This French VC went from posting on YouTube to raising a $12M fund for Y Combinator startups

Summary

Venture capital is filled with investors who claim they’ve got inside access to the next big thing. Meanwhile, Gabriel Jarrosson, a French engineer-turned-YouTuber-turned-investor, has built his VC firm around a single filter: if it isn’t a Y Combinator company, he won’t invest in it. That discipline pushed Jarrosson from filming scrappy venture explainers in Paris to managing more than $12 million in assets at Lobster Capital, with a larger second fund already in the works, according to recent SEC filings. His logic is simple: He believes YC’s track record of producing billion-dollar companies beats chasing startups elsewhere. In 2017, frustrated by the lack of access to promising French startups, Jarrosson launched a YouTube channel to share his investment journey in French. The channel grew a loyal following, evolved into one of Europe’s largest angel syndicates, and since 2020 has deployed $36 million into startups, mostly YC alumni. That track record paved the way for Lobster Capital, which closed its debut fund at $12 million, surpassing its $8 million target. Jarrosson’s reasoning on backing only YC startups rests on probability. According to this report, roughly 4.5% of YC companies become unicorns (in contrast to the 2.5% outcome for other venture-backed seed-stage startups), and around 45% of companies go on to raise a Series A (higher than the 33% average). Similarly, YC has funded more than 90 unicorns, with roughly a quarter of those growing into decacorns. That’s why the premium for YC deals, where valuations often run multiples higher than non-YC peers at the seed stage, doesn’t deter Jarrosson. Techcrunch event San Francisco | October 27-29, 2025 “If you think about the VC math and the returns, these outcomes are obviously great for your portfolio. As investors, you have to ask yourself, can this company become the next unicorn?” said the founder and managing partner in an interview with TechCrunch. “If the answer is yes, it’s often okay to invest ev...