文/Jason D. Rowley（Mattermark 网站的撰稿人、独立研究员）
几个星期前，我们曾问过这样一个问题：“如果有 100 个初创企业成功地获得了种子轮融资，那在这 100 个公司当中，有多少能够继续发展到 A 轮融资？获得 A 轮融资的企业中，又有多少能够继续到 B 轮？（以此类推）（备注：这与初创企业成功获得种子轮融资的比例是两个不同的问题）答案是“这个数量惊人的少”。
本周，我们还是想围绕这个问题，稍作改变，来探讨一下。美国哪一个创业中心的初创企业生存几率最高，能够获得一轮又一轮的融资？换言之，如果通常来说，初创企业的处境（至少在融资方面）都是捉襟见肘、令人犯难、粗野并且短暂，那在哪些地方初创企业的处境不至于这么惨呢？
在这里，我们将从原来的 2011 家公司（在 2009 年 1 月 1 日至 2012 年 12 月 31 日期间获得种子轮融资的 2011 家企业，这个数量已经有足够说服力，包括了 2009 年获得种子轮的 Uber 和 Airbnb 以及 2012 年获得种子轮的 Snapchat。我们认为，从那时起到现在的时间足够来观察其中一些企业后期的融资和发展情况）中选择最具代表性的六大都市区，并将这些区域的初创企业生存率与平均值进行比较。
这六大都市地区为：旧金山湾区、纽约市、波士顿、洛杉矶、西雅图和芝加哥。
我们将对这六大都市的初创企业表现状况做一个观察，然后结合我们之前在 Mattermark 上所做的 城市调查信息, 尝试找出这些汇总信息对于企业家、投资人和公民领袖背后的价值。
六大都市区初创企业生存状况
在之前 Mattermark 文章中，我们已经明确了是旧金山、纽约市和波士顿这些地方主导着美国的初创企业生态系统。在融资频率、融资金额、并购举措或者其他方面，这三个地区都是处于遥遥领先的位置。那在初创企业生存方面是否也是这样呢？下面让我们来探讨一下。
下面左右两侧图表显示的是相同的数据，但是纵轴比例不同（横轴代表融资轮次 A-F，纵轴代表获得该轮融资的企业比例）。
红线显示的是我们这 2011 家企业数据库中初创企业的生存率，蓝线表示的是该特定城市的初创企业生存率。当蓝线低于红线时，就意味着这个城市的初创企业生存率低于全国平均水平。
由上图可以看出，纽约和旧金山的初创企业生存率都高于全国平均水平，而波士顿的初创企业在早期融资的表现落后于全国平均水平，但是到 C 轮融资之后开始呈现赶超趋势。
那么，剩下的三个相对小一些的都市创业中心呢？
由上图数据可知，洛杉矶和芝加哥在所有融资轮中都接近或者说与全国平均水平保持相同的数据，在某些融资轮的数据甚至略高于全国平均水平。
西雅图的数据让人有些惊讶，其初创企业生存率低于全国平均水平，并且成陡然下降趋势。此外，在我们的数据库中，这六大都市区创业中心，只有芝加哥和西雅图在 2009 至 2012 年期间获得种子轮的初创企业没有获得 C 轮之后的融资。
这六大都市区以外的其他地方情况怎样呢？其他地区也有很多规模较小但充满活力的创业中心，例如奥斯汀、科罗拉多州博尔德（Boulder）、华盛顿特区和奥尔良等，但是这些地区在 2009 至 2012 年期间只有少数几个获得种子轮的初创企业，所以没有足够的数据来获取这些地区的总体信息。
所以，剩下的这些 34 个大都市区（加上我们数据库中的其它城市）在 2009 至 2012 年期间获得种子轮融资的初创企业大约占到了全部初创企业 25% 的份额。显而易见，小规模的城市初创企业生存率远远低于大型都市区创业中心以及全国平均水平。
可能性原因分析
然后，让我们先假设一下，未能成功获得后续轮次融资可能是以下三个原因之一：
1. 公司倒闭
2. 公司实现了财政的可持续性
3. 公司被收购
在较小规模的初创企业生态系统中（即在最后一张图表中汇总的城市），缺乏足够的风投资金、市场准入和一些类似因素可能是导致初创企业生存率低的主要原因。
而在西雅图这样的城市，可能是由于并购活动所以初创企业没有获得 C 轮之后的融资。至于实现财政可持续性，应该适合用来解释芝加哥这样的城市初创企业的表现，因为那里的投资者都较为保守，更加看重底层商业基础。
或者，从概率学角度来解释，小规模的创业中心初创企业数量不够多，还不足以产生一个发展到 C 轮融资之后的初创企业。
以上这些因素都可以解释为什么某个初创企业未能获得下一轮融资，但令人沮丧的是，它们都说明不了为什么一些城市的初创企业整体表现优于全国平均水平。
但是最重要的是，我们的分析证明了一个强大、成熟的初创企业社区所具有的价值所在。
Brad Feld 是 Mattermark的一名投资人，也是该公司的董事会成员，他在相关的书中阐述了一个强大的初创企业生态系统的支柱力量。他认为其中最重要的是，必须由那些有兴趣留下来的企业家来引领这个生态系统，起到带头作用。
