Technical co-founder and CTO: what’s the difference
Every startup business is unique in terms of the job titles and what employees really do there. Especially at the start, it’s hard to divide the fields of responsibility. But in most IT companies, there is either a technical co-founder or a CTO. Let’s find out who does what and whom to hire.
A technical co-founder is someone with solid development expertise ready to pour cash into the business and hold responsibility for the operations. Technical co-founders are responsible for product development and restrain the non-technical co-founder’s fantasies, marking the boundaries of what is possible and what’s not. At the same time, both of them make strategic decisions.
The technical + non-technical founder duo works well because:
- The first one is an expert in mobile or web development frameworks and methodologies. Technical co-founders understand how long it takes to develop an IT product, which team composition you need, and how much the development costs.
- The second one needs support: a technical co-founder without technical skills invests money and fulfills the development task pool. Meanwhile, the co-founder focuses on marketing, customer acquisition, and search for investors.
The CTO (Chief Technology Officer) is also a skilled developer with experience in team leading. As opposed to a technical co-founder, they don’t own part of the company but simply work for a salary. Accordingly, CTOs don’t make any strategic decisions. They consult, suggest, and participate in discussions, but don’t hold the veto right like co-founders. You need a CTO to hire and manage developers and represent your company at tech conferences when needed.
Why is it better to find a technical co-founder?
There are at least 3 reasons to find a technical co-founder. With them, you’ll:
Have higher chances of finding investors
If you have neither a technical co-founder nor a CTO, then most probably, you will outsource product development. With such an approach, you’d need to clearly understand technical requirements and control intermediate results to get the desired product. It’s impossible to accomplish that without technical expertise. Experienced investors are aware of this and prefer to invest in startups with a technical co-founder on board. In that way, it’s clear who will take care of the startup development process. Also, judging by the co-founder’s profile, you can forecast if they can bring the project to release at all.
Focus on your strengths
We all have the same 24 hours in a day. Even if you’re a time-management guru, it’s still hard to do everything solo: you need to delegate and share responsibilities. Code a product, set up a development team, talk with investors, promote the product — and that’s just a tiny part of what a startup business owner must do. To have it all done at the top level, you need to focus on your strengths instead of developing weaknesses and expanding effort x10.
Have access to expertise
To launch a functioning and scalable product, you need somebody who will:
- consider all the development risks
- mitigate them
- control the development process
A professional foresees all the bottlenecks and helps overcome them and save time and money. There’s no need to delve deep into the startup development process, learn programming languages, or hire developers. The weight of responsibility for startup development spreads evenly between two people and the product gets released faster.
What are the disadvantages of a technical co-founder?
You need to have the right expectations before making a decision — find a technical co-founder or hire a director. Partnership with a tech co-founder brings some disadvantages as well.
You should share the profits
Nobody likes to split the income, especially business stakes. At the initial stage, when you have nothing — there is also nothing to lose. But when the startup generates the first profit, that’s when the gut check starts for co-founders.
To avoid quarrels after the product launch, it’s better to settle issues at the start and seal the verbal agreement with a contract. In case of disagreements, you can just look at the terms. Then, either go to court or change the terms of cooperation.
Partner’s opinion may differ from yours
Supposedly, people try to find technical co-founders to get a different view of the product. Technical co-founders share their thoughts because they have a stake in the product’s success. But not all people are ready for it because, in fact, all they need is a CTO to manage a team and roll out the project on time. So, if you’re 110% sure of your idea, you need a CTO. They can also suggest new ideas but you have a right to listen and have it your way. It won’t be possible to pull something like that with tech co-founders.
Quarrels over who works more
The first one sits in the office until 23:00 while another one runs out of the office at 17:00 on the tick. It’s hard to define the workload standards because there is no work contract between you two. The only way to settle the issues is to find common ground and follow it.
