名字決定命運，公司也不例外？

????取名字是開公司最困難的事情之一。這個名字必須得到每位創始人的認可，還要買得到相關域名，也許最重要的是，投資者得喜歡它，因為初創公司的第一個字母會對公司能否輕松募集資金起到重要作用。

????無論如何，不要選擇以J、K或Q開頭的名字，而要優先考慮以T、O和A開頭的名字。

????下面的表格是2013年在首輪資金募集中，由于首字母選擇不當而失敗的IT公司所募得的資金量。我們對不同首字母的初創公司數量進行了標準化處理。以T開頭的公司在首輪募集中，獲得了兩倍于平均水平的資金，之后是A開頭的公司，獲得的資金比平均水平高出50%。另一方面，錯誤地選擇了J開頭的公司，在2013年募集到的資金只有平均水平的一半，這在市場上非常不利。

????Naming your startup can be one of the hardest things to do when starting a company. Each founder must agree. The domain must be available to buy. Lastly, and perhaps most importantly, investors need to like it because the first letter of startup's name has meaningful impact on how easily the company will be able to raise money.

????Whatever you do, don't pick a name that starts with the letter J. Or K. Or Q. Instead, favor names beginning with T, O and A.

????Below is a chart showing the share of capital raised by startups broken down by the first letter of their names for Series A rounds of IT companies in 2013. The data is normalized for the number of startups with each letter-name. Startups with T-names raise 100% more capital during the Series A than the average startup. Startups with the letter A garner 50% larger investments. On the other hand, founders who mistakenly chose J-words raised 50% less capital in 2013, quite a disadvantage in the market.

????這些數據清楚地證明，給初創公司的名字選擇一個正確的首字母，對它在首輪募集中能獲得多少資金存在關聯。

????不過這里面的問題是：這并不是因果關系，只是相關關系。所以，一切關于選擇正確字母的建議……好吧，都是沒用的。

????所以名字有什么意義呢？即便分析公司Looker叫了其他名字，它也一樣能很出色地分析數據。（免責聲明：沒錯，這是我投資的一家公司。）

????多虧了@milesgrimshaw，它提醒了我們：不要全盤相信看到的一切，就算似乎有一堆數據能證明觀點。（財富中文網）

????托馬斯?湯古茲是紅點投資公司的合伙人。

????The data clearly proves picking the right letter for a startup's name is correlated to the amount of money the company will raise in its Series A.

????But here's the trick: the relationship isn't causal, just correlated. So all that advice about picking the right letter... well, it's useless.

????What's in a name, after all? Looker by any other name would still analyze data elegantly (disclaimer: yes, it's one of my portfolio companies).

????Thanks to @milesgrimshaw who inspired this reminder not to believe everything you read, even if there's seemingly cohoret data to support the argument.

????Tomasz Tunguz is a partner with Redpoint Ventures.