It's too soon to say for most startups in the recent classes. From earlier rounds, there have been successful exits like AppJet, ReMail, Reddit, Omnisio, Zenter, as well as startups that appear to be thriving like Loopt, Justin.tv, Weebly, Scribd, AirBnb, Xobni...too many to count. YC started in 2005, and it can take 5 years sometimes to see if a startup is successful, so we'll have to wait and see who makes it big over the next few years.
Judging by the success we've seen so far, it looks like YC is getting better and better each year. We'll see a few solid exits per class in the years to come, and I'll bet it won't be long before we see a massive acquisition on the scale of YouTube which will really catapult YC into the spotlight (what's 6% of $1.65 billion?)
YC won't get 6% of such a deal. A massive acquisition like that usually happens after a round or two of funding diluting the original ownership interest.
Very true...in the case of YouTube, there were two rounds of investment at $3.5 and 8 million I believe. But still, any percent of $1.65 billion is a nice chunk of change.
True, hence the qualification "judging by the success we've seen so far" at the beginning of the paragraph. Based on what we've been seeing so far, and since the classes appear to be getting both stronger and larger, it's reasonable to expect this success to continue in the future. Even more so as the economy gets better.
Do you really think that out of 25-35 per class we won't see at least 2-3 who successfully exit or become profitable within 5+ years? If the YC team didn't expect as much, they wouldn't doing this anymore.
Judging by the success we've seen so far, it looks like YC is getting better and better each year. We'll see a few solid exits per class in the years to come, and I'll bet it won't be long before we see a massive acquisition on the scale of YouTube which will really catapult YC into the spotlight (what's 6% of $1.65 billion?)