

Ask HN:  What are some ways you can lose your startup? - benologist

This great presentation by Joe Stump the other day [1] got me thinking ... one of the slides says in nice big capital letters, "YOU CAN BE FIRED FROM YOUR OWN COMPANY".<p>A commenter here on HN said there's a 60% chance you'll be gone in the first year post-funding, whether accurate or exaggerated it's still obviously a terrifying proposition! [2]<p>There's not a lot of literature out there talking about what went wrong [3] so I'm very curious.<p>What are some of the ways you can lose your startup?<p>[1] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2710387<p>[2] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2711513<p>[3] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2711787
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brudgers
The most likely way is simply running out of money.

But anytime you don't own the majority of the company you can be fired because
you don't have control.

For example suppose you and a cofounder split the stock evenly, then sell 8%
of the company to a third person drawing 4% from each of you so that the stock
split is 46/46/8. Now your 46% gives you the same amount of control as the
person with 8%. If your cofounder and Mr. 8% decide to fire you, they've got
the votes.

