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Let's get real about the one-person billion dollar company

marcrand.com

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Re: Let's get real about the one-person billion dollar company

#91

Post by m463 »

Alex3917 wrote: post #47
LarsDu88 wrote: post #18

One thing I want to point out about software is that its perpetually commoditized. Any piece of valuable software will get a free version after some amount of time. It happened to compilers, operating systems, and renderer. It's gradually happening to game engines. That's why the largest software companies are really just network effect monopolies. You only use it because other people use it or it relies on some sort…

> From that perspective a one person unicorn is very feasible if we think about it as building a network effect monopoly. To build a one person unicorn, the main thing you need is an arbitrage opportunity for getting users that is unattractive to multi-person companies. Once established, this business may well turn into a network effect monopoly, but I don't think that is the crux of what is needed to get going.

> arbitrage opportunity

I kind of wonder if something like this will come along for non-enshittified hardware and software.

I keep seeing most companies "getting on the bandwagon", such as printer companies locking their ink refills, hdtv companies collecting viewer and viewing data, and cellphones getting between you and the device you own in just about every way possible.

I can hope.

Re: Let's get real about the one-person billion dollar company

#92

Post by mrkramer »

CafeRacer wrote: post #4

I'd predict a one person unicorn company potentionally possible, but this will be an inflated valuation company backed by someone, who is willing to prove a point. Not a company that delivers a great product and can be sustainable in the long run. Purely from the operational perspective, you need to handle support, you need to handle billing, to handle lawsuits, to handle infrastructure, to handle incidents... and st…

Cryptocurrency like Bitcoin can probably be made by LLM so if you have a good idea for cryptocurrency or some crypto token and you can vibe code it with LLM, perhaps it can reach a $1bn market cap.

Re: Let's get real about the one-person billion dollar company

#93

Post by margalabargala »

preommr wrote: post #80
ohdeargodno wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Couldn't ever do it alone without having someone (that loves him) sacrificing so much for him. >Yes this counts as "alone" I don't even know what to say to that, I guess we're just straight up redefining words to make yourself feel good?

I am curious which of the following (if any) you would define as alone: 1) one person but they take VC funding 2) one person but they use open source solutions 3) one person but they live with their parents 4) one person that lives completely off of what they earned themselves previously, but they did get government funded student loans that let them make money in the first place.

None of these. Even the guy who runs the Primitive Technology youtube channel, building up technology solo from literal sticks and rocks he gathers himself, would not be alone, because he did not too personally manufacture the digital camera he uses to record himself creating these things.

Also, was he not born? Can anyone be said to do anything alone, who did not themselves arise spontaneously from the primordial soup?

/s

Re: Let's get real about the one-person billion dollar company

#94

Post by notahacker »

trhway wrote: post #45
mlhpdx wrote: post #35

To put it in perspective based on recent Meta hiring, we're 1/4 of the way to an individual having a $1B valuation let alone a company.

yep, one-person billion dollar company is less than 10x of per-employee valuation of NVDA, OpenAI, PLTR, etc. - a bunch of companies where per-employee valuation has crossed $100M. That is tens of thousands of people, not just one individual.

The $1b per employee large corporation is much easier to imagine though, per the point of the OP - it's hard to imagine someone generating so much revenue that their company is valued at $1b not choosing to hire at least one person to do stuff they haven't got time for or don't like doing.

Re: Let's get real about the one-person billion dollar company

#95

Post by siva7 »

swyx wrote: post #58

i think "one person unicorn" is good clickbait but is too egotistical/founder centric and unrealistic. it takes a team, everyone needs help, founding engineers/designers/ops/PMs/domain experts can all contribute a ton that a founder doesnt have. my proposal for this term is "Tiny Teams": https://latent.space/p/tiny

That was (and still is for many) the conventional wisdom that you need a team to succeed in startup land. Now a few are betting that this rule of wisdom could be proven wrong in this ai timeline.

Re: Let's get real about the one-person billion dollar company

#96

Post by h2zizzle »

danaris wrote: post #59
sunrunner wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And to keep the thread going, Undertale (Toby Fox)?

Undertale not only credits Temmie Chang, it has characters based on her in the game. (There may be others credited; Temmie's the only one I can think of off the top of my head.)

Also not so sure that it's a billion-dollar game.

It's certainly made a ton of money, and has generated multiples worth of that in fan content, but that's partly because Fox has been so liberal with policing trademarks/copyright.

Re: Let's get real about the one-person billion dollar company

#97

Post by datadrivenangel »

nvch wrote: post #83

There are always too many painful and different things to do in any business, so a single person will certainly start aggressively delegating and outsourcing after a few millions of income. But not willing to grow over a 10 person team may be a strong and feasible personal preference. My bet is on $10 billion with a team of 10 people. Does that still count?

Instagram was bought for a billion dollars with a team of 13 people, so $10 billion with a team of 10 sounds possible.

Re: Let's get real about the one-person billion dollar company

#98

Post by ncruces »

choilive wrote: post #12

Do athletes count?

No, because they hire someone to massage their feet and do the books. /s

I'm sorry, I just find the whole concept silly. Makes it sound a silly business decision to do some SRE inhouse instead of “cloud everything” (prob. with the “help” of “consultants”) even at the $1bn scale.

Re: Let's get real about the one-person billion dollar company

#99

Post by HeyLaughingBoy »

LarsDu88 wrote: post #18

One thing I want to point out about software is that its perpetually commoditized. Any piece of valuable software will get a free version after some amount of time. It happened to compilers, operating systems, and renderer. It's gradually happening to game engines. That's why the largest software companies are really just network effect monopolies. You only use it because other people use it or it relies on some sort…

> Any piece of valuable software will get a free version after some amount of time

Technically. The reality is much closer to "Any piece of valuable software will get a crappy free version after some amount of time, and multiple paid copies"

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