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In my opinion this should be taken with a grain of salt. There may be a little bias too since YC obviously has an interest in the most stable of all configurati

by rsp1984 10y ago

In my opinion this should be taken with a grain of salt. There may be a little bias too since YC obviously has an interest in the most stable of all configurations for their startups, which is the 50/50 split (although it may not be the most fair one). I came up with the idea for the company Indeed a silly reason for unevenness. I started working n months before my co-founder IMO if n > 6 it's a valid reason. This is what we agreed to Well if it was a fair agreement among equals, why not? My co-founder took a salary for n months and I didn’t Again, for n larger than a certain number IMO this is a perfectly valid reason not to split equally. I started working full time n months before my co-founder See above. I am older/more experienced than my co-founder Silly reason to some extent. All other things being equal a drastically more senior co-founder will likely have more contribution to the startup. I brought on my co-founder after raising n thousands of dollars If n > 100 I think it's a valid reason not to split equally. I brought on my co-founder after launching my MVP Depends on what the MVP is and how much traction it has. We need someone to tie-break in the case of founder arguments That alone is a silly argument. Note: Edited for formatting

devinmontgomery 10y ago
>There may be a little bias too since YC obviously has an interest in the most stable of all configurations for their startups, which is the 50/50 split (although it may not be the most fair one). It seems this is what founders want too. If the goal is a big business and instability makes that less likely, I would optimize the equity split for effectiveness over fairness.
fragsworth 10y ago
> I started working n months before my co-founder For this one, the solution might be to vest n months earlier, but have the same number of shares in the end.
- curun1r 10y ago
  The other option would be to treat the time invested as part of the company's seed and treat it separate from the founder's equity. So figure out a relatively low salary, use it to convert the time spent to dollars and then give an equivalent amount of shares based on the valuation when the seed funding was raised. Give the other founders the option to invest money in the company in lieu of time at the same terms. I know this could result in one founder having more equity than the other(s), but I don't see how this can be considered unfair to any of the founders.

by rsp1984 10y ago

devinmontgomery 10y ago

>There may be a little bias too since YC obviously has an interest in the most stable of all configurations for their startups, which is the 50/50 split (although it may not be the most fair one). It seems this is what founders want too. If the goal is a big business and instability makes that less likely, I would optimize the equity split for effectiveness over fairness.

fragsworth 10y ago

> I started working n months before my co-founder For this one, the solution might be to vest n months earlier, but have the same number of shares in the end.

curun1r 10y ago
The other option would be to treat the time invested as part of the company's seed and treat it separate from the founder's equity. So figure out a relatively low salary, use it to convert the time spent to dollars and then give an equivalent amount of shares based on the valuation when the seed funding was raised. Give the other founders the option to invest money in the company in lieu of time at the same terms. I know this could result in one founder having more equity than the other(s), but I don't see how this can be considered unfair to any of the founders.