Idea –> MVP: A stuttering journey

[David]

Context: I am working on a business idea within a market in which I have domain expertise. I have validated the idea through interviewing and surveying potential clients and end-users and used this data to refine the idea and help shape the key elements and business strategy. I have also had positive early stage conversations with investors who in premise like the idea and believe it is scalable. It is a tech start-up requiring a fairly sophisticated platform build. I am a non-technical founder and based within the UK (close to London). Challenge: I’m really struggling to take the business to the MVP stage. As I mentioned before I am a non-technical founder and as such am looking for the best method to get an MVP built. Explored Options: – Technical Cofounder: My preferred option would be to find a technical co-founder, someone who I work well with and shares my belief for the project and is willing to initially work for equity. This is seemingly harder than finding a spouse! – Freelance Development: Heard horror stories about 10’s of thousands wasted on shoddy work, reluctant to go down this route. – Co-Foundry Companies: I have had interest from co-foundry companies who offer resources such as tech, legal, marketing, business development in return for equity (a hefty amount of equity) and an opportunity to pitch to their investment team. Although this all sounds ideal, I’m somewhat concerned about losing 1/4 of my company and not getting much in return. Questions: – What methods would you recommend to best try and find a technical co-founder? Are there any specific forums, social network groups, events or meet-ups that you would recommend (within the UK)? – Has anyone had a positive experience with freelance/offshore developers? Any tips I should follow should I reluctantly head down this route? Contrastingly, any horror stories with important lessons learnt that you would be willing to share? – Has anyone had any experience with co-foundry companies? Did they offer good value in return for that chunk of equity? At this stage I feel like progress is stuttering and I really want to press on and really generate some momentum going forward! Any advice you could offer would be greatly appreciated 🙂 Cheers! – by hq overview MarkPickess – –