YES!Delft

Frequently Asked Questions

General

  • YES!Delft is a tech startup incubator based in South Holland, The Netherlands.

  • We support startups and scale-ups becoming successful companies by providing a set of programs, networking events, support in getting funding and help in attracting the right talent.

  • An incubator helps entrepreneurs with the development and growth of their startup, with a focus on early-stage startups, by thinking along with new business ideas, in order to market a product or service in the right way. When startups are joining an incubator they will commit for a longer period of time. This takes place on a long-term basis, with mentoring, access to finance and network support.

    Accelerators offer entrepreneurs a mentoring experience spanning several months. During this period, they receive assistance in securing financing and building essential networks, enabling them to focus on their startup's growth and success through a structured program.

  • YES!Delft is a startup incubator that offers services and programs for startups, including an accelerator program.

  • YES!Delft is a non-profit organization and doesn’t take equity from startups. Our shareholders are TU Delftthe municipality of Delft, and the Erasmus University Rotterdam. We rely on the support from our shareholders and the partnerships with corporates and public organizations.

  • Yes, we only support tech startups. They can either have a technological innovation or have an interesting business innovation that uses complex technology.

  • YES!Delft does not take equity. We work with a program fee and success fee (only for the Accelerator Program) with our startups.

  • YES!Delft was founded to create a sustainable and strong supporting infrastructure for entrepreneurs. In addition, YES!Delft helps young innovators and entrepreneurs to find the necessary support and resources to build successful start-ups. Because of the effective way of working, startups grow faster than normal and the chance of failing is smaller. As an incubator, we help a team go from an idea to a saleable product or service. In this way, young companies can achieve success in the field of innovation and development.

    An incubator is only truly successful when its startups grow more successful than average and only a small part of them fail. The performance and success factors of incubators are determined differently for each incubator. At YES!Delft we can say that we are successful with 83% of our startups that are still alive after 5 years. To achieve our successes we have a knowledge ecosystem of service and corporate partners that contribute to the growth of the startups.

Joining the incubator

  • YES!Delft takes pride in its startups, mentors, Entrepreneurs in Residence, corporate partners, service partners, experts, and methodology. Thanks to this ecosystem, we can support tech entrepreneurs to build tomorrow’s leading companies. We are a non-profit organization and we take zero equity from your startup. Our focus is to empower and enable founders to contribute to a better world.

  • When you have a tech startup based on an innovative and scalable business idea, and you have considered your business model and market, you are welcome to apply for our programs. Find more information on our services or fill in our application form directly here. As soon as we’ve read your document, you will receive a follow-up email about the procedure.

  • YES!Delft has a broad network of coaches and mentors and carefully selects those people that supplement our ecosystem and answer to the needs of our startups. All coaches work on a voluntary basis and in full confidentiality with regard to our startups. Aspiring mentors and coaches can contact us and ask for our Community Manager.

  • No, diverse and multi-disciplinary greatly outperform single co-founder teams, globally and our data suggests this as well. If you cannot manage to convince people to join you on your mission and put trust in their capabilities, you cannot build a team and a company. Y-Combinator, Techstars, and other leading incubators worldwide adopt this “no single co-founders” policy as well. At our CO-LAB event you can meet potential co-founders. More information can be found on the Co-Lab page. 

  • In case you don’t have a specific tech idea but would like to become co-founder of a startup you could sign up for Co-Lab. Co-Lab is our monthly event where we challenge you to collaborate with fellow entrepreneurs. You will get the tools, knowledge, and connections to find your co-founder or join someone’s startup idea. Participation is free, but registration through our website is necessary. 

  • It always depends, but most often it is. If you are a person with an idea and you do not have a co-founder or have not done any sort of work to push your idea further (e.g. try a prototype or research into the idea), then our earliest program (Validation Lab) will not provide you with value at the right time.

  • Once you fill out a form for any of our programs (see services) on the website, one of our startup scouts will evaluate your application and get in touch with you to either follow up on your answers or ask you for an intake. From then on, the time from application until admission into the incubator depends on the programs we have open and their deadlines. However, if the intake with one of the startup scouts is successful, you will be asked to fill out our template pitch deck. The scout will evaluate it, and decide if you can join the Selection Day for the program that you are applying for, where you and your co-founder will pitch in front of a jury. The jury will then decide if you are accepted into YES!Delft or not. No worries, after the Selection Day, there’s only a couple of days until you find out the final decision.

