StartX is the startup accelerator, fellowship, and community for Stanford students, professors, and alumni. We provide resources, mentorship, and support to early-stage startups founded by Stanford-affiliated entrepreneurs.
StartX is open to startups from a wide range of industries, including technology, healthcare, biotech, and more. The program is looking for innovative and scalable ideas. We are vertical agnostic and tend to have companies in AI, Med, Sustainability, Consumer, Hardware, Enterprise, Web3, Education.
Yes, there is a selection process, and it can be competitive. StartX evaluates applications basedon various criteria, including the team, the market opportunity, and the startup’s potential forgrowth.
StartX does not take equity in the startups that go through our accelerator or fellowship program.
A Stanford-affiliated founder is someone who was/is a Stanford alumni, undergraduate student,graduate student, faculty member, postdoctoral scholar, academic staff member, or fellow in arecognized Stanford fellowship program. Additionally, the Stanford founder(s) must hold asignificant equity stake in the company. We make exceptions on a case-by-case basis if you arerecommended by multiple members of the StartX community.
Applications are open from mid-January to mid-February for the Summer cohort, from mid-Mayto mid-June for the Fall cohort, and from early September to early October for the Spring cohort.
Pre-register on startx.com/apply to receive all the information in due time.
Yes! You can apply to the accelerator or Student in Residence program, and you can applymultiple times!
If you’re an especially high-potential first-time founder that we’ve admitted into the StartX Community, we’ll start you out right away with 1-1 mentorship and educational seminars on the topics that affect you most. First-time founders also greatly benefit from our community of founders of different stages, board of advisors, fundraising coach, etc.
Plus, all companies receive $1.2M+ of free resources, as well as drop-in office space, legal advice, etc.
Experienced founders often rely on StartX's ability to provide educational training for their employees, access to industry & domain experts, and are given a peer group of other experienced founders in the same stage/role/industry to compare notes with.
We’ve had a ton of successful StartX repeat founders. Repeat founders often appreciate the value of community, and the program is customized each time and a different and more advanced program is provided for second / third time founders.
You can engage at whatever level makes the most sense for you. We usually recommend a2-hour-per-week commitment into the program. You will be invited to attend bi weekly peer-support groups and dinners with members of your batch and various in-person and virtual community events.
We’re looking for the best entrepreneurs who believe in the model of what we’re trying to build at StartX. Our approach is less about the company and more about the founders that build them.
Good question! The Student in Residence (SIR) Scholarship is a great stepping stone on your entrepreneurial journey, and can often help prepare you to apply to StartX. The SIR Scholarship provides financial aid to student entrepreneurs, as well as temporary 6 month access to select StartX resources.
Applications are reviewed by StartX alumni and trusted expert judges in our network.
Yes! StartX has one of the best medical programs in the world.
StartX Med companies include GigaGen, Lark, Gauss Surgical, Purigen Biosystems,AccuraGen, Freenome, Breathometer, Arterys, Eko device and many more! To learn more, visitStartX Med.
Yes, please submit separate application for each of your companies.
Every company that applies is offered customized advice & feedback on their specific company(from VCs, serial entrepreneurs, and StartX alumni) regardless of the outcome of the application!
You’ll receive an email near the end of the application process with the details.
Yes! We always encourage you to apply again. Our judges love being proven wrong. The application process itself can a learning opportunity of its own. Incorporate the advice & feedback that you receive, and continue to make progress in those areas!
An applicant mixer is an exclusive event for the founders that have submitted an application. It’s a unique opportunity to not only learn more about the program but also to meet and interact withStartX startups, staff and other fellow applicants.
Only applicants who’ve submitted an application are granted entrance.
We’re looking for the best entrepreneurs who believe in the model of what we’re trying to buildat StartX. A great way to find out what you need to be admitted is to have applied in a previoussession. Teams not admitted are always offered customized advice & feedback on what stepsthey can take to reach the next level. For companies earlier in their journey we recommendjoining our Student in Residence, Professor in Residence, or Entrepreneur in Residenceprograms.
A Stanford-affiliated founder is someone who was/is a Stanford undergraduate student,graduate student, faculty member, postdoctoral scholar, academic staff member, or fellow in arecognized Stanford fellowship program. Short-term executive/educational programs, continuingstudies, and certificate programs do not currently qualify.
