Paul Graham, Dropbox and The Single Founder Exception

I agree. You also can't just pick anyone as a co-founder. Not only is it hard to find entrepreneurial people, but also people with the right skill set to complement you, and the right rapport to work with on a daily basis. That's HARD to find.

Without Woz apple would have never happened, because he designed their first flagship product. What Woz did back then is highly relevant because it was the thing that eventually enabled Jobs to start Next and buy Pixar.

Jobs and Woz to me are the ideal example of the sum being much greater than either part.

Without Paul Allen Microsoft as we know it would not have existed because he named Microsoft Microsoft.

Your insulting tone and capitals do not make you right, they're reminiscent of people raising their voice and making things personal just because they can't win an argument.

I read a bit in your comment history and this seems to be a recurring theme for you, it is almost as if you take this single founder thing personal. The way to prove that it works is to simply succeed. As a single founder myself I've been there, I've done the multiple-founder thing too (with mixed success). There are no guarantees, to pretend either way is a shoe-in is nonsense. But statistically speaking, and looking at things from the point of view of a guy or girl considering going it alone or from the point of view of an investor that has the choice to invest in a company founded by one or more people the statistics seem to point to more being the better choice. Exceptions will always happen. But the ones that you point to are not those exceptions.

We can't know anything about pasts and futures that didn't happen, but we can safely say that things that did happen and that were likely significant were at least as significant as anything that you think would have happened otherwise. Jobs, Wozniak, Gates and Allen would probably never have said what you just said, and that alone marks them as potentially more successful. How you interact with others is an important factor in your chances for success, and being able to give credit where credit is due is another.

I agree that you and I should not be involved in any business because we'd probably fight, and you are making that point very eloquently.

No one is denying that Gates,Jobs and Buffett accomplished incredible feats. I'm just arguing that, at the beginning, each had a partner to help get things started. Woz created the Apple 1 and 2 which brought incredible financial success to Apple allowing Jobs to later start Next and purchase Pixar from Lucas. Paul Allen was instrumental Microsoft's early days including coding Microsoft Basic and making deals. Gates had the chance to then operate from a strong position to grow Microsoft and lock in that monopoly. Warren Buffett has always said that he didn't create Bershire alone and that Charlie Munger (as well as Benjamin Graham) helped immensely.

I am currently a single founder and I disagree with the idea that you must have a co-founder to be successful. I'm just arguing that if you want to use Gates,Jobs and Buffett as your examples of single founders they don't hold up well.

"would they have been able to without the support of the other half?" The evidence overwhelmingly, yes they would have been successful. You are correct that Gates, Jobs, and Buffett are not perfect examples of successful sole founders, but the question is, can a sole founder be successful? The 'rub' in this question is, can just one guy, alone, making all the decisions alone, do well? Then the examples of Gates, Jobs, and Buffett are quite relevant because each did great things essentially alone.

For Jobs, whatever might say about Woz and Jobs's first period at Apple, later Jobs did very well alone at Next, Pixar, and back at Apple. For those last three gigs, Woz was somewhere in the nickel seats. Yes, the success with Woz gave Jobs a lot of cash that was no doubt important for him in his last three gigs. So, then we say that Jobs is an example of a three time successful sole founder with cash. So, with cash a sole founder can work.

After the success of MS/DOS and Allen leaving Microsoft, Gates really had to reinvent, 'refound' the company. It is fair to say that he was a founder again. Yes, he was a founder with cash, but he was still acting essentially alone. Again, the issue is, can a sole founder do it alone, and that is what we are addressing. With the cash from MS/DOS, Gates did it alone. It's amazing what he did because he crushed IBM, Sun, Lotus, Netscape, DB2, and more.

For Buffett, no way should we count Ben Graham! He wrote a book and was a prof of Buffett at Columbia and possibly a friend. Graham had likely hundreds of students and millions of readers, but there was just one Berkshire. So, for Berkshire I don't credit Graham.

For Munger's role, that's just a judgment call, but my reading is that Buffett didn't much need him. Partly I draw that conclusion because it appears in recent years Buffett has been making his decisions essentially just alone.

Again, the main issue is, can a sole founder really get the work done or will he go off the deep end, for fast women, slow horses, cheap booze, wacko ideas, etc.? Well, Gates, Jobs, and Buffett didn't do any of these bad things.

There's another great example: Fred Smith at FedEx. I absolutely, positively guarantee you that there I know in fine detail just what the heck I'm talking about: FedEx was due almost entirely just to Smith, not Art Bass, Roger Frock, Mike Basch, ..., or me. Yes, it's true that Smith had a fortune from Southern Greyhound.

But with a fortune, it's easy, right? Tell that to Carly Fiorina, John Akers, Gil Amelio, Pat Dunn, etc.

Good stuff. Dealing with your co-founders indeed expands into a long list all by itself, to make it explicit is better.

Freedom is indeed the #1 reason I had when I decided to be a 'single founder' (in fact, it wasn't a conscious decision at the time, I only realized it after the fact) and getting an investor on board was the last thing on my mind.