  • At YES!Delft, we advise startups to file for patents (when this is the case) or to have the freedom to operate for their innovations, as soon as they can. We don’t support financially the patent application process, but we do help our startups with recommendations of specialised lawyers and they can get more support in the community for specific deep tech industries.

  • Yes, our mission is to support the startups with the infrastructure we have here, in The Netherlands.

    We are a regional tech incubator, with offices in Delft, The Hague and Rotterdam. This allows us to add value to local startups with our ecosystem. Even though our methodology could apply to your stage and help your startup, our mission is to support the startups with the infrastructure we have here in the Netherlands.

  • No. We are happy to welcome startups from all over the world, as long as they are planning to move here, in The Netherlands with a valid reason. In addition, some of our programs are open European startups, so geographical diversity is only encouraged.

  • Yes, we are a facilitator organization for startup visa support for the startups selected in one of our programs.

  • We are a tech incubator who is always excited to invite startups running within complex technology ideas that are competitive, unique, and scalable.

    Startups who are aiming to relocate to the Netherlands, have two committed founders and are also pivotal to add value to our ecosystem as a regional tech incubator.

  • Yes, we are very open to hear and discuss your groundbreaking tech innovations! You can reach out to contact us.

Validation Lab

  • Your startup needs to meet the criteria mentioned in the program guide, namely a startup with a minimum of two committed co-founders, an innovative technology solution, and to be in the stage of needing to validate your business idea and focus on your problem-solution fit.

  • All of our programs take place in our incubator in Delft. Some activities may take place somewhere else like Rotterdam or The Hague.

  • The Validation Labs have a commitment fee of € 799,- (excl. VAT) per team of two founders | + €500,-(excl. VAT) for every next founder attending the sessions.

  • By participating in the Validation Lab, you acquire the right skills, receive an extensive toolset & get access to the YES!Delft ecosystem to tackle the biggest challenges you’ll face during the whole lifecycle of your startup. Joining the program allows you to validate your business idea, talking to many customers, and find your Problem-Solution Fit, whilst learning about different aspects of your business, e.g. legal, funding, and team.

  • The Validation Lab is a 10-week program. The first two weeks are designed to help you understand and select the right market, customer, and problem to solve and build a strong value proposition. In the following weeks, we host sessions with experts and organize deep dives in topics such as Legal & IP, Business Modelling, Team, Finance & Funding and pitching. During the program, you will focus on talking to your customers and getting out of the building to validate your assumptions. Throughout the program, you will be guided and supported by our startup coaches, your mentor, experts, and your peers in the program. 

  • One of the main reasons startups fail is lack of market demand. Our methodology and tools help you to validate your idea as quickly as possible and reduce uncertainty and risk. We don’t want you to be spending time and money on building startups and products that nobody wants.

Accelerator Program

  • An incubator helps entrepreneurs with the development and growth of their startup, with a focus on early-stage startups, by thinking along with new business ideas, in order to market a product or service in the right way. When startups are joining an incubator they will commit for a longer period of time. This takes place on a long-term basis, with mentoring, access to finance and network support.

    Accelerators offer entrepreneurs a mentoring experience spanning several months. During this period, they receive assistance in securing financing and building essential networks, enabling them to focus on their startup's growth and success through a structured program.

  • Your startup needs to meet the criteria mentioned in the program guide. The Accelerator Program is designed for hardware and digital startups with a committed founding team of at least 2 individuals, that have validated Problem-Solution Fit, built a working prototype or MVP, have some traction in the market and have the potential to scale. In addition, you have an innovative technology solution, a registered startup in the Netherlands, freedom to operate or an IP patent and a runway of at least 6 months.

  • The Accelerator Program is a 3-month program and helps you to strengthen the foundation of your startup and accelerate your traction in the market.

    During the first two kick-off weeks, you’ll get to know your peers in the batch, YES!Delft and our ecosystem. You focus on your long-term vision and short term plan towards Product-Market Fit. You will be evaluated and challenged by our Entrepreneurs-in-Residence and experts and matched to a mentor to help you move forward. The Accelerator Program contains weekly tailored masterclasses and workshops in different fields, such as Go-to-Market & Sales, Finance & Funding, Legal & IP, HR & Team and Personal Development and Leadership. All masterclasses and workshops are given by professionals and experts in their field. In addition, we host peer-to-peer sessions to help each other and connect you to relevant partners and experts for 1-on-1 sessions.

