3 ms·

Ask HN: I think I want to breakup with my co-founder, help me

8 points by tommartin12 16y ago

I am running a startup with my technical co-founder, we have a personal friendship that led us to starting the company together. I convinced him to quit his day job working at a large company. He has not ever worked outside of a large corporation before. I am the business/SEO/marketing guy. The kicker is that we are working remotely, he is working in one country, while I am in another country. The target market for our product is the country where I am based. At the start, we agreed to this arrangement. I am however finding the strains of working remotely a big stress on this relationship. 1. I don't have visibility on what he is doing, and he is of an introverted nature, so he will never skype me first, I always have to skype him or ask him a question and then he responds. 2. We are expanding and hiring people, and without my technical co-founder on the ground here, it is very difficult to lead technical people. I have a better relationship with the other technical person in our company because I am on the ground here, I don't think this situation is ideal. 3. Since we started the company, we have pivoted several directions that requires my co-founder to learn a new programming language(objective C), however he has struggled to get up to speed quickly(2 months and no code produced), so we had to hire someone to basically continue product development. 4. I don't feel like he puts in "extra" into the company, things like working weekends, coming up with new ideas, etc... I don't know whether I am unrealistic in expecting him to learn a new language, but his inability to do so has shaken my faith in his technical abilities. The product and the company I feel is taking off, we will be trying to raise a seed round soon, but I am very concerned with my co-founder. I don't feel like he is a co-founder, I am making all the decisions and he has very little to say about the major directions of our product, just agreeing with me. We are going to raise money soon and I don't know if I can scale the company with my friend and co-founder? Am I being paranoid? What should I do?

apu 16y ago
Is there a chance he could move to your country? Is he still accomplishing anything? Do you know what his personal situation is like (any recent troubles)? Have you formally started the company? What's the equity split like? Do you have any revenue?
- tommartin12 16y ago
  1. Yes, but it is a chicken and the egg, he is not willing to move unless we can raise funding, but... Most investors will not invest unless we have the whole team together. 2. Yes, we are still going full steam ahead, but I just have this nagging feeling that it will not end well. 3. He is very private about his personal life, there is a girlfriend in the picture which factors into his reluctance to move. 4. Yes, formally started. 5. 70/30, I have 70 6. No revenue yet, it's a consumer based startup, so free product at this stage.
rick888 16y ago
That's a tough situation to be in. It's probably going to ruin your friendship. Do you have a contract? I have friends that are great coders, but I know they probably wouldn't be a good co-founder. I also have some friends that would make great co-founders. It sounds to me like your friend would be a better employee. Founders of a company should be sacrificing and busting-ass every waking moment. Could you ask him to fly/temporarily move to your country?
- tommartin12 16y ago
  no contract, we talked about shareholder agreements but nothing put in writing. I have asked him to move temporarily, after months of "nagging him", he has agreed to come for a month at a time. But I feel like it's kinda self-defeating, I should not have to nag him to get him to do this.
  - linuxdo0d 16y ago
    Hopefully this has been a good learning experience for you. Always understand that when you build a company with someone that you are starting a _professional_ relationship with that person, and that your personal relationship is going to come second to your professional relationship. There are a ton of "gotchas" in this situation, remote country, target audience - but by far the biggest one is make sure you have a binding legal document that can help you out in situations like this. Make sure it's all in writing. Good luck, sorry about the situation. Hopefully it gets better.
  - gyardley 16y ago
    Before you do anything else, at all, take care of the paperwork. If you two part ways before everything's been formalized, you'll create a cloud of legal uncertainty over your start-up that'll make it very difficult to raise or have an exit. In your agreement, you both should have a long period of founder vesting. Then, should you part ways, you can give your co-founder his share of equity multiplied by whatever fraction of the four years he worked. Getting the paperwork right doesn't end with the shareholder agreements - you also need to make sure all the intellectual property is assigned to the company. Actually, what you really need to do is sit down with a lawyer that knows what they're doing.
coryl 16y ago
How did you end up with 70% compared to his 30%?
- staunch 16y ago
  This could be part of the problem. A huge benefit of an equal partnership is that neither feels justified in feeling that the other person should do more of the work. Even if you're intellectually okay with an uneven split it can gnaw at you subconsciously and effect motivation.
  - tommartin12 16y ago
    I suspect that this might be part of the problem, he has mentioned that he would like to re-negotiate the equity split. However, I feel like giving him a larger proportion of the company to solve a motivation issue is not the right thing to do.
    - staunch 16y ago
      Well, personally I'd never start a partnership with someone that wasn't even. If they're not worth half they're not worth partnering with. There are exceptions: if I invested in the company I might end up with more equity based on that investment, but it would still start at 50/50 on day one. No one feels bad if you put in $500k to get an extra 20%. But just arbitrarily deciding one guy gets an extra 20%? That's going to gnaw at you later. You said you put in 70% of the money and he put in 30%. Is he willing to match your contribution to get himself up to 50%?
      - tommartin12 16y ago
        not really possible, he doesn't have the money.
- tommartin12 16y ago
  i put in 70% of the capital, he put in 30%.
kerben 16y ago
It was not too wise to start out down this path with your co-founder in another country - with that said - my advice to you would be to simply trust your gut. Based on what you have described, I don't think equity is the problem. There seems to be an established history of 'flakiness' and he clearly doesn't seem to share your passion. If you continue to sense his heart just isn't in the project then you should cut your losses and sever the relationship. If you do split up make sure you get a waiver from him.
will_lam 16y ago
Ideally you should be in same location, I find that face time is crucial. I can relate to you as I'm the business/SEO/marketing/product guy as well. I had to fire my technical co-founder because it turned out that he wasn't all that "technical" after all and lost my faith in him. It took me months to do it, even with my mentors/advisors telling me to do it. I gave him the benefit of the doubt, and let it drag on for too long, when in fact it should have been an easy decision to part ways. Long story short, trust your gut.. if you're not feeling it, pull out the axe, don't waste your time and hustle to find a suitable replacement. I know it's easier said than done, but it CAN be done...
- tommartin12 16y ago
  I had my reservations before we started about the remote arrangement, but started anyway. The thing is that he is good at his chosen field of technical expertise(with years of experience in big companies), but I am finding out that if he needs to learn new technologies quickly, it is a huge struggle.