💡Purrweb’s tip
If you’re ready to share the profits, you’d better find a technical co-founder. They’ll risk their stake, not just the salary of a CTO. Accordingly, the inclusion in the startup development cycle will be higher. However, if you need a CTO, we have an article about how to find one. ⬇️
But how to find a technical co-founder?
There are at least 5 ways to find a technical co-founder. Let’s get into the details:
1. Use social networks
Social networks are an abundant source of information about candidates and also a way to let people know about your idea. If you want to find a technical co-founder, LinkedIn will suit you well. And if you want to broadcast your idea, use X (formerly Twitter).
LinkedIn works well for the initial search: just type in ‘software engineer’ and get 13M profiles. The main point is to have in mind the selection criteria. Be it an experience of working in a blue-chip company like Google, or experience of launching a startup — add those criteria in additional filters and study the results. Next, send out DMs pitching your idea and suggesting to meet if the person is up for it.
People perceive cold messages worse but there’s still a chance that somebody will answer. For example, the Hubstaff owner managed to find a tech co-founder on LinkedIn. He had two important ingredients at hand: a clear vision of a promising idea and specific requirements for a co-founder.
X (formerly Twitter)
You can post your idea and ask for feedback. Maybe it’ll draw somebody’s attention. For example, Product Hunt started exactly like that. The startupper didn’t know how to find a tech co-founder, shared his business idea on X (formerly Twitter) and asked for feedback. Not only did it let him validate the idea, but also put him in touch with people who helped him launch the product.
2. Ask people on a forum
You can validate your technical idea on forums and find a tech co-founder along the way. The principle is similar to publishing an idea on Twitter: just open a relevant thread and drop a line describing your idea. Reddit is one of the most active forums.
There is a popular subreddit r/co-founder/ where you can find a tech co-founder. There users post info about their business and describe the desired tech co-founder. The chances of coming across a tech co-founder are high because the number of daily active users is 70M. But even if it does not work out, you’ll also get feedback like in the case of X (formerly Twitter).
3. Address a business incubator
A business incubator is the hub where initiative and idea-driven people meet. Of course, most of the participants already have technical ideas that they truly believe in and hope to fulfill. But no one’s stopping you from finding the crossing points with those people and winning them over to your project. Your visions may actually be pretty close and you’d not need to talk them over for long: a duo will form organically.
There are several international business incubators. You can find a list of startup incubators here. Let’s look at the 3 most notable ones:
Y Combinator
Probably, one of the most popular business incubators that finances startups on the seed stage and helps to find a technical co-founder. Apart from initial investments, you may get access to startuppers passionate about their ideas.
Every year, Y Combinator organizes an online startup school where participants:
- study business theory
- track their startup development progress
- score their first deals
- find co-founders
Startupbootcamp
It’s a business accelerator with 20+ international industry-focused programs. The platform provides access to mentors, potential partners, and investors from various technical industries: IoT, fintech, and foodtech. On the website, you can check upcoming events where you can meet other startuppers and find a tech co-founder.
Seedcamp
One of the most known business accelerators in Europe. It helped Revolut start a revolution in the fintech technical market faster. The Seedcamp Nation organizes workshops and one-on-one sessions with experts. There you may also find a tech co-founder.
4. Submit a request on special platforms
Y Combinator Cofounder Matching
Y Combinator recently rolled out a platform where users may find a tech co-founder. They just need to list their search criteria, e.g. business interests, skills, location. The platform is still young, but taking into account the community around Y Combinator, you can expect that the new project will be in the groove very soon. As the website states, in the first month, more than 9,000 users managed to find a tech co-founder.
CoFoundersLab
On this platform, you can also find a tech co-founder, a mentor, or an investor. To find a tech co-founder you need to sign up, answer several questions about yourself and your business, and then proceed to search. The platform works on a freemium basis. There are currently 355,000 founders on the website.
Founders Nation
A platform tailored to finding a tech co-founder in a startup business. The functionality of the service is similar to CoFoundersLab. To post your info, you should fill in 4 fields: who you are, elevator pitch, stage of idea, and contact information. The platform also offers free legal, financial, technological, and marketing support through its partners.