  • Yes, you can apply. YES!Delft supports entrepreneurs who build complex products (both hardware and digital) in challenging markets, often with a run-up time, long development trajectories and expensive prototyping involved. As such, many startups in our Accelerator Program have already received funding. 

  • You’ll become a YES!Delft startup! We put the entrepreneur first, commit for the long-term and don’t take equity. We offer tailored advice, support and connections to accelerate your startup. During and after the Accelerator Program, you have access to the one of a kind YES!Delft ecosystem with experienced mentors, experts, trainers, service partners, corporates and fellow entrepreneurs. YES!Delft works with a small success fee based on revenue milestones which is reinvested into the incubator.

  • The program fee is € 2.750,- (excl. VAT) per team. Additional terms may apply for some services. You will only be asked to pay this one-time kickback fee of 5K when you reach 250K in annual revenue and a fee of 20K when you reach 1M in annual revenue.

Startup Jobs

  • If you are looking for a startup job, you can visit the Startup Jobs page on YES!Talents website. In case you don’t find an interesting position you can send your open application to all YES!Delft startups via this link. If a startup finds your profile interesting they will contact you directly.

  • In case you don’t find an interesting position you can send your open application to all YES!Delft startups via this link. If a startup finds your profile interesting they will contact you directly.

  • In case you don’t have a specific tech idea but would like to become co-founder of a startup you could sign up for Co-Lab. Co-Lab is our monthly event where we challenge you to collaborate with fellow entrepreneurs. You will get the tools, knowledge, and connections to find your co-founder or join someone’s startup idea. Participation is free, but registration through our website is necessary. 

  • Working for a startup offers a window of opportunities, freedom, and responsibility, as well as a lively and rapidly changing environment, where you are able to learn and grow. Startups within YES!Delft are always looking for talent, whether that is full-time employees, part-timers or interns/students. If you are interested to work for a startup, you can register for our Talent List or check out the job openings at our Startup Job Page

    When registered for the Talent List you may be approached when one of the startups thinks you would be a good fit for their job opening and team culture. When applying to one of the vacancies on the Startup Job Page, the startups will get back to you based on your resume and motivation. 

  • YES!Delft has a strong collaboration with the TU Delft and Erasmus University Rotterdam. YES!Talents is one of the services of YES!Delft offering startups within the ecosystem help and advice concerning their team, recruitment, and HR. At the moment YES!Talents services are solely offered to YES!Delft startups. If you are a YES!Delft startup and seek assistance with hiring talents from TU Delft or Erasmus University Rotterdam, please send a message to talents@yesdelft.nl.

  • YES!Talents can help you with your HR structure. We can put you in contact with some of our HR experts, as well as legal experts which will be able to assist you in creating the most suitable HR structure for your specific organization. When you are a YES!Delft startup, Office Hours are available with HR experts on Union where you can book a timeslot for 1-on-1 advice. 

  • First of all, it is a unique experience to start working at a startup. Startups still have every opportunity to grow and that involves a lot of innovation and creativity. In addition, you learn a lot because you are often involved in different activities and you get a lot of responsibility. This probably gives you the right motivation because you have to make smart decisions to perform well for the startup. Because startups need to grow fast, you work in an innovative environment with a close and dynamic team. The growth of the startup also has an attractive share in your career path.

  • It is important that you look at references from the founders of the startup. Here you look at work experience, previous successes, educational background, and more. In addition, it is important that you look at the composition of the team and whether the startup suits you. Interested to see what YES!Delft startups have to offer? Find them here. 

Funding and investments

  • YES!Delft does not invest money in startups directly. However, we have services and programs to help you get funded, a large network of investors and banks, plus decades of financial experience to match you with these investors and help you get your funding in order. In addition to that, we don’t take any equity from startups.

  • YES!Delft has funding programs and services to help startups in any phase of their lifecycle with their funding plan, matching them with our investor network, and assisting them in deal-making, both with private and public funding. When you are part of the YES!Delft Slack, you can download our financial lifecycle planning document (pdf).

    For more information about our funding programs and services, see our Investor Readiness Program and Strategic Funding Support consultancy service.

  • Yes, with our deal-making service. After evaluating your Investor Readiness Level, we will support you in preparing the right material and refining your storyline to introduce you to investors in our network that match your profile.