8 points by tommartin12 16y ago

apu 16y ago

Is there a chance he could move to your country? Is he still accomplishing anything? Do you know what his personal situation is like (any recent troubles)? Have you formally started the company? What's the equity split like? Do you have any revenue?

tommartin12 16y ago
1. Yes, but it is a chicken and the egg, he is not willing to move unless we can raise funding, but... Most investors will not invest unless we have the whole team together. 2. Yes, we are still going full steam ahead, but I just have this nagging feeling that it will not end well. 3. He is very private about his personal life, there is a girlfriend in the picture which factors into his reluctance to move. 4. Yes, formally started. 5. 70/30, I have 70 6. No revenue yet, it's a consumer based startup, so free product at this stage.

rick888 16y ago

That's a tough situation to be in. It's probably going to ruin your friendship. Do you have a contract? I have friends that are great coders, but I know they probably wouldn't be a good co-founder. I also have some friends that would make great co-founders. It sounds to me like your friend would be a better employee. Founders of a company should be sacrificing and busting-ass every waking moment. Could you ask him to fly/temporarily move to your country?

tommartin12 16y ago
no contract, we talked about shareholder agreements but nothing put in writing. I have asked him to move temporarily, after months of "nagging him", he has agreed to come for a month at a time. But I feel like it's kinda self-defeating, I should not have to nag him to get him to do this.
- linuxdo0d 16y ago
  Hopefully this has been a good learning experience for you. Always understand that when you build a company with someone that you are starting a _professional_ relationship with that person, and that your personal relationship is going to come second to your professional relationship. There are a ton of "gotchas" in this situation, remote country, target audience - but by far the biggest one is make sure you have a binding legal document that can help you out in situations like this. Make sure it's all in writing. Good luck, sorry about the situation. Hopefully it gets better.
- gyardley 16y ago
  Before you do anything else, at all, take care of the paperwork. If you two part ways before everything's been formalized, you'll create a cloud of legal uncertainty over your start-up that'll make it very difficult to raise or have an exit. In your agreement, you both should have a long period of founder vesting. Then, should you part ways, you can give your co-founder his share of equity multiplied by whatever fraction of the four years he worked. Getting the paperwork right doesn't end with the shareholder agreements - you also need to make sure all the intellectual property is assigned to the company. Actually, what you really need to do is sit down with a lawyer that knows what they're doing.

coryl 16y ago

How did you end up with 70% compared to his 30%?

staunch 16y ago
This could be part of the problem. A huge benefit of an equal partnership is that neither feels justified in feeling that the other person should do more of the work. Even if you're intellectually okay with an uneven split it can gnaw at you subconsciously and effect motivation.
- tommartin12 16y ago
  I suspect that this might be part of the problem, he has mentioned that he would like to re-negotiate the equity split. However, I feel like giving him a larger proportion of the company to solve a motivation issue is not the right thing to do.
  - staunch 16y ago
    Well, personally I'd never start a partnership with someone that wasn't even. If they're not worth half they're not worth partnering with. There are exceptions: if I invested in the company I might end up with more equity based on that investment, but it would still start at 50/50 on day one. No one feels bad if you put in $500k to get an extra 20%. But just arbitrarily deciding one guy gets an extra 20%? That's going to gnaw at you later. You said you put in 70% of the money and he put in 30%. Is he willing to match your contribution to get himself up to 50%?
    - tommartin12 16y ago
      not really possible, he doesn't have the money.
tommartin12 16y ago
i put in 70% of the capital, he put in 30%.

kerben 16y ago

It was not too wise to start out down this path with your co-founder in another country - with that said - my advice to you would be to simply trust your gut. Based on what you have described, I don't think equity is the problem. There seems to be an established history of 'flakiness' and he clearly doesn't seem to share your passion. If you continue to sense his heart just isn't in the project then you should cut your losses and sever the relationship. If you do split up make sure you get a waiver from him.

will_lam 16y ago

Ideally you should be in same location, I find that face time is crucial. I can relate to you as I'm the business/SEO/marketing/product guy as well. I had to fire my technical co-founder because it turned out that he wasn't all that "technical" after all and lost my faith in him. It took me months to do it, even with my mentors/advisors telling me to do it. I gave him the benefit of the doubt, and let it drag on for too long, when in fact it should have been an easy decision to part ways. Long story short, trust your gut.. if you're not feeling it, pull out the axe, don't waste your time and hustle to find a suitable replacement. I know it's easier said than done, but it CAN be done...

tommartin12 16y ago
I had my reservations before we started about the remote arrangement, but started anyway. The thing is that he is good at his chosen field of technical expertise(with years of experience in big companies), but I am finding out that if he needs to learn new technologies quickly, it is a huge struggle.