Y Combinator wants climate tech, AI, body-scan startups and more

Storied Bay Area accelerator Y Combinator, which helped nurture Reddit, Dropbox and Airbnb, is looking for its next batch of companies to seed. It released an updated "request for startups" on Wednesday, outlining 20 categories that it's particularly interested in.

The list leans heavily towards artificial intelligence across many sectors including robotics, health care, enterprise software and domestic manufacturing, as well as foundational AI models.

Other sectors on the list include climate technology, space technology and defense technology.

"These are by no means the only ideas we’ll accept — many of the best ideas are the ones we would never expect — but if you aren't sure what you want to work on, these (requests) should provide a useful jumping off point to begin your ideation process," the accelerator wrote in an announcement.

Within the climate sector, Y Combinator cited the Inflation Reduction Act as something that will "significantly accelerate the existing market" and lists five specific subcategories of interest: energy, science, adaptation, "green fintech" and carbon emissions accounting and offsets.

The accelerator, led by outspoken CEO Garry Tan, also implores founders to think big and reach for the stars — literally.

"Building a space company might scare founders by seeming too ambitious, but surprisingly, it is not necessarily harder than building a software company," a separate, related blog post says.

Another sector listed is advanced body-scanning technology — specifically via magnetic resonance imaging or MRI machines — which is becoming more popular outside of clinical settings thanks to startups like Prenuvo and Ezra AI, and even gyms that offer DEXA scans, originally developed for bone density imaging.

Y Combinator is looking for startups that are working on ways to improve MRI technology for early-stage cancer screening — essentially making it scalable and more cost-effective and reducing false positives.

"For this to work, the world would need to scale up the number of MRI scans it does by at least 100 (times)," the accelerator wrote. "Doing that will require innovations in the MRI hardware, the AI algorithms to interpret scans and reduce false positives, and the business models and consumer marketing to make it a viable business.  We’re interested in funding companies looking to tackle this multifaceted problem."

Augmented and virtual reality are another hot sector, and Y Combinator mentions both Apple and Meta as companies moving the needle forward with the Vision Pro and Quest 3 headsets.

"The user experience is getting better, rendering power is increasing, and hand/eye tracking has improved dramatically — but there’s still work to be done," Y Combinator wrote. "We would like to see a new set of startups building software on these devices, solving practical use cases that go beyond gaming."

Here are all 20 categories outlined in Y Combinator's updated Request for Startups.