How do I deal with a co-founder who hasn't contributed?

I love these questions.

The good news: you haven't signed anything, so all code written is yours, you legally don't owe this fake co-founder anything.

The real question: do you really have the motivation to finish the startup by yourself, without the other founder? Are you willing to go fulltime on it? If yes, then ignore your old co-founder. Later on, when you incorporate (close to launch), ask him if he would like a small equity share as a gesture (less than 5%). His choice.

Do not keep this co-founder with you: if he hasn't worked on it for 3 months, then he is not passionate. He would be a drag on your progress. You'd be arguing and keeping him in the loop (a lot of work) for very little positive results.

These are facts (assuming what you said is true and fair). Your challenge: have the guts to kick your co-founder out and to stop pretending like there is no problem. There is a major problem and great entrepreneurs address problems head on. Will you?

I am not a lawyer, but I've been through this exact same situation, and am passing on the tactics and advice I received from my lawyer.

Why you can't cut and run at this point

I agree with many that he seems like "an idea guy" and will be "dead weight" and that you'd be better off pursuing this on your own (or recruiting another cofounder) if you're really passionate about it. The problem is, you might not have the freedom to.

In most jurisdictions in the United States, if you're operating in any sort of business arrangement without a formal structure or legal entity (ie, corporation, partnership, etc) then the law views your business entity as a "general partnership". Under this structure, you have very strong fiduciary agreements which basically means that you can't do anything that isn't in your partner's best interest. Similarly, he can't do anything to screw you over either.

If you decide to cut him out of the business and take it on yourself, you'll have to sleep with one eye open forever in case he ever decides that he wants to take you to court over the business, even if you go on and incorporate it and build it out all by yourself. It would essentially be up to the judge to decide what's "fair", but it's very hard to make a convincing case that you did all the work yourself. People lose these kinds of cases every day.

Similarly, if you go to raise funding, while the VCs are conducting due dilligance, you'll have to tell them about your situation and they'll be extremely skittish. It might tank your deals.

Basically, he'll turn into a huge liability for you and the business.

So what can you do now?

If you really want to cut and run -- which I agree that you should -- you absolutely, 100% need to get him to agree to leave, and get it in writing. Have a lawyer draft something so that there are no loopholes.

It needs to say that he is assigning all of the businesses assets to you, including intellectual property. It needs to say that he forfeits all claims to the business. It needs to say that he won't misrepresent himself as an agent of your business going forward.

It should probably say that he can't publicly disparage the business and you might even throw in a non-compete clause.

But how do you get get him to agree to leave?

If you can't coax him into leaving the business on his own, the best way is to "buy him out". Since you don't have actual shares, there are no numbers to go by, so it'll take some negotiation. Sit down with him and tell him that you'd like to offer him a large sum of money for the idea and inspiration, and the right to carry it on yourself. Word this carefully to soften the blow and help your negotiation.

Then the two of you should hash out what you think the business is worth. Once you agree on that amount, offer to pay him half -- from your own personal savings -- and make sure that he knows that the exchange is:

• he gets your money
• you get his signature on the release contract.

If you make the release agreement really strict, he might ask for more money. You'll have to be flexible on this since you need his signature on that piece of paper. If he gets cold feet then you've done nothing but make bad blood -- and you're still stuck with him.

What if he still doesn't agree?

Then you need to stop working on the business. As hard as it may be for you, and as much as you've poured into it already, it's simply not worth it. If you slave away for months and years and make the next Facebook, he'll be eating half of your pie.

But more than that, an estranged and uncommitted business partner is a drain on you and your efforts. It'll drive you crazy and it will absolutely destroy your relationship. I've been in this situation and -- to this day -- I can't look my former roommate and friend in the eye.

It's a very messy situation and there's no easy or polite way out. Just keep reiterating that it's not personal, it's just business. Don't be hot-headed or you'll never reach an agreement. Best of luck.

As Founder, I had a related situation - albeit with much better communication.

Our biz developed an online application and pushed the product off the shelf. I had a very talented CEO (I'll call him Logan) of another company approach me stating he thought our idea had "great potential" and after a couple of lengthy conversations, we decided to enter a Co-Founder Agreement. The plan was for Logan to vest into 30% + ownership over 4 years and contribute 10+ hours a week. We created a 90 day "cliff" to evaluate our working relationship before making the vesting official. This was key!