  • If you are already in contact with an investor or if you got offers from multiple investors, we can help you close the deal. We can support you in various ways: evaluating who’s a good investor for you, making sure a term sheet is convenient for all parties involved, support in the due diligence process, and the entire deal-making process until you get the money in your bank account.

  • We offer support with finding and executing both private investment and public funding instruments. We aim for the best mix of both types of instruments. For public funds, such as grants and soft loans, we work with our partner Benedict Peax, strategic funding consultants.

  • YES!Delft treasures its network of investors and we are constantly looking to expand this. The importance of (seed) capital is evident for the success of startups. Get in touch with our Investment Director Jan Geert van Hall of our YES!Funded team to find out what we can offer you.

  • Yes! Due diligence can be arduous and time-consuming, and as a startup, you do not always have a complete data room at your fingertips. We can assist you and support you in giving sufficient comfort to prospective investors.

  • Yes, we think it is essential to draft a shareholders’ agreement that keeps in mind the goals and objectives of the parties and to come up with creative governance solutions to suit everyone’s needs. Too often parties are negotiating pre-drafted agreement templates and lose sight of what it is that they actually want to agree upon.

  • Yes, our experience is that applying for grants and subsidies takes a lot of time and know-how. YES!Delft is a proud partner of Benedict Peax, they are specialized in doing this. They can not only help with writing applications but will also help find the right funding strategy and assess different available instruments for your startup.

Partners and collaborations

  • Of course! YES!Delft has a very active partnership ecosystem. We are always interested in new partners. Our core mission is to ensure the success of our entrepreneurs. Our partnership program achieves this by making the right connections to our ecosystem. We can also leverage our experience with startup way-of-working to accelerate your internal innovation processes. Our partnerships are always customized to your needs, so we would like to discuss the opportunities with you. You can learn more about our corporate partnerships on our partner page. Get in touch with our Head of Partnerships via the contact page.

  • YES!Delft has a broad network of coaches and mentors and carefully selects those people that supplement our ecosystem and answer to the needs of our startups. All coaches work on a voluntary basis and in full confidentiality with regard to our startups. Aspiring mentors and coaches can contact us and ask for our Community Manager.

  • YES!Delft has a broad network of coaches and mentors and carefully selects those people that supplement our ecosystem and answer to the need of our startups. All coaches work on a voluntary basis and in full confidentiality with regard to our startups. Aspiring mentors and coaches can contact us and ask for our Communication Manager.

  • We love to connect our startups to the best suppliers and service providers in the world. YES!Delft has a separate program for Service Partners. If you want to get access to our startups you are more than welcome to contact us to discuss the possibilities. In order to maximize the value for our startups, we ask of you that you offer a discount programme for our startups. In exchange we will actively involve you in our programs and promote your services to our startups.

  • If you want to promote your event to our startup, please  and we will consider promoting it on our internal community platform MyYES!Delft and on our internal Slack channel.

  • As YES!Delft we’re always eager to collaborate with organizers of different startup and tech related events and conferences, both in and outside The Netherlands. We already collaborated with the biggest European tech conferences like TNW, VivaTech, Hello Tomorrow, etc. 

    If you want to partner up with us please send your request to marketing@yesdelft.nl and we will make sure to come back to you as soon as possible.

Office and locations

  • We have three different locations in Zuid-Holland, The Netherlands:
    - Our headquarters is in Delft, we’re on the southern part of the TU Delft Campus.
    - In 2018 we opened our Digital Hub in The Hague in collaboration with the Municipality of The Hague.
    - In November 2020 we opened our third office at the Erasmus University Rotterdam, where work closely together with Erasmus Enterprise in order to promote, stimulate, and accelerate entrepreneurship at the EUR.

  • Indeed we have offices in Delft, Rotterdam and The Hague. Delft is our main location. Rotterdam and The Hague are close to Delft, all three cities are in the same province (Zuid-Holland). We believe in the concept of a regional incubator, where different startup ecosystems can work together and build one of the best startup regions in Europe.

    In The Hague we work closely together with the municipality of The Hague and Governmental organisations. The office is located in The Hague Tech, a building that houses multiple (YES!Delft) startups.

    In Rotterdam we focus our activities on students and early stage entrepreneurs. We provide custom made programs, organise events in which we connect startups to students and we have office space available for startups.

