!

BUSINESS IDEA #1 | STARTUP

Printful for Fan Merch 👕

Causing a fan fair

1. Problem/Opportunity❓

Fans of bands, creators, sports teams, even movies or tv shows are incredibly passionate. Like this guy.

And many super fans often create t-shirts or even full merch stores to show their devotion to their favourite creator, band, sports team and so on.

They do this out of pure love, but this causes all kinds of problems such as IP infringement, particularly when the fans try to monetize.

So let’s create a platform to solve this problem.

2. Solution ✅

Here’s the idea…create a platform which allows fans to create and sell their designs as approved merchandise.

Here’s how it works. The creator, band or brand signs up to the platform and invites any fans who want to make designs to their platform. Fans join the platform and they can submit their designs or fan art through tooling on the platform, using any IP that the creator owns, such as their logo. The artwork is then submitted for review and the creator or band can accept or reject the designs.

All approved designs become available on the creator or brand’s store to order. When ordered they are fulfilled by the platform. A revenue sharing agreement means that fans earn a % of every sale through the platform for any item that they designed.

It’s a win-win situation for everyone.

3. Business Model 🏦

Go-to-market: Start by testing the concept with independent creators and you can move on to the big boys once you’ve validated the concept

Monetisation: take a % of the revenue generated through the platform

Startup Costs: Startup costs should be pretty minimal here. You could leverage existing print-on-demand companies to fulfil orders before investing in your own infrastructure

4. How You’ll Get Rich 💰

The path to an exit here would be to sell to a company like Printful (shocker) who would be able to leverage their existing infrastructure to take this business to the next level.

BUSINESS IDEA #2 | CASH FLOW BUSINESS

Positive Comments Platform 💬

The power of positivity

1. Problem/Opportunity❓

As we all know (and may have even experienced) the internet can be a cruel place.

Exhibit A:

This is particularly true for creators, like the 29m full-time creators in the USA, who have to endure a lot of hateful comments. And while that’s part of the job, it can still badly affect their mental health.

While they do receive positive comments, they tend to be drowned out by the negative ones.

So let’s create a product to help them to focus on the good.

2. Solution ✅

The idea is to create a platform shows a creator all the positive comments they receive across different social media platforms.

Here’s how it works. Creators sign up for the platform and link their different social media accounts. The platform then scrapes comments on their posts and uses sentiment analysis to differentiate between positive and negative comments. All the positive comments are then added to the app and categorised. The creator can then come on to the platform every so often and read the positive comments.

Creators also receive an email every morning with a randomised positive comment to start off their day on the right note.

3. Business Model 🏦

Go-to-market: Start by working with creators in a niche who receive more hateful comments and build from there

Monetisation: One-time payment for ongoing use of the tool

Startup Costs: This is extremely cheap to start since it’s a very simple tool

4. How You’ll Get Rich 💰

Go-to-market: Start by working with creators in a niche who receive more hateful comments and build from there

Monetisation: One-time payment for ongoing use of the tool

Startup Costs: This is extremely cheap to start since it’s a very simple tool

DRUNK BUSINESS IDEA

Cameo for Breakups

Are you looking to break up with your partner? Don’t know the best way to approach it?

Make the breakup just as memorable as the relationship with Dumpeo. Get your partner’s favourite celeb to send them a video to breakup with them. Say they’re a big fan of The Rock…who better to deliver the news than Dwayne Johnson himself.

Coming soon to an app store near you…

BIG DECK ENERGY

Theranos’ $28.5m Series C Deck

Year: 2006

Stage: Series C

Amount: $28.5m

Theranos was a consumer healthcare technology company that developed proprietary technologies for detecting, treating, and preventing blood-borne diseases.

Except…it wasn’t. It was a massive fraud purpotrated by Elizabeth Holmes who’s currently serving an 11 year prison sentence for her crimes.

She convinced investors to give her $700m over the life of the company and in 2006 she raised $28.5m from investors for the company’s series C.

Here’s the deck she used to do it.

THE MONEYSHOT

Making $100m from a Name Change

The crypto craze is in full swing right now, with Bitcoin sitting at a cool $70k right now.

But this isn’t peak crypto bull market. No, that can be best explained by looking at a very different company in a very different industry…iced tea.

Back in 2017 Long Island Brand Beverages, which produces ready-to-drink iced tea and lemonade under the "Long Island" brand, decided it was time for a rebrand.

So what did they rebrand to? Long Blockchain Corp.

That’s right, an iced tea manufacturer rebranded to long blockchain corp as part of a corporate shift towards "exploration of and investment in opportunities that leverage the benefits of blockchain technology"

You can’t make this shit up.

And guess what happened? The market loved it.

The company had a market value of $24m before the rebrand and shares traded up as much as 500% after the name change, valuing the company at $140m.

But it didn’t end well for the business. In 2018 they were delisted from the stock exchange and they have been investigated by the SEC and FBI for insider trading and securities fraud related to the name change.

Wild.

And that…as they say…is the tea.