"He had concluded that something fundamental needed to be done about Disney's relationship with the tech industry. "We-meaning The Walt Disney Company-didn't really have a very good reputation at the time for working with startups," he remembers. Tech accelerators such as Y Combinator, 500 Startups, and Techstars were changing how high-potential concepts got their shot at becoming thriving businesses. Min thought Disney might learn something by investing in such an accelerator."
"Iger's take: That idea wasn't big enough. "His response to me was like, 'Why would we do that?-we should just do it ourselves,' remembers Min. So Disney did. The entertainment and media behemoth launched its own accelerator, partnered with Techstars to get it rolling, and gave it the most logical possible name: Disney Accelerator. In 2014, it unveiled its first cohort of 11 startups."
In 2013, David Min concluded that something fundamental needed to be done about Disney's relationship with the tech industry and proposed learning from tech accelerators. Bob Iger urged a larger approach, and Disney created its own accelerator in partnership with Techstars, naming it Disney Accelerator. The program launched in 2014 with an initial cohort of 11 startups. Over eleven years the corporate-accelerator model became common, and Disney's program expanded beyond reputational repair. The 2025 demo day introduced four startups—Animaj, DramaBox, Haddy, and Liminal Space—and attracted employees from movies, broadcasting, theme parks, cruise ships, and consumer products.
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