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Ask HN: any successful start-ups started by non-technical founders?

5 points by pennyfiller 17y ago

Please let us know which companies are successful today that were started by non-technical founders.

cperciva 17y ago
It's a bit of a stretch, but you could put Jeff Bezos into this category. He's obviously a very smart and generally technically-inclined guy, but I don't think he was ever particularly involved in the technical side of Amazon.com.
- hga 17y ago
  More than a bit of a stretch; from Wikipedia: "Bezos showed intense and varied scientific interests at an early age. He rigged an electric alarm to keep his younger siblings out of his room and maintain his privacy. He converted his parents' garage into a laboratory for his science projects. [...] While in high school, he attended the Student Science Training Program at the University of Florida.... He entered Princeton University, planning to study physics, but soon returned to his love of computers and graduated summa cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa with a degree in computer science and electrical engineering." His first set of jobs were also in CS, networking, etc. I think it's no accident that Amazon is the leading cloud computing provider.
  - cperciva 17y ago
    Hence my comment about him being obviously technically inclined. He has the skills of both a technical guy and a business guy; my point was that with Amazon he was playing the non-technical role, in spite of his technical qualifications.
    - hga 17y ago
      Well ... we're getting to the point of quibbling; I just wanted to show he was more than "generally technically-inclined".
SingAlong 17y ago
Hmm... yes Sridhar Vembu of Zoho. He wasn't a single founder though. He also acted as their offshore marketing guy in the beginning. Atleast thats what I know from the recent Mixergy podcast
- deleted 17y ago
  [deleted]
jgamman 17y ago
Sam Morgan - NZer who created an EBay type site for himself back in the day by hiring a coder to build it. Sold it a couple years ago for $750M or so.
startupcomment 17y ago
I think what you are seeking is technology start-ups founded by non-technical founders -- not just start-ups in general.
adora 17y ago
Gilt Groupe
deleted 17y ago
[deleted]
pascalchristian 17y ago
digg, Myspace
ig1 17y ago
Wikipedia, Xing

5 points by pennyfiller 17y ago

Please let us know which companies are successful today that were started by non-technical founders.

It's a bit of a stretch, but you could put Jeff Bezos into this category. He's obviously a very smart and generally technically-inclined guy, but I don't think he was ever particularly involved in the technical side of Amazon.com.

hga 17y ago
More than a bit of a stretch; from Wikipedia: "Bezos showed intense and varied scientific interests at an early age. He rigged an electric alarm to keep his younger siblings out of his room and maintain his privacy. He converted his parents' garage into a laboratory for his science projects. [...] While in high school, he attended the Student Science Training Program at the University of Florida.... He entered Princeton University, planning to study physics, but soon returned to his love of computers and graduated summa cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa with a degree in computer science and electrical engineering." His first set of jobs were also in CS, networking, etc. I think it's no accident that Amazon is the leading cloud computing provider.
- cperciva 17y ago
  Hence my comment about him being obviously technically inclined. He has the skills of both a technical guy and a business guy; my point was that with Amazon he was playing the non-technical role, in spite of his technical qualifications.
  - hga 17y ago
    Well ... we're getting to the point of quibbling; I just wanted to show he was more than "generally technically-inclined".

SingAlong 17y ago

Hmm... yes Sridhar Vembu of Zoho. He wasn't a single founder though. He also acted as their offshore marketing guy in the beginning. Atleast thats what I know from the recent Mixergy podcast

deleted 17y ago
[deleted]

jgamman 17y ago

Sam Morgan - NZer who created an EBay type site for himself back in the day by hiring a coder to build it. Sold it a couple years ago for $750M or so.

startupcomment 17y ago

I think what you are seeking is technology start-ups founded by non-technical founders -- not just start-ups in general.

adora 17y ago

Gilt Groupe

deleted 17y ago

[deleted]

pascalchristian 17y ago

digg, Myspace

ig1 17y ago

Wikipedia, Xing