Y Combinator: agent readiness, investment criteria and pitch path

Mountain View, United States · founded 2005 · North America · scanned 31 October 2026

Agent-Ready Index2851st of 97
Agent tasks0.5of 3 verified tasks
Readiness levelL1Basic Web Presence
Checks passed5/25all decided

WEEK BY WEEK

The index is scanned again every week; this firm's history starts with the 26 Oct edition (28).

Every weekly edition is reviewed by a person before it goes live. Week-by-week data for all firms: history.json.

FIVE PARTS OF THE INDEX

Discoverability40%
Content for agents33%
Bot access50%
APIs, MCP and auth0%
Agent tasks17%

Each part counts 20%. Parts are the share of their checks passed; agent tasks give half credit for criteria only in page prose and for a pitch form.

THREE AGENT TASKS

½ Prose only

Can an agent discover the investment criteria?

“Four times a year we invest $500k in a select group of startups.” (ticket · html)
“We invest $500,000 in each company.” (ticket · html)
“When we fund companies that are further along, we work with them differently and help them with different things compared to early-stage startups.” (stage · html)
✗ No

Can it access APIs or MCP tools?

No MCP server card, API catalog, OpenAPI document or WebMCP tools.

✗ Email or none

Can it find a structured pitch-submission path?

Email only: apply@ycombinator.com.

Checked by hand: The application form sits behind a sign-in: ycombinator.com/apply links to account.ycombinator.com and apply.ycombinator.com, so an agent cannot reach it without a login. The apply@ mailbox on that page is for questions. source

FIRM PROFILE

Fund size

Not stated on its site.

Ticket

“Four times a year we invest $500k in a select group of startups.” — source

Stage, in its words

“When we fund companies that are further along, we work with them differently and help them with different things compared to early-stage startups.” — source

Backed (as listed on its site)
DoordashAirbnbCoinbaseInstacartGrowwMeeshoGitlabDropbox
WebsitePortfolioReceipts (JSON)

EVERY CHECK

Discoverability

✓robots.txt — A valid robots.txt is published (4 User-agent groups).
✓Sitemap — A sitemap is published.
✗Link headers — Homepage Link header has no agent-useful relations.
✗DNS-AID — DNS for AI Discovery (DNS-AID) records not found under _agents.
✗Organization identity — No Organization structured data on the homepage.

Content for agents

✗Markdown on request — Accept: text/markdown answered HTTP 404.
✗llms.txt — No /llms.txt found.
✓Readable without JavaScript — The server HTML carries the page text (1543 of 1543 words).

Bot access

✓AI bot rules — No AI-specific groups; the wildcard rules apply to AI crawlers.
✗Content Signals — No Content-Signal directive in robots.txt.
✗AI usage signals — No AI usage preferences declared (Content Signals, IETF Content-Usage, TDMRep or noai).
–Web Bot Auth — No Web Bot Auth directory (informational: only for sites that run their own bots).
✓AI agents can get in — 7 of 7 AI crawlers are allowed and reached the page.

APIs, MCP and auth

✗API catalog — No API catalog found.
✗OAuth discovery — No OAuth/OIDC discovery metadata found.
✗Protected Resource — No valid /.well-known/oauth-protected-resource.
✗auth.md — auth.md not found.
✗MCP server card — MCP Server Card not found.
✗A2A agent card — A2A Agent Card not found.
✗Agent Skills — Agent Skills index not found.
✗WebMCP — No WebMCP tools were registered while the page loaded.
✗ARD manifest — No ARD capability manifest found.
✗Personal Agent Protocol — No Personal Agent Protocol manifest (/.well-known/poppy.json).

Agent actions

✗Criteria for agents — Key facts appear only in page prose (ticket, stage), not in llms.txt, Markdown, JSON-LD or an API.
✗API / MCP access — No API or MCP entry point for agents (no MCP card, API catalog, OpenAPI document or WebMCP tools).
✗Pitch path agents can finish — Only an email address (apply@ycombinator.com) — no structured path for agents.

Commerce

–x402 — x402 payment protocol not detected (not a commerce site).
–MPP — MPP payment discovery not detected (not a commerce site).
–UCP — UCP profile not found (not a commerce site).
–ACP — ACP discovery document not found (not a commerce site).
–AP2 — AP2 not detected (no A2A Agent Card) (not a commerce site).

NEARBY IN THE INDEX

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FAQ

What is Y Combinator's ticket size?

Y Combinator states on its website: "Four times a year we invest $500k in a select group of startups." (read on 31 October 2026).

How do you pitch Y Combinator?

Y Combinator lists an email address (apply@ycombinator.com) on its pitch page but no structured form or tool an agent can use. The application form sits behind a sign-in: ycombinator.com/apply links to account.ycombinator.com and apply.ycombinator.com, so an agent cannot reach it without a login. The apply@ mailbox on that page is for questions.

Is Y Combinator agent-ready?

Y Combinator scores 28 out of 100 in the Agent-Ready VC Index (rank 51 of the firms we could fully check) and reaches agent-readiness Level 1 (Basic Web Presence), passing 5 of 25 checks.

Agent-ready services

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Want to be the firm an AI agent can work with? Reaudit's team gets your site there and shows the result with the same 31 checks used in this study, before and after.

  • Agents find youAI search and agents discover your site, know who you are and reach the pages that matter.
  • Agents understand youYour investment criteria, product or pricing in a form an agent can read, quote and compare.
  • Agents can actA structured way for an agent to take the next step for its user: pitch, book, ask or buy.
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Or write to rose@reaudit.io

Part of The Agent-Ready VC Index by Rose Samaras, Reaudit. GET requests only, nothing submitted. Is this your firm? Get a free report on your site.