

Ask HN: I think I want to breakup with my co-founder, help me - tommartin12

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.<p>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.<p>I am however finding the strains of working remotely a big stress on this relationship.<p>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.<p>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.<p>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.<p>4.  I don't feel like he puts in "extra" into the company, things like working weekends, coming up with new ideas, etc...<p>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.<p>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.<p>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?
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will_lam
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
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.

------
apu
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
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.

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kerben
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.

------
rick888
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
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.

~~~
gyardley
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.

~~~
bootdaddy
Exactly! Get with an attorney quick. Other option is to find funding and buy
him out now. Sometimes investors like stepping in where there is a shakeup,
they feel like a savior, get more equity and presumably, control. If you can
do this, part of the deal will be the full release agreement along with ip
assignment.

~~~
tommartin12
At this early stage of a startup before we have scaled, the leaving of a co-
founder is likely a bad signal that would scare away any investors.

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

~~~
staunch
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
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
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
not really possible, he doesn't have the money.

