Paul Graham explains why your startup shouldn’t stress over competitors

What makes companies.

Fail most of the.

Time is poor.

Execution by the founders. We often talk.

To startups.

Who are worried about competitors. And one advantage of YC having funded so many companies is you have a really large data set. And, like, how.

Many companies have been killed by competitors?

One. More than one. Like, out of 1900.

Right. I tell startups that basically you have the same protection.

Against competitors.

That that light aircraft.

Have against crashing into other.

Light aircraft.

When flying.

Through clouds. You know what the protection is? Space is large.

This falls under.

The rubric of counterintuitive.

Advice, because one of the things that.

Happens all the time is people come.

Up to them and say, oh, my God, there's another new company that's in exactly my space. What should I do?

Right? And it's sort of like if you're.

Running the hundred meters and suddenly there appears another lane with another runner in.

It, what should you do? Run as fast as you can, just like you presumably were. If they're better than you, they'll win.

And if not, then you'll win.