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How did you build the product that your first business sold without a technical person onboard? You coded it yourself. Thus, you have technical skills. 9 years

How did you build the product that your first business sold without a technical person onboard? You coded it yourself. Thus, you have technical skills. 9 years later, when you were looking for a cofounder, you decided to go with a technical cofounder. You can talk all you want, but at the end of the day, you chose to bring on a second technical cofounder (the first being yourself) over the business cofounder that you are recommending the OP seek out. N.b. by technical cofounder, I don't necessarily mean someone with a PhD in Computer Vision. I mean someone who can productively write API integrations and use whatever tools are needed (e.g. Rails, Meteor, Xcode) to build the product.

jason_tko 12y ago
Again, I think you're mischaracterising me a little bit. I can't code. I'm not a technical co-founder. My first business was not a software business, it was an IT infrastructure business. In my first business, I discovered a need in the Japanese market for a good invoicing/document management software. It came about through me building a crappy invoice management system, and showing it to other Japanese business owners. It was a little scary to work seriously on this, since there were no competitors, hence possibly no market. However, I went out and did the following: a) Designed and had built a crappy version of the software that was functional, but not elegant or scalable. b) Talked with nearly a hundred potential users of this software to find out how they're currently solving this problem, and to try to get a sense of the market and the potential demand. c) Found a group of people who were very interested in buying this software. So by the time I found my co-founder, I had already invested hundreds of hours, and tens of thousands of dollars. However, I had a working prototype, many potential customers, and a good feel of the market. It was a LOT of work. When people dismiss business co-founders as not doing a lot of work, or not doing meaningful work, it's both very irritating and also leads me to believe they've never worked with a 'real' business co-founder.
- chiBT 12y ago
  Jason sounds like you have been where I am now. When you found your co-founders, after all that work, how did you split the equity? I'm a business founder looking for co-founders and I want to be fair but fair to myself as well.
  - jason_tko 12y ago
    We ended up roughly splitting the equity. I think what I did in finding and validating the market was table stakes. I could have made a strong argument for more equity, but when it comes to actually building the product, there is still a tremendous amount of risk, and if you want someone to be as dedicated to it as you are, I would generally advise being generous with equity. Naturally, as things move forward, it makes sense to revise the equity if the situation drastically changes, such as you committing full-time, and them not being able to, or interested to, etc. At the end of the day though, equity discussions are more of an art than a science, and everyone needs to feel happy and looked after - including, of course, yourself.
    - chiBT 12y ago
      That makes sense and is somewhat my situation. I want the right people and think I might have them but they can not become full time without being paid and I'm all in already. I'm paying for the first mvp to be built over seen by the possible cto. I want them happy but how can someone part time end up with as much as someone full time and with money in? And "generous" is so subjective, give me a ballpark for generous cause that's where I want to be. But it has taken years of work and cost to develop things down to a business,and we know there will be other equity shares given out, and neither of us has said where that will come from. I see how this is a very common challenge.
    - chiBT 12y ago
      Another issue for me is there are 2 other people wanting equity. If they got their initial request it would give them 2/3 of the company's voting stock. Kind of a problem to me and it concerns me they would want that position after knowing me only a couple of months. They knew each other before I met either of them.
    - jason_tko 12y ago
      Seems like I can't reply to your message, maybe we've hit the limit of tree replies. That's a hard one... and it's hard to offer advice because it's very situation specific. I might be able to help, or at least act as a sounding board if you want to hop on Skype and have a chat. My email address is in my profile!

jason_tko 12y ago

Again, I think you're mischaracterising me a little bit. I can't code. I'm not a technical co-founder. My first business was not a software business, it was an IT infrastructure business. In my first business, I discovered a need in the Japanese market for a good invoicing/document management software. It came about through me building a crappy invoice management system, and showing it to other Japanese business owners. It was a little scary to work seriously on this, since there were no competitors, hence possibly no market. However, I went out and did the following: a) Designed and had built a crappy version of the software that was functional, but not elegant or scalable. b) Talked with nearly a hundred potential users of this software to find out how they're currently solving this problem, and to try to get a sense of the market and the potential demand. c) Found a group of people who were very interested in buying this software. So by the time I found my co-founder, I had already invested hundreds of hours, and tens of thousands of dollars. However, I had a working prototype, many potential customers, and a good feel of the market. It was a LOT of work. When people dismiss business co-founders as not doing a lot of work, or not doing meaningful work, it's both very irritating and also leads me to believe they've never worked with a 'real' business co-founder.

chiBT 12y ago
Jason sounds like you have been where I am now. When you found your co-founders, after all that work, how did you split the equity? I'm a business founder looking for co-founders and I want to be fair but fair to myself as well.
- jason_tko 12y ago
  We ended up roughly splitting the equity. I think what I did in finding and validating the market was table stakes. I could have made a strong argument for more equity, but when it comes to actually building the product, there is still a tremendous amount of risk, and if you want someone to be as dedicated to it as you are, I would generally advise being generous with equity. Naturally, as things move forward, it makes sense to revise the equity if the situation drastically changes, such as you committing full-time, and them not being able to, or interested to, etc. At the end of the day though, equity discussions are more of an art than a science, and everyone needs to feel happy and looked after - including, of course, yourself.
  - chiBT 12y ago
    That makes sense and is somewhat my situation. I want the right people and think I might have them but they can not become full time without being paid and I'm all in already. I'm paying for the first mvp to be built over seen by the possible cto. I want them happy but how can someone part time end up with as much as someone full time and with money in? And "generous" is so subjective, give me a ballpark for generous cause that's where I want to be. But it has taken years of work and cost to develop things down to a business,and we know there will be other equity shares given out, and neither of us has said where that will come from. I see how this is a very common challenge.
  - chiBT 12y ago
    Another issue for me is there are 2 other people wanting equity. If they got their initial request it would give them 2/3 of the company's voting stock. Kind of a problem to me and it concerns me they would want that position after knowing me only a couple of months. They knew each other before I met either of them.
  - jason_tko 12y ago
    Seems like I can't reply to your message, maybe we've hit the limit of tree replies. That's a hard one... and it's hard to offer advice because it's very situation specific. I might be able to help, or at least act as a sounding board if you want to hop on Skype and have a chat. My email address is in my profile!