What Y Combinator's Request for Startups Requires From Those Seeking Capital in Silicon Valley

A lista de apostas da Y Combinator para o batch Fall 2026 inclui, pela primeira vez, uma tese assinada por um integrante do governo dos EUA. O padrão por trás das treze entradas funciona como um checklist implícito para quem tenta captar capital internacional.

Y Combinator's list of bets for the Fall 2026 batch includes, for the first time, a thesis signed by a member of the US government. The pattern behind the thirteen entries works as an implicit checklist for anyone trying to raise international capital.

A document that became a quarterly ritual

Y Combinator publishes its Request for Startups (RFS) every batch: a document in which the accelerator's partners, and sometimes founders from its own portfolio, describe the problems they most want to see solved. The current list, from the Fall 2026 batch, brings together thirteen theses signed by names like Pete Koomen, Diana Hu and, for the first time in the document's history, a sitting member of the US government: Daniel Driscoll, Secretary of the Army of the United States.

That alone is a strategic data point. YC doesn't usually invite public officials to sign investment theses. Driscoll's entry signals that venture capital and defense policy have stopped being separate worlds, at least in the United States.

For those who read the RFS as a fundraising tool, not as accelerator news, the value lies elsewhere: the pattern that repeats across the thirteen theses works as a portrait of what convinces, or dismisses, a US investor right now.

The pattern behind the thirteen bets

Each RFS entry follows the same rhetorical structure: a problem, a number that justifies the 'why now,' and, in most cases, a company from YC's own portfolio already tackling that problem. This isn't a writing coincidence. It's, in practice, the format the accelerator is teaching candidates to use when raising capital.

The common thread across the table's six rows is that none of them sells a vague trend. All of them tie the problem to a verifiable number and a named example. It's the opposite of the generic 'AI for X' pitch that flooded funding rounds in 2023 and 2024.

The Driscoll case: when the state becomes a VC thesis writer

Driscoll's entry details what the US Army is willing to fund directly: low-cost interceptors, sensors and software pluggable into open architecture, drones, and advanced manufacturing resistant to extreme climates. The text even promises capital and a proving ground for whoever builds in that direction.

There has never been a better time to build for the Army. The door is wide open, so let's get to work.

Daniel Driscoll, Secretary of the Army of the United States

The implication for founders outside the US is twofold. First, defense has stopped being an uncomfortable niche and become an investment category legitimized by a mass-consumer accelerator's document. Second, that door is, by definition, American: there is no Brazilian equivalent of a direct military contract opening up venture capital, which makes this thesis practically inaccessible for anyone building from Brazil without a US presence.

The direct message for those in Latin America

The crypto thesis, signed by Nemil Dalal, is the only one of the thirteen that explicitly cites companies focused on the region. The text mentions BlindPay and Infinia as responsible for building 'the developer interface and crypto ramps for Latin America,' alongside Aspora, which solves remittances for India.

Dalal's argument is that the crypto bear market, with falling prices and depleted narratives, is exactly the right moment to build: it pushes out the founder chasing quick liquidity and leaves only those solving a real financial infrastructure problem. YC has already invested in more than 100 crypto startups according to the text, and expects that number to rise.

For a Brazilian fintech or payment-rails founder, this is a concrete map: the 'crypto bridge for LatAm' thesis already has YC-funded proof of concept, which reduces the friction of convincing a US investor that the problem exists. The friction that remains is proving better execution than the already-funded competition.

The counterpoint: a wish list isn't a signed check

Treating the RFS as an official investment checklist has a problem at its root: each entry is written by an individual partner or founder, expressing personal interest, not an investment committee voting on the firm's priorities. Startups outside any listed theme keep getting accepted every batch, and a major portfolio success may well not have originated from any specific RFS.

In short: the RFS works better as a thermometer of where individual partners are paying attention than as an approval filter. A pitch outside the list isn't dismissed for that reason; a pitch inside the list isn't automatically in.

What's left for decision-makers in Brazil

The useful reading of the Fall 2026 RFS isn't to copy one of the thirteen themes. It's to copy the rhetorical structure the thirteen have in common: a specific problem, a verifiably sourced number that explains why this is the moment and not another, and a named example (preferably from one's own operation) proving the problem has already been tackled on a smaller scale.

Those seeking international capital from Brazil gain more by citing their own friction metric (how much it costs today to manually solve the problem the startup tackles) than by citing the AI trend that also appears in the pitch of a hundred other candidates. YC's RFS isn't a shortcut to approval; it's an example of how to argue without resorting to a round number pulled from a stage.

Source

1. Y Combinator, Request for Startups (RFS), Fall 2026 batch (https://www.ycombinator.com/rfs)