Up and Running

JUNE 14, 2012

Do I need a co-founder? These are some of the most frequent questions about co-founders that I have heard from entrepreneurs over the years. Do I need a co-founder? How many co-founders should I have? I have seen many successful companies with as few as 2 and as many of 11 co-founders.

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Cofounder Technical Cofounder Accredited Investor Equity 90

blog.nahurst.com

JULY 19, 2010

The graphic below balances the risks cofounders take with their relative contributions to help answer this question. This covers one of the most common situations I encounter: For a pre-funding web startup whose team includes only a non-technical cofounder, how much equity should an incoming technical cofounder get?

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Technical Cofounder Cofounder Equity Salary 43

Startup Professionals Musings

NOVEMBER 8, 2010

One of the first tough decisions that startup founders have to make is how to allocate or split the equity among co-founders. Expertise can be marketing, technical, financial, or sales. Even still, regardless of the initial equity split, you should seriously consider vesting your founders shares over at least two years.

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Equity Intellectual Property Cofounder CTO Hire 228

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 27, 2023

Every entrepreneur needs to understand the following basics, to be addressed at company formation, as they engage a qualified attorney to draw up the paperwork: Allocate founder’s stock commensurate with commitment. Key founder vesting should have no cliff. This is called stock dilution control.

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Stock .Net Vesting Founder Vesting 240

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 23, 2012

One of the first tough decisions that startup founders have to make is how to allocate or split the equity among co-founders. Expertise can be marketing, technical, financial, or sales. Even still, regardless of the initial equity split, you should seriously consider vesting your founders shares over at least two years.

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Intellectual Property Equity Cofounder CTO Hire 252

View from Seed

SEPTEMBER 9, 2014

This is a guest post from Stephano Kim , former co-founder of Web 1.0 Many startup CEOs hire COOs or launch companies with a co-founder carrying the title. When should founders hire one? The needs of each founder are so different from the next, and the challenges his/her business faces are even more diverse.

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Hiring Cofounder Startup Technical Cofounder 336

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 14, 2017

I read commentary or Twitter or blogs and realize that there are also strongly held convictions that there are these evil VCs who do terrible things to mostly altruistic founders. But unlike the popular press reporting of this conflict — 80% of the time it is founder-to-founder conflict and not investor-to-founder conflict.

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Cofounder Stock Options Equity Technical Review 217

This is going to be BIG.

JANUARY 18, 2024

Some of these folks are founders and CEOs, but not at high-growth tech startups. While they might be generally smart, they’re unsophisticated investors who don’t know what the market is for where you are. Role When I was a lowly Analyst at Union Square Ventures, I had so many ideas for the founders we worked with.

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.Net Cap Table Startup Technical Review 88

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 4, 2014

Nowhere is the politics more difficult than with co-founders, which is why for years I’ve spoken publicly about “ the co-founder mythology.” ” Of course we all go into businesses expecting to be aligned with our co-founders but over time life changes. Those are the easy cases.

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Founder Sacramento Cofounder Technical Review 340

David Teten

JANUARY 21, 2021

(co-written with Jamie Finney, Founding Partner at Greater Colorado Venture Fund. This essay is part of a series on alternative VC: I: Revenue-Based Investing: a new option for founders who care about control. III: Why are Revenue-Based VCs investing in so many women and underrepresented founders?

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Equity Revenue Cofounder Colorado 78

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 14, 2017

As the idea went from innovating on software & systems to launching a company to rolling it out in the field brought on Rahul Gandhi as his co-founder to physically launch the company. What sized team can I afford in order to sell, market & provide service to these customers? How profitable is my product or service?

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Operations New York City Technical Review Startup 286

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 8, 2022

Most entrepreneurs struggle with many startup founders quandaries in building their business, and these key dilemmas are probably the biggest source of pain and failure for the entrepreneur lifestyle. The right time to jump is a function of favorable career, personal, and market circumstances. The co-founder relationship dilemma.

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Founder Hockey Stick Cofounder Liquidity Event 325

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 15, 2021

Every entrepreneur needs to understand the following basics, to be addressed at company formation, as they engage a qualified attorney to draw up the paperwork: Allocate founder’s stock commensurate with commitment. Key founder vesting should have no cliff. This is called stock dilution control.

