Y Combinator and Oishii

Most Innovative Companies

Y Combinator has become arguably the most powerful force in tech. It touts that five-and-a-half of the startups that have participated in it have become unicorns . . . which is at least double that of rival accelerators such as TechStars and 500 Global. But it started suffering from exactly the kind of corporate bloat that its founder Paul Graham abhorred.

Current president and CEO Garry Tan—who also happens to be a YC alum—took over last January and promised to reclaim YC’s roots and focus on serving early-stage founders. Here’s Fast Company senior writer Ainsley Harris to help fill us in on the behind-the-scenes action.

In theory, there are a lot of benefits to indoor farming . . . they often use 90% less water than traditional farms and can produce year-round crops, but we’ve also seen a whole bunch of companies like AeroFarms, AppHarvest, and others really struggle to make the unit economics work. We wanted to hear from Oishii cofounder and CEO Hiroki Koga. His luxury strawberries can be purchased at Whole Foods for $15. Here, he talks about the challenges of vertical farming, and explains why he recently raised a whopping $134 million to expand his operation.