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It makes no sense as there are so many other positions that become available as a company grows.
Go learn Product. It doesn't take nearly as long, and you can have just as big of a positive impact.
You not only own part of the company but can use this experience to grow both technically and professionally.
Don't waste the chance to learn more than you ever could.
Are you taking a salary?
I don't see how you could contribute negatively to the company if you are at least somewhat productive and know the domain.
First off, I'm sorry about your situation. Nobody here will be able to judge with any degree of accuracy whether he has a point. I personally would not look at this situation as a technical one; this is a business relationship situation. Regardless of whether there is any grain of truth, the CTO has lost confidence in you. Not just a little bit. He has asked you to leave. The rest of my advice assumes the CEO (your c…
Thank you for taking the time to respond. > The rest of my advice assumes the CEO (your co-founder) has quite a bit of confidence in the CTO. This is the case, it is in my interest however to remain in the company because my equity is vested, the sooner I leave the less I will get in return, apart from my time, and opportunity cost I invested all my personal wealth.
He's trying to fuck you over. Remind him that he works for you, not the other way around. Start looking for his replacement. Check with a lawyer about the security of your own stake and make sure you are good with the business guy, because the CTO has probably been whispering poison in his ear about you.
This just has to be true.
Whose company is this, you and your co-founder's or the CTO's?
You are a co-founder. That counts for a lot. I am also assuming that your equity stake is significant.
First of all, deal with this right now. Don't wait for the 3-6 months. You are basically being told that once they have raised money, they will find a way to get you out. Right now, it's a fishing expedition between the CTO and the other founder. Will you be a nice gentle person and go along with their approach or are you going to turn into an attack dog.
You likely have tremendous leverage right now due to this funding round coming up. They will not want to rock the boat. But this is exactly when you should be doing it as I don't believe the "we need you" bit means anything other than "we don't want you to fk up our funding round coming up".
At the end of the day, if they really want you out, they'll find a way to do so. The main thing is that you got to get on the offensive and make sure if you do end up leaving the company, you've left on the best financial terms possible for yourself. Make them pay. In fact, throw out a number you are comfortable with and have them pay you out from that in the next funding round.
If you approach this as "what's best for the company", you have already lost because that's not what this CTO and your other founder are approaching this from.
EDIT: You should provide some more detail on the equity position you have and how formalized it is (ie. proper contracts). Being a co-founder isn't about just writing code. As others have said, if you have significant equity, you have a lot of power. Don't underestimate this.
FIRST THING GET YOUR OWN LAWYER AND TALK TO THEM NOW!
The key question here is : do you have equity, and how much equity do you have in percentage terms?
If you are an equal cofounder, then when someone turns up and says "you have to leave cause better people have been employed", you say "fuck off". Think about it - EVERY company that grows will employ people who are better than the cofounders in some way, that is the whole point. You are the FOUNDER, you brought value to the company early. Just because smarter or more experienced people have been employed in no way devalues what you did in the early stages. In fact this is PRECISELY what is meant to happen. Do you think that Zuckerberg is the best developer at Facebook - legend may say so but it's not true - can't be. So should Zuck be fired cause he's not their strongest tech guy?
You also need to think separately about your rights as employee and rights as a shareholder/owner - they are not the same thing. You DO have clear contracts as both employee and shareholder DON'T YOU? Those contracts specify (or should specify) your rights.
And who the fuck does this guy think he is that he can tell a cofounder to leave? You are his BOSS.
DO NOT LEAVE. And if you do leave, DO NOT SELL YOUR SHARES IN THE COMPANY - just say "I want a MASSIVE payout to accept being fired, and I WILL NOT sell my shares as part of settlement". Hang on to those shares because now these guys are going to do all the hard work in growing the company and you can chill out and do other things and when they IPO, you'll take home your share. And if this is the path you take, look out cause some time in the future they will try to play a legal game in which you hang on to your shares but they get diluted down to almost nothing. This cannot happen if you are careful to look out for it.
This is all on the assumption that you do have equity and contracts in place. If you don't, then you should go and watch "The Social Network" repeatedly until you learn your lesson.