Angel.co
A popular platform for finding a tech co-founder, business angels, or an IT professional. In the section AngelList Talent, you can sign up as a recruiter and publish a vacancy. Also, you get access to specialists’ profiles and you can connect with them. Now, there are 2M job seekers on the platform.
Indie Hackers
The startup community focused on helping entrepreneurs increase profits from their projects. Startuppers describe their financial goals and product ideas and find a tech co-founder for their startup. There is also a forum where users share the success stories and methodologies that they used. Also, they publish ideas and offer help in carrying out projects. Currently, there are 31,719 indie hackers on the platform.
5. Hire a CTO and turn them into cofounder
Let’s say, you found a credible software developer with 15 years of experience on the stack that you need. Everything seems to be okay, but you still doubt whether the nominee can cope with the tech co-founder’s responsibilities or not. Because they never had such an experience before. You don’t need to endanger startup development. Just hire the candidate as a CTO and see the results of work in such a format. If you don’t manage to find a tech co-founder by that moment, you may offer your CTO the ‘all-in’ option.
Examples and the fruits of such partnership
Apple
Now, it’s hard to believe that some people have never heard of Apple. It’s the №1 tech company in the world by market capitalization. Products like iPod, iPad, iPhone, and iMac in their times revolutionized their markets.
Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak stand behind the success of this company: a classical example of a mix of technical and non-technical co-founders. For them, the question ‘how to find a technical co-founder’ was an easy one to answer — take a look at what your peers do and find the one who shares your interests. Both Jobs and Wozniak were keen on electronics, with one difference: the first was a visionary while the second liked to dig into electronics. Jobs knew which products the market needed and what to focus on. Wozniak was a wizard who turned his partner’s vision into a technical reality.
Steve Wozniak and Steve Jobs in 1976
Steve Wozniak put the first computer, Apple I, together. Steve Jobs was the one who saw the potential in it, founded a company, and suggested scaling up. Wozniak admits that he never wanted to do two things in his life: politics and business. Jobs took the business stuff on his side while letting his partner focus solely on technical product development.
Microsoft
It’s also one of the pioneers in the consumer software market. It goes right after Apple by the market capitalization. Its success is mostly credited to Bill Gates, who strongly associates with the Microsoft trademark in the public mind.
Surprisingly, the story of Microsoft’s foundation is similar to Apple’s. Gates was also responsible for the business while Paul Allen was more of a technical co-founder. At the same time, you can’t say that Gates didn’t know how to program, he was also involved in the development process. But formally the distribution of responsibilities was as follows — Allen was doing technical development, and Gates — negotiations and customer acquisition.
Paul Allen and Bill Gates
Dropbox
Dropbox — a file hosting service that lets users store their files in the cloud. The idea is simple: upload files in a special folder and get access to them from any device with Internet access.
The idea of creating such a service crossed Drew Houston’s mind on the road. He wanted to elaborate on several technical startup ideas on the way from Boston to New York but forgot to take the USB stick. So, he realized it would be great to access files from anywhere in the world without being bound to an HDD or a memory stick. In 6 months, Drew headed to Y Combinator to present the business concept. The startup accelerator believed in the idea but made a provision: find a tech co-founder as it would increase the startup’s chances to succeed.
How to find a technical co-founder in 2 weeks? — that was the challenge that Dropbox’s founder took on. Through the grapevine, he got in touch with Arash Ferdowsi, and in 2 hours, he persuaded him to become a tech co-founder. Now, the market capitalization of Dropbox is $8.10 billion.
Drew Houston and Arash Ferdowsi
Checklist: how to find out if the cofounder fits well
Now that it’s clear how to find a technical co-founder, we need to understand who to look for. There is a list of general criteria that can tell you if you’ll get on with the tech co-founder or not. The technical co-founder will fit you well if they:
See the potential in the idea
Seems like it’s the most obvious, but often people forget about it. It may turn out that you found a tech co-founder, but they don’t see the future of your product and still decide to take on your project thinking: ‘My partner is bulletproof sure that it’ll work out. He probably knows better.’
