Survey of portfolio companies: 40% of founders say remote or decentralized is best for a new startup, most with offices will have 2 or 3 days in office per week
we've been increasingly funding companies all around the country and lately the world for 6 years now https://twitter.com/...
InitializedKim-Mai Cutler
Context & Ripple Effects
Initialized has been funding companies outside its home market for six years, so this portfolio survey reads as a checkpoint on that thesis rather than a pandemic snap reaction. The headline split — 40% of founders calling remote or decentralized best for a new startup, while most office-holders settle on 2-3 days in — lands between Facebook's earlier pledge to become the 'most forward-leaning company on remote work' with roughly half its staff remote ([[a:953933]]) and the fully remote YC S20 Demo Day that non-Western founders credited with putting them on equal footing with US peers ([[a:957420]]).
First-order effects
Founders running portfolio companies with offices now face a concrete scheduling decision — 2-3 in-office days per week becomes the default operating norm rather than a choice.
For new startups in the portfolio, 40% of founders are signaling they will build distributed from day one, changing hiring geography and cost structure at incorporation.
Second-order effects
Talent competition shifts toward whoever offers flexibility first: the related reporting shows 81% of sub-5K-employee companies already offer remote work versus 26% at 25K+ employers ([[a:841458]]), so large incumbents' return-to-office mandates hand early-stage rivals a recruiting edge.
VCs like Initialized widen their sourcing radius beyond coastal hubs, forcing other funds to either build out-of-market deal flow or concede deals to geographically flexible investors.
Third-order effects
If the hybrid 2-3 day pattern holds, startup formation decouples further from physical tech clusters, extending what YC's remote Demo Day started for international founders to domestic secondary markets.
Office-footprint economics for early-stage companies structurally shrink, making headcount location a capital-allocation decision rather than a real-estate one.
The trend: Startup work norms are settling into a remote-or-hybrid default set by small companies first, with venture funding following talent out of concentrated hubs.
There's been a ton of speculation of what Silicon Valley is going to look like after the pandemic when companies return to work. I've been interested in this for several years and I thought I'd add data to the conversation based on our founder surveys: https://blog.initialized.co…
Post-pandemic, the Bay Area will still be the leading physical hub for the industry. But it will be second to the cloud. You can see 2020 vs. 2021 numbers here: https://blog.initialized.com/ ... https://twitter.com/...
Great data analysis here. Wasn't until I looked back at deals I led that I saw this, but wasn't sure if it was bc I spent so much time outside of SF, or something else. (2016 vintage) 54% of my companies outside of SF (2018 vintage) 71% of my companies outside of SF https://twitt…
Start-up founders say they will move to 2-3 days in the office post-pandemic, but that won't be the case for larger companies. As one F100 CTO told me, “We moved back into the cities after the Black Plague. We're going to move back into the offices.” https://blog.initialized.com/…
Here's a funny thing. I've 100% been hearing the opposite. People are hitting Covid walls. They REALLY WANT to leave their houses. This comes back to: whatever whatever percentage of founders say: what does the talent want https://www.techmeme.com/...
Future of workplace survey data by @kimmaicutler 1/3 startup companies plan to be all remote or decentralized Other 2/3 plan half time remote, few expect employees to work all days in the office 40% founders say best place to start company is remote https://blog.initialized.com/ …
Peak Silicon Valley for Initialized was actually 2014— we've been increasingly funding companies all around the country and lately the world for 6 years now https://twitter.com/...
The majority of our founders also don't expect to make salary adjustments based on local market rates: https://blog.initialized.com/ ... https://twitter.com/...
This data-backed post dispels the myth that tech is leaving the Bay Area in a pandemic epiphany. Bay Area tech peaked in 2014. Distributed companies are the future. Otherwise, there's 4x more interest in founding a company in SF than Austin. https://blog.initialized.com/ ...
Great post by @kimmaicutler surveying 90 tech cos on how COVID has changed their outlook on where to work. Response doesn't support the “Everyone in the Valley is moving to Miami!” narrative. Remote now rules but the Bay Area as HQ choice remains strong. https://blog.initialized.…
Distributed/remote is the #1 choice for Initialized founders if they were starting from a blank slate. This is a huge shift from majority SF this time last year. https://twitter.com/...
Thanks for sharing @drorpoleg! Great data points. No question the future of work is hybrid and increasingly decentralized. “Post-pandemic, the Bay Area will be the second leading technology hub after the cloud.” https://blog.initialized.com/ ...