  • For renting office space, we kindly refer you to the owner of the building: TDVG. Startups within our programs or ecosystem have priority over to other startups or businesses.

  • We have 3 main options for holding events within our main building in Delft:

    • Auditorium (90p)
    • Business Lounge (40p)
    • Greenhouse (30p)

    For more formal meetings we also have the Executive Room (20p). For larger events, we can arrange the Main Hall for you, where there is room for up to 200 people.

  • Yes, please send an email to events@yesdelft.nl if you want to organise something together with YES!Delft.

    You can also contact the building owner directly if you prefer to organize an event without the involvement of YES!Delft.

  • No, we don’t sell memberships or desks inside the YES!Delft office. If you want to rent office space you can contact TDVG. Startups within our programs or ecosystem have priority compared to other startups or businesses.

  • Yes, at YES!Delft we have a lot of different services that we offer to startups inside the building. Via our community platform you can book meeting rooms, etc. Contact us form more information.

  • No, it is not possible to visit YES!Delft unless you have an appointment with one of our team members.

News and events

  • In terms of events, you can find upcoming events on our website. For updates and stories, you can check the latest news and you can subscribe to our newsletter. You can also find us on LinkedIn where we post regular updates.

  • You can find our upcoming events on this website.

    Often you can register to participate in an event, but be aware that some of our events are invite-only to guarantee YES!Delft’s core principle of putting our startup’s interest first. If you have an innovative idea, you can apply to join YES!Delft and become a YES!Delft startup entrepreneur yourself. 

  • We have 3 main options for holding events within our main building in Delft:

    • Auditorium (90p)
    • Business Lounge (40p)
    • Greenhouse (30p)

    For more formal meetings we also have the Executive Room (20p). For larger events, we can arrange the Main Hall for you, where there is room for up to 200 people.

  • Yes, please send an email to events@yesdelft.nl if you want to organise something together with YES!Delft.

    You can also contact the building owner directly if you prefer to organize an event without the involvement of YES!Delft.

  • We organize events together with our partners in order to support the startups, or solve our partners’ challenges with startup innovations. However, if you are not a partner we might be able to arrange something together as well. Send your idea to events@yesdelft.nl to submit your event idea.

  • As YES!Delft we’re always eager to collaborate with organizers of different startup and tech related events and conferences, both in and outside The Netherlands. We already collaborated with the biggest European tech conferences like TNW, VivaTech, Hello Tomorrow, etc. 

    If you want to partner up with us please send your request to marketing@yesdelft.nl and we will make sure to come back to you as soon as possible.

Contacting YES!Delft

  • On the About page, you can find all our team members with their specific job title and a link to their LinkedIn profile. If you have any general questions or you don’t know who is able to help you, you can send and contact us and we will make sure to redirect you to the right member of the team.

  • If you have specific questions about our programs and services, please contact our startup scout at startupscout@yesdelft.nl. If you have questions about our events and activities open to the public, please send an email to events@yesdelft.nl. If you have a question about marketing, contact us at marketing@yesdelft.nl. Are you interested in activities in Rotterdam, then reach out to Rotterdam@yesdelft.nl

    If you have general inquiries about YES!Delft and you’re not sure about who is able to help you out, contact info@yesdelft.nl and we will make sure to redirect your message to the right member of the team.

  • Because our resources are limited and our team’s main focus is on supporting the startups in our ecosystem, we are not able to personally connect you to individual startups or do interviews with you regarding our incubator. We do however welcome you to visit the About page on this website for more general information about our incubator. Go to our Startups page to find an overview of our startups and individual contact details. Feel free to contact our startups directly!

  • First of all, thank you for your interest in YES!Delft. As we are a non-profit organization and have limited resources, we are currently not considering sponsorships in this area. Feel free to get in touch with our Student Board (YES!Delft Students) to discuss potential opportunities with them.

  • YES!Delft exists of a rather small team that is devoted to facilitating entrepreneurs in building tomorrow’s leading firms. This means that we are unfortunately not always available for interviews. If you want to know more about what we do as an incubator, please find more information here

  • As YES!Delft we’re always eager to collaborate with organizers of different startup and tech related events and conferences, both in and outside The Netherlands. We already collaborated with the biggest European tech conferences like TNW, VivaTech, Hello Tomorrow, etc. 

    If you want to partner up with us please send your request to marketing@yesdelft.nl and we will make sure to come back to you as soon as possible.

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