DigitalOcean Launches Startup Accelerator Program Hatch

After a few years of working with popular startup accelerators including Y Combinator, Techstars, and 500 Startups, DigitalOcean has launched its own global incubator program, called Hatch, which gives startups access to DigitalOcean’s cloud for 12 months. 

Like other startup programs, Hatch offers participants free technical training, mentorship, and the ability to connect with other startups, accelerators, and potential investors. Along with access to DigitalOcean cloud for 12 months (up to $100,000 in credits), Hatch startups can access priority support from DigitalOcean.

Companies starting up now have the ability to be cloud-native, without any legacy workloads existing on-premises. Still, cloud infrastructure is not cheap, as DigitalOcean CEO Ben Uretsky notes.

"Use of the cloud has significantly decreased the capital required to start a business, yet still remains one of the largest expenses founding teams face in the early days,” DigitalOcean co-founder and CEO Ben Uretsky said in a statement. “We got started as part of the Techstars accelerator program so we understand, firsthand, the challenges and what it takes to launch and scale a company. That's why we're supporting the next generation of startups in getting their products off the ground."

One hundred startups will be part of the Hatch pilot; DigitalOcean plans to onboard a larger group of bootstrapped and funded startups from around the world later this year.

"Early in their lives, startups need to focus 100 percent on building a product that customers love rather than on keeping the service up and running,” Investor Andreessen Horowitz partner Frank Chen said in a statement. “With access to programs like Hatch, startups can focus on running experiments on their way to product-market fit and entrust the infrastructure to DigitalOcean."