FloorEgg, solid advice. i've (painfully) learned parts of this over the past two years. i wish i knew this when i got started, if you haven't shared this already, highly recommend sharing this on more public channels -- more first time founders will benefit from this :)

there's no IP, there's nothing other than two arguing founders lmao

yeah would love to chat! where do i connect with you?

how do you value the shares in that case? if i leave, i'm debating whether to sell my shares or simply split the company in half because it's no product and just the two of us.

they bought it back for what I paid them for, very cheap.

then they issued stock options to me based on the 1-year cliff. I never exercised those options.

we pivoted away from it for fairly dumb reasons ngl. my cofounder didn't segment ICP whatsoever and then got mixed signals from the market and eventually decided there wasn't a need. in hindsight, there was demand we just botched it. this is my first year doing startups and it's my fault not learning enough startup basics when we got started.

could you please elaborate why it's costing me to be doing this investors already signed on?

Because you're more or less starting over. The technical work you do would carry over, to a large extent, at a new company with a clean cap table. All the "real" work is customer discovery and early GTM. Your investors signed on for an earlier company, that company didn't pan out, they're adults, they get that, they don't get a claim on your next company.

It's not like this is an iron rule, but it's something you should be thinking about. If the only things in common between your new direction and your old one is your cofounder and some of your tech stack, you should have a good reason to keep the investors on, right?

haven't bought it up with the VCs yet. there's only two and we raised a few 100k. feels too much like snitching on someone or going behind their back.

agreed - in hindsight, cofounder compatibility was low. i met them at a networking event and then started tinkering on ideas.

my cofounder has been pivoting across different ideas for the past 4 years now after their last company failed. while admirable, the inability to stick to idea/industry/persona, to me, seems like a massive red flag. we started the company for the sake of starting a company, ngl.

what does a good cofounder breakup look like?

After seeing a ton of teams and failed companies, I think people fall into two categories. The first group don't care much about what they work on, as long as it grows quickly. The second group is emotionally invested in an idea/space. This is obviously a gross generalization, but you get the idea. There are good and bad manifestations for each group. The anything-that-pops group can over-pivot and never stick it out, but obviously rolls the dice more which improves chances of a good outcome. The my-life-calling group can get too ideological and be stuck on something that's just not working/isn't the right time, but the endurance is necessary for building great companies. There is no right way. I think the most important thing is for you and your co-founders to understand each other's stances and the types of sacrifices you're willing to make. Your stance could also change with experience, so you should check in regularly. Nobody's born with a "calling" and it's developed over time. But should your stances diverge in a significant way, a lot of conflict can result.

For a good breakup, I usually think about 3 perspectives:

1) Relationship with your co-founder(s) - Unless there's some major violation of my values, I'd like to be on good terms even if the team fell apart. That means you might still grab dinner/beer with them and even help them out in their next venture. You all may end up co-founders in the future when you're all wiser and the opportunity presents itself.

2) Reputation with your investors - The VC space is smaller than you think, and you need to maintain goodwill. These investors did make a bet on you, and I think you'd want to demonstrate you tried your best. You might even return some of the money left (it's mostly symbolic, but w/e counts). Most VCs understand failures are inevitable, but you don't want to leave the impression that you were the problem.

3) Self-image/self-esteem - I think many founders underestimate the benefits of a good closure emotionally. A good breakup means you sleep well at night and are content with how you handled things. You don't want bad vibes to fester and ruin your motivation and focus for whatever you do next. Building a company is already hard enough, you don't need the debuff. Doing rash things you'd end up regretting will likely cost you more time and opportunities later.

thanks for the advice here, fzwang. when these relationships end, what have you usually seen? have there been scenarios where the company/remaining funding is split between the founders? or is one usually bought out?