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Vesting Dilution Stock Founder Vesting 298

David Teten

DECEMBER 2, 2019

Now the bad news: some venture capitallists have a bias against startups with an explicit positive social impact, on the grounds that they have a smaller addressable market, and that the founders are not sufficiently focused on creating shareholder wealth. J.M.Kaplan Innovation Prize. “The Bloomberg New Economy Forum Solutions.

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Technical Review SBIR Dilution Silicon Valley 60

YoungUpstarts

SEPTEMBER 23, 2017

I raised money and traded equity, but with my venture, I had to make one of the toughest decisions, to build it with some assistance of co-founders. Also, determine the market demand to make sure what you’re doing is sustainable. Find the right co-founders. Often, this is considered as a mistake.

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Cofounder Sweat Equity Equity Dilution 124

David Teten

JANUARY 19, 2021

(co-written with Jamie Finney, Founding Partner at Greater Colorado Venture Fund. From RBI, Flexible VCs borrow the ability to reap meaningful returns without demanding founders build for an exit. By tying payments to actual revenues, founders and investors remain aligned around the company’s real-time performance, good or bad.

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Cofounder Technical Review Equity Dividend 78

The Next Web

OCTOBER 3, 2012

Andrew is the co-founder and CTO of Parse.ly , a technology startup that provides big data insights to the web’s best publishers. He wrote: When startups die, the official cause of death is always either running out of money or a critical founder bailing. Editor’s note: This is a guest post by Andrew Montalenti.

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Cofounder Technical Cofounder Technical Review Software Review 155

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 13, 2018

I had joined MIPS Computers, my second semiconductor company , as the VP of marketing and also took on the role of the acting VP of Sales. I worked with engineering to try to find product/market fit ( big endian or little endian ?) I worked with engineering to try to find product/market fit ( big endian or little endian ?)

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Part-Time VPE Employee Cofounder Hiring 333

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 17, 2011

. “We’re all equal co-founders and we don’t care about titles.&# Still, I’ll bet that functionally you divide areas of competence like sales & marketing, product, engineering, biz dev, etc. Dilute your cash, equity or both. and my favorite]. But it will not help your business grow faster.

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Operations CTO Hire Startup Early Stage 292

Business Plan Blog

OCTOBER 4, 2013

Furthermore, when faced with adversity only great teams can respond to competitors, markets, funding environments, staff departures, PR disasters and the like. Rather, give titles such as VP of Engineering, Product/Technology, Sales, Marketing, Finance, etc. Don’t make everyone a founder. Seed to Series A.

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Part-Time VPE Fractional VPE Cofounder CTO Hire 79

David Teten

OCTOBER 1, 2015

Should you co-found your company with a software development shop? I’ve talked with a number of software development shops who are eager to get into the business of cofounding companies, i.e., getting product revenue and equity instead of just consulting revenue. What are the terms of their relationship with the founder?

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Software Developers Software Development Software Review Technical Cofounder 60

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 3, 2010

years ago and told me, “I just got offered the chance to buy this company because the founder doesn’t want to continue. How much dilution should I take for it?&# My friend’s company was pre-revenue. Me: “Zero dilution. Sometimes this involves co-CEO’s. BUT … it’s your company.

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Merger Technical Review Early Stage Dilution 276

David Teten

AUGUST 19, 2019

RBI normally requires founders to pay back their investors with a fixed percentage of revenue until they have finished providing the investor with a fixed return on capital, which they agree upon in advance. For background, see Revenue-Based Investing: A New Option for Founders who Care About Control. Capital need of up to $1.5M

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Revenue Technical Review Software Review Equity 60

YoungUpstarts

MAY 6, 2019

You are looking for cofounders that can help you build a product. You have finally found a cofounder that can take care of the startup. Market Research. In this stage, you will also search the market to check if your idea is viable. If there is a gap in the market, there will be demand. Next is marketing.

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Startup Technical Cofounder Merger Early Stage 113

YoungUpstarts

OCTOBER 24, 2013

One of the challenges for investing in startups has always been the lack of an established way for founders and investors to actually measure and decide on the valuation of the startup concerned. When you are clocking 80-hour weeks building your start-up from the ground-up on limited funds, neither of those options are attractive.”