The runway to launch had already taken well over a year with considerable bootstrapping - we already had a membership base of 140+ users, but no revenue yet.

Long story short: Logan kicked ass for the first 45 days and really contributed lots of ideas and helped to execute some site changes. For the next 45 days he was basically a no-show because (thankfully for him), his biz took off so much he became swamped. He did not even have 10 minutes a week to give.

At 90 days we decided that indeed, he over-committed and unfortunately did not have the time to contribute consistently over the long haul. Co-Founder agreement ends, yet Logan remains on board as an Adviser with a 1% share of equity ownership.

Hope this helps...

Richard

It seems you are dealing with an "idea guy". Classic.

An idea has zero value. Nothing. Only execution counts. Somebody on board who refuses to work, but wants to get credit for the whole thing pretty much guarantees failure. Also, because he will not go through the path of execution with you, he will have no clue why it is important to pivot with the idea, when it comes to that. The initial idea always changes on the way. This is one reason the idea has no value.

The experience you gained could be used on a project that doesn't involve a totally useless person who is calling himself a founder. If I were you, I'd quit the project ASAP, and try to come up with a new idea myself, while looking for a better co-founder, possibly a technical one.

Here is something to read on the topic.

Good luck!

Tell him you want to "buy out" his portion of the business. And you'd be willing to pay him $100 per hour for all the long hours he's put in the past few . . . . oh wait.

Hmmmm, is it possible to write a check for $ 0.01?

I think Alain has a good grasp on this.

Alternatively, one thing you could do is get the company registered, and put both of you on vesting schedules. This basically gets you out of having a nasty confrontation. You vest your shares in the company over a couple years, and base them on milestones. When your partner doesn't meet the milestones, he looses the rest of his share in the company, and you go forward alone, but with a largest share of the company. There can't be hurt feelings, because your partner didn't live up to the deal. It makes everything very black and white, and fair on all accounts.

However, the up side of this is that if he does get into gear, and starts contributing, you still end up with the same equity you have now, and you still have a partner that will be working hard. I always prefer to work with at least one other person when starting a business, so I can't really tell you it's better off alone, having another opinion on things is pretty invaluable.

I agree with the 5% for idea suggestion above. At our start-up we have a number of partners helping at various levels (a couple of hours per month to full-time). We made a simple spreadsheet with various contributions (idea, business planning, engineering, marketing/sales, finance etc) and weighted % distributed across all of them. Idea had a small part (5%) of the total weight. We then used this simple spreadsheet to discuss the relative equity % among the main partners along with their level of involvement and depth in the field. It was easier to discuss because we had something tangible to work with. If you would like to keep your partner on-board, you could try something similar and see if you can reach a reasonable compromise. If not, it is time to move on without the partner or find a new idea.

I've worked with someone exactly like this. He and I were very close friends. We starting up a company together and as time went on, he had little to do but still never did it. There wasn't the 'idea issue' that you seem to have but anyone who thinks an idea is work a lot of money need a dose of reality.

If you don't want to 'screw him over' I think that is very admirable of you. We should always keep things balanced. However, he's not keeping things balanced at all. The promise of more effort is a joke - he is either completely sold on making things happen or he is not. If he's not, then get away from him: at best he'll just take a cut of your added value; at worst, he'll destroy the business.

I don't know about buying him out or cutting him out (buy starting your own thing which does the same thing). There are a million ideas out there. Find a better partner and move forward with that. Just tell the guy that you're disappointed with the progress of the company and don't want to move forward with the idea (since part of the idea is moving forward with him).

Good luck to you!

Actually, Hartley is pretty close to accurate, but not quite. You can't just stop working on it. If you do, then YOU have legal liability as a fiduciary (aka "owner") and he could sue you for breach of fiduciary duty unless you give him notice of your intent to cease the business.

Walking away is NEVER the right thing to do, even as an employee. Make sure you outline your concerns in writing, have them reviewed by a competent attorney in your state, and then have your partner served so that you have legal proof that he received the documents.

You don't have to file a lawsuit, but you do have to protect yourself. In my opinion, the best route here is to go the "let's get an agreement in place" route, and have in that agreement the responsibilities and that equity is tied to participation.

If that fails, notice them that you're leaving and turn your shares into the company (if any exist).