HN Explorer

Ask HN: Solo founders, what’s your got-hit-by-a-bus strategy?

29 points by herodoturtle ↗ HN
If you’re the sole person in charge of codebase, hosting, support, etc. - what sort of measures do you have in place to support your users/customers in the event that your life is unexpectedly taken?

Apologies for the morbid question. I suspect this is a real concern that is shared by many solo founders.

51 comments

[ 5.3 ms ] story [ 102 ms ] thread
PaulHoule
There is always Apres Moi Le Deluge.
alvest
Putting your code and documentation into a third party source code escrow is a common solution.
iqkznnft
Code is not a company.
notpushkin
It is still some legacy you can leave behind.
iqkznnft
I understand, but my point is that if your company as a "got hit by a bus" problem, having the code in third party escrow is probably not gonna solve that. It kinda suggests to me that someone who believes that putting the code in escrow is a solution to that problem, also believes that the biggest problem with the founder getting hit by a bus is that only the founder knows where the code is. That's not the biggest problem, not even close.
version_five
I think it's often a poor focus for founders, until you have a real leadrship team in place and naturally have distributed responsibility. Companies dealing with startups are assuming some risks and should be aware of that. There are more highly probably events (going out of business for example) that your time is better spent mitigating. So my opinion is don't worry about it if you're a 1 person or small operation, just accept that there is a risk, and be honest with customers if it ever comes up.
Tretioh
Why?

I don't think you would be in any relevant position at all to care about a startup which is run by you in case you die.

Your family can't run it, others can't just take it over and you are 6 feet under.

Get life insurance and stop worrying about this if you haven't brought the company far enough yet.

marginalia_nu
Once we are dead, our legacy is what is left of us. Since it all amounts to nothing, might as well try to make a dent in history. Maybe we'll be one of the ones people are still quoting two thousand years later without even realizing it ([... do]lorem ipsum dolor sit amet).
[deleted]
(comment deleted)
altdataseller
Nobody even thinks about your legacy after you’re dead. Nobody has that much time. They’re all worried about themselves.
marginalia_nu
Then why are people like Steve Jobs held in such esteem?
marc_io
Most think that for a minute and then simply move on with their lives.
marginalia_nu
Really? There are people who are vitually LARP:ing the man to this date, turtleneck and all.
blitzar
Case and point - the greatest something of a generation: legacy - wearing a turtleneck.
marginalia_nu
Sure. I even started out by noting that Cicero has been reduced to "Lorem ipsum".
XCSme
I always think that in 300 years (probably even less) nothing that you did mattered and no one will remember who you were and what you did. Also, trying to do something "big" and change the world might lead to the opposite of what you tried to achieve, so trying to do something that will benefit the world in 1000 years for now doesn't really make any sense.
alvest
You can work with a lawyer to put your business in a trust so that if something happens to you the trust and trustee take over operations.
iqkznnft
Look before you cross.
yourad_io
I grew up in a somewhat vehicularly lawless society where mopeds going the wrong way down a one-way street are an everyday phenomenon.

I legitimately look _thrice_ before crossing: expected traffic side, other side and back once again.

I am paranoid about getting hit by a bus/car/...

I'll likely be done for by a falling piano.

[deleted]
(comment deleted)
iqkznnft
I grew up in a society where traffic in relatively orderly, and we were still told as kids that same pattern: traffic side, other side and back
spacemanmatt
I feel like this is something that solo founders don't address because continuity is a concept that attaches to shared assets. Once someone else cares enough to be involved the founder is no longer solo.
rozenmd
I run a business that entitely runs itself on cron.

I guess the customers that ask for support would just churn, but the stable set of customers that know what they're doing would keep enough cash in the accounts to keep the lights on until AWS permanently shuts down.

altdataseller
No measures at all. If I die, the business will most likely die as well. Since it’s not a huge business that can support lots of employees, the impact to my family will be negligible too
muzani
None. The company has trouble staying alive with me alive. It will be gone when I'm dead. Heck, the one that got acquired died even with me in an advisory position.

There will always be competitors. Some may spawn or be inspired later. Someone eventually does the same thing but better.

It's probably overengineering to try to keep a company alive longer than me. The primary responsibility is keeping my kids alive should I die within the next two decades, so I'd rather focus on that first.