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Pre-Money Valuation Web Technical Review Angel Investor 150

Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 9, 2021

A popular myth these days is that finishing college only dilutes your entrepreneurial instincts, and the best of the best, including Bill Gates, Steve Jobs and Mark Zuckerberg, dropped out early to hasten their success. I agree with Robert E. Start with your school connections with peer universities around the world.

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Entrepreneur Chad Incubator Dilution 373

YoungUpstarts

OCTOBER 16, 2016

By Bryan Miles, CEO and co-founder, Miles Advisory Group, Inc. As your business thrives, the providers who support you with banking, marketing and other services should change as your demands change. But take it from what a good friend and advisor once said to me: “Ego is dilutive to net worth.”.

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Cofounder Balance Sheet Small Business Administration Technical Review 100

thinkspace.com

SEPTEMBER 7, 2012

Marketing Intern. How to Divide Equity to Startup Founders, Advisors, and Employees. The part that I’d like to zero in on is when you’ve got a high growth company what are some of the best practices out there to distribute equity to the founders, advisors, and employees? Equity for Founders. Bookkeeper.

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Equity Employee Founder CTO Hire 62

View from Seed

APRIL 30, 2015

What is it, and how should founders think about it? note: We’d like to be extra clear that founders should not take on venture debt if they don’t have 100% visibility into repaying the loan, as banks that need to recoup their loan my force the company or you as the guarantor into liquidation or bankruptcy.

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Term Sheet Equity Startup Seed Stage 120

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 10, 2019

Most entrepreneurs struggle with many startup founders quandaries in building their business, and these key dilemmas are probably the biggest source of pain and failure for the entrepreneur lifestyle. The right time to jump is a function of favorable career, personal, and market circumstances. The co-founder relationship dilemma.

Hockey Stick 243

Hockey Stick Cofounder Liquidity Event Startup 243

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 31, 2020

The simple solution I recommend to inventors is to find a partner who can focus on business and marketing, while you focus on technology. Understanding what drives customers to buy, in different market segments and cultures, is usually just as challenging as creating and combining technology to deliver function.

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Founder Intellectual Property Dilution Startup 312

ReadWriteStart

JULY 18, 2011

Clavier began his presentation at the beginning of a company's lifecycle, asking how many co-founders a startup ought to have. If you like this kind of advice, check out my coverage of a talk by Paul Palmieri, Co-Founder and CEO of mobile advertising service Millennial Media, titled " Investing in Your Influencers. ".

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Investment Bankers Technical Review Cofounder Due Diligence 153

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 23, 2019

The challenge we all have as business founders is to move from the idea stage to a real business. Do the same for partners and co-founders that will buttress your strengths. Dilution of focus kills too many small businesses, as they try to attract more customers and counter more competitors.

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Intellectual Property Dilution Cofounder Social Media 248

Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 14, 2014

Most entrepreneurs struggle with many startup Founders dilemmas in building their business, and these key dilemmas are probably the biggest source of pain and failure for the entrepreneur lifestyle. The right time to jump is a function of favorable career, personal, and market circumstances. The co-Founder relationship dilemma.

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Hockey Stick Cofounder Entrepreneur Liquidity Event 268

www.avc.com

SEPTEMBER 22, 2011

To be clear, these are hires we are talking about, not co-founders. Co-founders are an entirely different discussion and I am not talking about them in this post. Or it can be a public market comp analysis. The other important data point is the number of fully diluted shares. In this case, it would be $2.50

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Equity Employee CTO Hire Fractional CTO 64

JANUARY 9, 2014

No clear vision or purpose This should be the starting point for any startup founder, but it’s often overlooked. By trying to appeal to everyone and adding features left, right and centre, you will actually dilute your message and could end up with a complex, bloated product. Life’s too short to build something nobody wants.”

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Early Stage Startup Cofounder Design 102

Feld Thoughts

SEPTEMBER 12, 2018

First, Felicis Ventures is committing 1% on top of every check the firm writes in non-dilutive capital earmarked for “founder development” in coaching and mental health. ” Next, Mahendra Ramsinghani has a long article in Techcrunch titled Investors are waking up to the emotional struggle of startup founders.

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Founder Cofounder Dilution Email 116