It’s a direct way to nowhere. You won’t have the drive and energy needed to launch something new. If a technical co-founder doesn’t believe in success from the ground up, you’d better not even start such a partnership.
See eye to eye on life values
Good internal chemistry with the tech co-founder guarantees that you two will focus on the client and the product instead of squabbling. You need to trust the person and have a shared vision of how your business should develop.
The trick of partnership is bringing diverse expertise and examining the product from different angles. If a technical co-founder principally doesn’t want to conquer foreign markets, but in your perspective, that’s the only possible scenario of development, then such a partnership won’t work long.
Think from the business perspective
There are developers who simply enjoy coding, experimenting with frameworks, and generally researching. In the IT business, developers build a profitable product in the first place and educate themselves in the meantime. That’s why a technical co-founder should be able to balance between the team’s development and achieving business goals.
The key question that a technical co-founder should keep in mind is — where’s the money Lebowski? Who will pay for the IT solution, and why should it be interesting for anybody after all?
Know how to meet the deadlines
The time-to-market is crucial in development. If the market niche is developing fast, most probably somebody already developed a similar product. To eat the ginger, you need to be the first on the market. If a technical co-founder follows the ‘if one’s luck changes’ approach to deadlines, then there will be no discipline in the team.
Communicate well
Often you can meet team leads who know technologies inside out but can’t explain their thoughts and ideas simply. A technical co-founder is a rare type of professional. They know what’s what in terms of technologies and at the same time can communicate with the team and co-founder. Find a technical co-founder who communicates clearly so that everybody on the team is on the same page and happy.
Have strategic vision
Usually, senior developers think about the borders of their technical projects and work with the information given by a project manager or a product owner. Such developers don’t always need to delve into why the software should be built in a particular way. So, they mostly participate in the development process.
Technical co-founders think strategically in terms of the product and skillfully balance between short-term and long-term tasks. They don’t forget about what has to be done now. At the same time, they look at the product from the users’ shoes, and if needed, change the development plan.
Have experience in the area of your startup
For those who don’t know a thing about the technical part of IT, it may seem as if experienced IT techies are magicians who can do anything. Partially, that’s true. But they can do a lot in the stack they have the most experience with. It’s better to find a technical co-founder who has experience in launching products like yours.
So, what to do?
Before finding a co-founder and starting a partnership, you should understand what you really need from this cooperation — just the technical implementation of the product or all-in inclusion into the project. You’ll have to listen and hear your partner, sometimes meet halfway, and not always do as you wish. If you aren’t ready for it and just want to give orders, then, you’d better find a CTO or outsource the development.
Good CTOs are most probably busy with other projects, and there’s no point for them to risk switching to a young startup. Taking on the risk is only worth it if you get a decent paycheck. But are you ready to pay a high salary indeed? If you’re not, then you will hire an inexperienced CTO trying to take on any opportunity. In such a case, the stakes are high, and it’s not clear if the project will take off.
That’s why when you don’t have a technical co-founder and don’t want to play Russian roulette in the CTO selection process, you can outsource the development. One of our clients did that. He wanted to create a platform for shared investments in real estate. We developed an MVP, the project started to generate profit and the client afforded to hire a professional CTO. Now, they work with us on an outsourcing basis.
The same story happened on the project Energo. This app allows users to rent power banks. We designed and developed 3 apps — for users, advertisers, and maintenance. Then, the client got his own development team together, hired a CTO, and stopped outsourcing, as he managed to align product support on his side.
Design of the EnerGO app
If you have an idea, but no team to implement it, you can follow the scenario of Energo: the idea is on you, and we’ll take care of everything else. Interested? Then, describe your idea in the form below, leave your email to us, and we will contact you within 12 hours.