[deleted]
(comment deleted)
fragmede
Beyond life insurance, what have you done to ensure your descendants future?
krnlpnc
Bought them a round of Ferraris
muzani
Life insurance is one thing, but it has to be managed well. My will puts it into a fund that distributes it at a monthly rate until they're a certain age, so it doesn't get used up all at once. The rate is a little higher for college aged and some conditions let them cover college fee directly from the pool. There's also named guardians in case my wife dies too, and they get a caregivers stipend.

There's also a lot of stuff that isn't clearly handled by inheritance laws - crypto, steam games, income from say, Google Play, passwords, so you have to set that up as well.

Also because software made me paranoid about failsafes, I took a separate life insurance in case the people in charge of my will screws over the kids, so they'll get a lump sump once I die.

deserted
The separate lump sum life insurance is brilliant. Assuming all goes well, it will be a nice initial boost to handle one off 'start of new setup' expenses and ensure a buffer of savings beyond the monthly stipend. Worst case, it can be stretched and used for critical things instead of safety and comfort.
_448
> Heck, the one that got acquired died even with me in an advisory position.

:) There is an interesting advice on this topic in a book "Make a million before lunch". It states that your job as a founder should be to make yourself redundant as soon as possible. It helps a lot strategically in the long-run.

mateusfreira
Open-source it. I don't really advise running any business 100% solo, but I have done it for a while until my company has grown a bit. At that time and now (with my current new project), my strategy is to open-source it if something happens to me. Then, any customer or close person can take it from where I left it.
herodoturtle
Interesting answer - makes a lot of sense.

I’m on (what sounds like) a similar path to yours - in that the SaaS is growing nicely (and will one day afford a team and hopefully scale sustainably) but currently there is significant key-man risk.

My main concern is for my customers, so your open source idea sounds very practical.

How did you set this up? Do you have a private GitHub repo for example? With a Will / procedure to open it to customers?

Just trying to understand the practical execution of this idea.

mateusfreira
Yes, I have private repositories on GitHub with my SaaS products, and I add close friends as read-only contributors (usually to exchange ideas or show something I have done in the project).

These friends are also coders tho. They don't have interests (neither do I at the moment) into became part of the business. I told them openly in case I died, they could open-source the project or take over the project. Passwords I keep with my wife / direct relatives so they can contact them to just take control of the project.

However, open-sourcing would probably be enough for some of my customers to run the system by themselves. With the code and getting the access by contacting my relatives, these friends can potentially take the project and continue supporting my current customers.

f0e4c2f7
Much less than a bus can kill a one person startup.
gus_massa
There was a very similar question posted two years ago, and it has a great reply by patio11:

> There are, roughly, three very different rationales to have business succession planning in place, and at the scale of a solo operator they have very different best options available:

> 1) I want to avoid negatively impacting paying clients in the event of a bus factor issue.

> 2) I want to avoid negatively impacting "the community" in the event of a bus factor issue.

> 3) I want to ensure my heirs receive the residual value of the income stream.

It's too long to repeat it here, but the the the rest of the comment by patio11 with his answers to 1, 2 and 3 are in https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21908638

giantg2
My stuff would end up being dormant or shutting down. I don't feel the need for continuity with my LLC nor my Android apps. If I'm dead, oh well. The Android apps are open source, so someone can recreate them.
randyrand
My product is self hosted “IoT” hardware.

It doesn’t need the internet to work, by design, and is standards based. (Mobile App is optional)

[deleted]
(comment deleted)
epc
A friend and I review each other’s “in case I’m dead” documents on a ~yearly basis. He runs a small MSP (~200 clients), I run a variety of small income producing things. The point of the documents isn’t to run the business perfectly, it’s to capture the day one…thirty issues for the survivors to either shut the business(es) down cleanly, or sell off. Even a simply "if I’m dead, this is what you should do” document is incredibly helpful to your heirs or whoever administers your estate.

The reason for a solo founder to at least think about these things is, sure, if you’re dead, you’re dead. But if you have any family they will inherit the mess left behind when you die. Even if your intent is the business should die with you there’s paperwork and pissed off clients/customers. If you run a sloppy LLC or C corp (minimal paperwork to keep up the corporate veil) your family will absolutely love to learn that you’ve dumped this pile of crap on them after your death.

patiiipot_
As a business founder, you really have to think even beyond life XD. I agree with you that we should think about who will handle the business if you pass away. It's what you built and leaving it to someone who is messed up might ruin it :(( I'll ask more about this to my folks at Founders Cafe. https://founderscafe.io/