Yeah, this is a great point (and no offense taken—I appreciate the real talk even if it’s a bit painful to hear). I’m taking the other job because the risk is so much lower. And while I do believe that this business could potentially make me more money/be more fulfilling than a day job, there is a huge amount of risk that we’d never make any money and that I’d be forfeiting a guaranteed high salary. We’re still a ways away from making enough revenue to warrant me forfeiting the salary job.
I appreciate your insight. I’ll definitely keep this in mind. Even though I want to get my slice, I also want to be fair to my partner. It might just be that we’re not a good fit for each other right now.
If we can’t come to an agreement and I have to exit, do you have any suggestions about what to do with the app (I currently own the IP for all the code)?
This app does not use AI at all (nor is it AI slop—I used AI very sparingly to build the product). The app uses NextJS and Postgres, and it’s mostly CRUD and a bit of scraping+caching behind the scenes. It does solve a business problem that we’ve validated with a pre-MVP (low-tech Google Forms + Google Sheets + Twilio) via waitlist members.
The free version of our MVP is ready to launch to general users, though, and the only thing holding us back is that we haven’t signed an agreement about compensation.
We’ve already identified/communicated with some potential customers, and deals with these customers are typically 40K+/year based on our research (FOIA requests to public institutions using competitor products). Based on what’s built (and what I could finish building by August), I think I’d we’d have a fairly competitive offering in the market we’re targeting even if we changed nothing after August.
This risk of “dead equity” to future investors is why we have discussed doing profit sharing. Does this info change anything? Got any alternative proposals/advice? Thanks for your help—it is very much appreciated.
Stock buybacks sound like they could be a fair way to structure this deal. What if the company never goes public/gets bought? How do I ensure that I get something out of this if the business becomes very profitable?
I appreciate your insight. I’ll definitely keep this in mind. Even though I want to get my slice, I also want to be fair to my partner. It might just be that we’re not a good fit for each other right now.
If we can’t come to an agreement and I have to exit, do you have any suggestions about what to do with the app (I currently own the IP for all the code)?