

Ask HN: How to get rid of a bad gut feeling / co-founder? - wrongdecision

One year ago i had an idea and decided to found a startup. But i made a big mistake. A got a co-founder on board while having a bad gut feeling.<p>He is a business guy and we already worked a few years together as agency (he) and freelancer (me, designer). He still runs his agency full-time while i am working on it 30h&#x2F;week (while studying and working). I have 2&#x2F;3 of the shares. He has round about 1&#x2F;3. But we wrote nothing down and the company is not founded yet. He is round about 10 years older than me (i am 21).<p>There are a few things which makes me nervous: i have had a bad gut feeling from the beginning, i do not trust him and it blocks and demotivates me to have him in the team. He is lazy (regarding our startup) and it feels like having a shark on board.<p>First i tried to get rid of him six month ago. It didn&#x27;t work out. I told him by phone that i can not do this with him. That i have a really bad feeling and do not want to do this with him. That i like to work with him but that we have two different views on entrepreneurship and how to build a startup. He threatened with a lawyer and said that he promise to &quot;destroy&quot; me when i would do this. 
He added two persons to the team, tried to create a partnership and wrote round about 20 lines of the business plan. Nothing more, in one year.<p>Now, six months later i begin to struggle again with the fact to have him in the team. It blocks me mentally. It demotivates. It feels bad. We are two months away from our launch and i really need some advices how to handle this. Should i contact a lawyer? Should i just say &quot;Goodbye&quot; and hang up the phone?<p>What do you think? The best thing would have been to listen to my gut and havn&#x27;t let him on board, i know.
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alain94040
You are weak and you know it. You should never have continued this far. You
know what the right thing to do is (quit), so just do it. Of course it's
complicated, now that you poured so much effort into the whole thing, it's
even more painful to quit. But it won't get any better.

It's time to review all the emails and papers you signed and figure out what
your bargaining position is. You seem to have a weird situation where "share
ownership" has been agreed (2/3 vs. 1/3), but nothing was written down. That
doesn't sound right.

Your options are, from worse to best:

. quit the "partnership" and give up on the idea . quit, keep the IP you
developed, and continue the project on your own . take control of the project,
fire your co-founder and keep everything

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wrongdecision
yes, you are right. thank you.

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hderms
It sound like YOU might need to talk to a lawyer before making any decisions.
Hacker news is probably not an appropriate place to get information regarding
this situation.

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wrongdecision
Perhaps some experiences

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icedchai
If there's nothing written down just start another company without him. Tell
him you're out and are taking all your IP with you.

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mrshershey
I would have to definitely recommend discussing this with a lawyer and BEFORE
the launch.

Good Luck!

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wrongdecision
Would you discuss all this with the team?