从这一点看来，湾区在过去这几十年以来一直是创业活动的主要枢纽地区。湾区已经产出了几代企业家，其中许多企业家都留在湾区，通过投资、组织社区或者为初创企业提供指导来回馈湾区。因此，或许这种企业家网络的广度和深度促使湾区初创企业在各个阶段的生存率都比其他地区要高。
但是，波士顿和纽约的创业社区也已经有一定历史，然而这些地区的初创企业生存率并没有明显高于全国平均水平。所以，这样一来，最大的可能性便是有一些层层相扣的因素存在，有助于提高初创企业的生存率，但是现在我们还无法拨云见日、抽丝剥缕地解开这一难题。
与此同时，由于每个创业中心具有独特性，所以格外又增加了难度。借用列夫托尔斯泰的一句名言，稍作修改似乎便可以形容这一问题：所有低于平均生存率的创业中心都是相似的，高于平均生存率的创业中心却各有各的千秋。（原文大意为：所有幸福的家庭都是相似的，不幸的家庭却各有各的不幸。出自《安娜卡列尼娜》开篇首句。）
以下为英文原文：
Several weeks ago, we asked: “If you had 100 startups that have successfully raised a Seed round, how many of them would go on to raise a Series A? Of those that then raise a Series A, how many go on to raise a Series B? (And so on and so forth.)” (Note: This is not the same as asking “What proportion of startups successfully raise a seed round?”)
The answer is “surprisingly few.”
This week, we’re asking the same question, but with a bit of a twist. Which of America’s top startup hubs have the highest rates of startup survival on a round-by-round basis? In other words, if, in general, the life of a startup (at least with respect to fundraising) is poor, nasty, brutish, and short, where in particular is it less so?
Here, we’ll take the six most-represented metropolitan regions from our original set of 2,011 companies and compare their survival rates against the average.1 In rank order, here are the regions: the San Francisco Bay Area, New York City, Boston, Los Angeles, Seattle, and Chicago.
We’ll take a look at each city’s performance, tie our findings here back to previous coverage of cities we’ve done on Mattermark, and try to figure out what all of this means for entrepreneurs, investors, and civic leaders.
Startup Survival In The Big Six
In previous articles on Mattermark, we’ve established that places like San Francisco, New York City, and Boston dominate America’s startup ecosystem. In terms of funding event frequency and dollar volumes, inbound mergers and acquisitions activity, and other factors, these hubs stand head and shoulders above the rest. But what about in terms of round-to-round survival of the startups based in these mega-hubs? Let’s find out.
Here’s how to read the charts below. Both charts on the left and right display the same data, but use different scales. The red line shows the survival rate of all 2,011 companies in our dataset, whereas the blue line shows the survival rates of just the companies from a particular city. Wherever the blue line is below the red line, that means the city’s startup survival rate is below the national average.
In both New York and San Francisco, the round-to-round survival rate is higher than the national average across all rounds, whereas Boston lags behind the average in earlier stages of the fundraising lifecycle but comes out ahead in rounds following Series C.
What about the slightly smaller startup hubs?
Los Angeles and Chicago are at or near the national average across all rounds, faring slightly better in certain places.
The real surprise here is Seattle startups, the round-by-round survival rate of which falls precipitously relative to the national average. Additionally, Chicago and Seattle are the only major startup hubs where companies that raised their seed rounds between 2009 and 2012 didn’t raise beyond Series C in our dataset.
What about the rest of the country? There are plenty of smaller (but still vibrant) startup hubs like Austin, Boulder, and Washington D.C., as well as cities like New Orleans that produced only a couple seed funded startups that, taken individually, didn’t have enough data to make any general claims about their performance.
Taken together, these 34 metropolitan regions (plus the cities that weren’t associated with a metropolitan region in our dataset) account for roughly 25% of the startups that received seed funding between 2009 and 2012. It’s easy to see that, in aggregate, these smaller startup cities significantly underperform both the largest startup hubs and the national average.
So What?
We’d originally hypothesized that “failure” to raise a subsequent round can happen for one of three reasons:
The company fails.
The company reaches financial sustainability.
The company gets acquired.
We might expect a lack of adequate venture capital funding, access to markets, and other factors to be the primary cause of the drop-off in cities with smaller startup ecosystems (i.e. the ones aggregated in the final chart). M&A activity may help explain why startups in a city like Seattle don’t raise beyond Series C. And reaching financial sustainability likely accounts for some of the drop-off in places like Chicago, where startup investors are thought to be more conservative and focused on underlying business fundamentals.
Alternately, from a probabilistic perspective, smaller hubs don’t produce enough startups to have one make it beyond Series C (or whichever arbitrary milestone you wish to set).
This all makes a case for why startups fail to make it to the next funding round, but, frustratingly, it doesn’t make a positive case for why some cities outperform the average. More than anything else, our analysis demonstrates the value of strong, established startup communities. The key word is likely “established.” In his book on the subject, Brad Feld (who, full disclosure, is an investor in Mattermark and sits on the company’s board of directors) explains the pillars of a strong startup ecosystem. Chief among them is the notion that a startup ecosystem must be led by entrepreneurs who have an interest in staying put.
The Bay Area has been a major hub of startup activity for decades at this point. It has produced several generations of entrepreneurs, many of whom stay and give back through investing, community organizing, and mentorship of young up-starts. It might be the depth and breadth of its alumni network that leads Bay Area startups to survive at a higher rate, at all stages, than startups in the rest of the country. But, then again, Boston and New York’s startup communities have been around for awhile too, and yet survival rates in these cities aren’t markedly better than the nation as a whole.
In all likelihood, there are a number of interlocking factors that contribute to high rates of startup survival, but disentangling all of them is a gordian problem we can’t solve here.
And all of this is complicated by the fact that each hub is unique. It’s the inverse of the old Tolstoy quote, which I’ll proceed to butcher here. All startup hubs with below-average rates of round-to-round survival are the same. Each hub that rises above the average likely does so in its own way.
We found this by looking at the fundraising trajectories of 2,011 companies that raised seed rounds between January 1, 2009, and December 31, 2012, inclusive. It’s sufficiently recent to include companies like Uber and AirBNB, which both raised their seed rounds in 2009, and Snap Inc. (née Snapchat), which raised its seed round in 2012. Enough time has passed since then to see some companies to progress through multiple late-stage rounds.
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