Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

AI OSS tool repo goes archived over night after raising $7.3M Seed

github.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

121–130 of 196 posts

Re: AI OSS tool repo goes archived over night after raising $7.3M Seed

#121

Post by hn_throwaway_99 »

Barbing wrote: post #110
GabrielBianconi wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mostly salaries to support a small team. We are returning the remaining capital to investors.

I’ve never heard of this before. Anyone know if it’s uncommon? Familiar with creditors getting divvied in bankruptcies, but not refunds to investors… oh it’s because there’s never any money left when things wind down. (We hear of retail stores where employees discover closures posted on shop doors when reporting to work.)

It actually happens a lot. Sometimes founders may pivot when the original thesis isn't working out, but a lot of times the prudent thing to do is to just say that it didn't work out and return investors' money.

Honestly, I was close to flagging this story because the title is deliberately manipulative - it makes it sound like the founder did a rug pull. But I was really glad to see the founder come in to these comments and just say we tried, but the market shifted under us. Happens all the time.

Re: AI OSS tool repo goes archived over night after raising $7.3M Seed

#122

Post by Verdex »

ajross wrote: post #48
singpolyma3 wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not on anyone to set up your favourite "governance" system. If anyone honestly wants to keep maintaining or using it the code is still there.

[flagged]

No it's not.

Also read the link. This is apache 2 licensed. Even in whatever imaginary world where there is such a social contract, there is thankfully a legal contract that includes disclaimer of warranty.

Re: AI OSS tool repo goes archived over night after raising $7.3M Seed

#123

Post by Schnitz »

Barbing wrote: post #110
GabrielBianconi wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mostly salaries to support a small team. We are returning the remaining capital to investors.

I’ve never heard of this before. Anyone know if it’s uncommon? Familiar with creditors getting divvied in bankruptcies, but not refunds to investors… oh it’s because there’s never any money left when things wind down. (We hear of retail stores where employees discover closures posted on shop doors when reporting to work.)

This is super common with startups and is usually called an orderly shutdown. You don’t want to wait until you are insolvent, but stop when there is enough money left to pay all outstanding liabilities as well as the people that will shut down the business entity, do a final tax return and so on. Then whatever is left eventually gets paid back to investors, who usually have a liquidation preference requiring this as well. The alternative, running truly out of money, no one shutting down anything, a ghost entity that continues to accumulate taxes and penalties, creditors chasing whoever they can get a hold of, is much worse. Just because everyone quits doesn’t mean the entity ceases to exist.

Re: AI OSS tool repo goes archived over night after raising $7.3M Seed

#125

Post by GabrielBianconi »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #121
Barbing wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’ve never heard of this before. Anyone know if it’s uncommon? Familiar with creditors getting divvied in bankruptcies, but not refunds to investors… oh it’s because there’s never any money left when things wind down. (We hear of retail stores where employees discover closures posted on shop doors when reporting to work.)

It actually happens a lot. Sometimes founders may pivot when the original thesis isn't working out, but a lot of times the prudent thing to do is to just say that it didn't work out and return investors' money. Honestly, I was close to flagging this story because the title is deliberately manipulative - it makes it sound like the founder did a rug pull. But I was really glad to see the founder come in to these commen…

Thanks, that's exactly what happened.

The title is misleading unfortunately but that's how social media goes...

Re: AI OSS tool repo goes archived over night after raising $7.3M Seed

#126

Post by Eridrus »

jdw64 wrote: post #16

VCs think, 'Apps are risky, infrastructure is safe,' so they invested in AI infra. "infra is safe" Hmm, but that wasn't a good idea. because if an open source infrastructure project like TensorZero gets shut down this quickly, won't they start to realize that those investment theories are also risky? The difficult thing about AI infrastructure is that, unlike other industries, it will not become fragmented. It will l…

Tell me you haven't talked to a VC.

A better model for VCs is: companies are finding tons of budget to allocate to new AI spend. Besides the labs, who is going to be able to capture some of that spend while they're actively looking to spend it?

Nobody at the seed stage is investing in things they think are "safe". They are investing in things they think have huge upside.

Re: AI OSS tool repo goes archived over night after raising $7.3M Seed

#127

Post by gavinray »

GabrielBianconi wrote: post #114
faeyanpiraat wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are there any lessons around the why which may be publicly shared ?

There are many factors at play here but if I had to pick one... an open-source company has to find product market fit twice: first for the OSS project and again for a commercial product. The AI market moves very quickly so it's easy to take a step in the wrong direction and fall behind. I might publish a long-form reflection when the dust settles.

It might come off as trite, but I genuinely am sorry that things didn't pan out for you

Very early in my career I used to believe that I or anyone else could be a CEO.

It wasn't until working with tiny teams where the CEO/founders devoted everything in their life to the business -- often at the expense of hobbies, romantic relationships, and any shred of free time -- that I realized true CEOs are a rare breed.

When are you ask things like "what happens if the product fails?" the answer would always be "It won't."

They both relentlessly believe in, and put every ounce of energy toward, their vision because anything less would not suffice

Again as trite as it sounds, I empathize with these people in that to them losing their vision felt like losing something dearest to them

Re: AI OSS tool repo goes archived over night after raising $7.3M Seed

#128

Post by maxnevermind »

GabrielBianconi wrote: post #101
cluckindan wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What did you spend the money on? The other half goes where?

Mostly salaries to support a small team. We are returning the remaining capital to investors.

I thought usually founders try to pivot till they run out of money. I wonder if that is good or bad for a serial entrepreneurs if they decide to shut it down instead of pivoting?

Re: AI OSS tool repo goes archived over night after raising $7.3M Seed

#129

Post by killingtime74 »

Schnitz wrote: post #123
Barbing wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’ve never heard of this before. Anyone know if it’s uncommon? Familiar with creditors getting divvied in bankruptcies, but not refunds to investors… oh it’s because there’s never any money left when things wind down. (We hear of retail stores where employees discover closures posted on shop doors when reporting to work.)

This is super common with startups and is usually called an orderly shutdown. You don’t want to wait until you are insolvent, but stop when there is enough money left to pay all outstanding liabilities as well as the people that will shut down the business entity, do a final tax return and so on. Then whatever is left eventually gets paid back to investors, who usually have a liquidation preference requiring this as…

Worse and also most likely illegal too (sometimes jail or ban on running companies). Depends on where you do it.

Re: AI OSS tool repo goes archived over night after raising $7.3M Seed

#130

Post by GabrielBianconi »

jdw64 wrote: post #16

VCs think, 'Apps are risky, infrastructure is safe,' so they invested in AI infra. "infra is safe" Hmm, but that wasn't a good idea. because if an open source infrastructure project like TensorZero gets shut down this quickly, won't they start to realize that those investment theories are also risky? The difficult thing about AI infrastructure is that, unlike other industries, it will not become fragmented. It will l…

Our investors aren't looking for safe, they're looking for a small chance in funding the next Databricks or similar. Most times it doesn't work out unfortunately, but that's part of the game.

(Also, we raised the capital in 2024 and didn't burn most of it.)

Post reply on HN