This is difficult to say as the significance of the equity is relative to the number of founders onthe founding team and each of their equity. For example, if one founder has 95% and theStanford-affiliated founder has only 5%, our expert judges would question the validity of theStanford affiliation with regards to the company’s application to the program.
StartX typically admits serial entrepreneurs, industry or domain experts, Stanford professors,first-time founders, and well-funded/growth-stage companies. However, we do often acceptespecially high-potential first-time entrepreneurs as well.
We support all industries, historically ranging from biotech, informatics, medical device,hardware, fintech, cleantech, and non-profit to the more traditional consumer/enterprise/healthIT & deep tech.
The community has companies at all stages, whether you have only recently developed aninitial prototype or have already raised Series B+.
Our community offers access to networking events, educational workshops for startups,discounts on vendor services, two investor demo days per year, 1:1 mentorship opportunities,and more! Let us know if you have specific questions about our resources.
Solo founders are very welcome in the StartX community. Make sure during your application &interviews that you are very clear to the judges about what you will do, and what you willdelegate if you intend to operate this company as a solo founder for its full duration. Similarly, ifyou are thinking about potentially adding future co-founders, make sure to express that as well.
Having said that, the statistics show that 17.5% of StartX’s admitted startups are solo founderstartups. And, while the general success rate of solo founders in Silicon Valley is quite weak, wehave found that StartX’s solo founders perform very well — we believe this is because thesupport of a community can often offset the difficulty of not having day-to-day co-founders.
Experienced founders often rely on StartX’s ability to provide educational training for theiremployees, access to industry & domain experts, and are given a peer group of otherexperienced founders in the same stage/role/industry to compare notes with.
We’ve had a ton of successful StartX repeat founders. Repeat founders often appreciate thevalue of community, and the program is customized each time and a different and moreadvanced program is provided for second / third time founders.
Yes! We have a personalized track for Professors in Residence. This is a great option forStanford professors who cannot work full-time on their start-up. Their co-founders may also participate. Please email applicantsupport@startx.com if you have specific questions about what qualifies as a professor.
To qualify for “Stanford-affiliated” as a post-doctoral scholar, you need to be either:
We do not restrict the way you decide to be innovative. We accept startups creating something new or repurposing old ideas/products in a new way. Being a nonprofit also does not affect your chances of being admitted to the StartX community. If you are able to demonstrate a sustainable way to cover operating costs, then you can still be considered for StartX.
After submitting an application, a team of StartX judges reviews and makes a decision. If a team is moved forward, they complete a Round 1 interview with a panel of industry-specific judges, ranging from VCs to serial entrepreneurs. If a team moves to Round 2, they will complete multiple interviews, including a Culture interview with founders and technical interviews including any relevant technical employees. Finally, StartX judges or staff may reach out with any final questions or reference checks before a final admissions decision is made.
References should be people who know one or more of the founders for your team professionally and can speak to your abilities in your roles / your personality / convictions /efforts you’ve made building your company. They should not be customers. References will only be contacted after the second round of interviews.
References are different from recommendations. A reference is someone who personally knowsyou or your team. Recommendations are required for non-Stanford-affiliated companies. If aStartX alum wants to recommend you directly, they will need to go to startx.com/recommendations (after logging in).
To be eligible to apply for the Student-in-Residence program, you must be a current Stanford student/post-doc and must be a co-founder of the company with a significant equity stake. Your application must include all co-founders of the company, even those who are not active students at this time.
Here’s how we think about Student Scholarship vs. StartX Community:
Apply to the StartX Community as a student if:
Apply to the Student-in-Residence Scholarship as a student if:
You can, of course, apply for the scholarship this time, and apply for StartX next time — they arenot mutually exclusive!
The only constraint is that interviews for the StartX Community and Student Scholarships areheld on the same days, so if you are interested in applying for both, you should do so inseparate cycles.
We recommend attending the program in person to take advantage of being around peers in the same batch, alumni, and mentors in the community.
We also offer a virtual option with only 4 in-person required days at the beginning and the end of the program for non-local founders.
It is not a requirement of the StartX community that you are geographically located in the are awhile in the program. There are only a couple of session-mandatory events that will usually take place in our office in Palo Alto, and the rest of the programming (such as workshops or office hours) is opt-in.
Many of our founders are not located in the Bay Area. This is because StartX is a community without deadlines or a prescriptive program.
We aim to provide you, as a founder, with three things:
Here are a few examples of programming we built to deliver these results without requiring you to travel: