8% of such a tiny sample isn't anywhere near close to being able to extract trends. In such a volatile arena as investor funding even if the number of hardware companies doubled from 4% last year to 8% this, it's still noise.
We (as a tech community) need to careful thinking so small. YC is tiny. If the article was the result of talking to other investors and a similar trend was identified across the board it might be newsworthy, but to anyone with any statistical background this isn't a trend, it's noise. That doesn't mean there isn't a trend, it just means this isn't in and of itself, evidence of one.
We (as a tech community) need to careful thinking so small. YC is tiny. If the article was the result of talking to other investors and a similar trend was identified across the board it might be newsworthy, but to anyone with any statistical background this isn't a trend, it's noise. That doesn't mean there isn't a trend, it just means this isn't in and of itself, evidence of one.