While ingenuity is required, coding expertise is not. Case in point: Airbnb, Pandora, Tinder and Pinterest — along with many other apps and sites we use every day — were started by non-technical founders. In fact, 65% of startups today are led by non-technical founders and this number is growing.
So if you’re not going to take on the laborious task of learning to code, does that mean you need to hand a sizable amount of equity over to a technical cofounder? Some do, but oftentimes this move is premature.
There’s a third option here, and that’s to hire the 8base Labs design and development team to create custom software for you. Our world-class pros aim to amaze, moving fast and lean while never sacrificing architecture or security (thanks to the AWS-based, API-first 8base platform).
The chief responsibility of a technical co-founder isn’t to code. It’s to set technical direction and staff up. With 8base Labs, you gain instant access to a team that have built products used by millions. Instead of wasting weeks on resume review and job interviews, our pre-vetted product designers, engineers, project managers, enterprise software experts and digital strategists can immediately start working on your company’s product. By eliminating the expense of a CTO — and an internal team — you’ll be able to reduce costs by at least one order of magnitude.
While a common critique of outside vendors is a lack of dedication and responsiveness, the 8base Labs team is highly engaged. Our founder and CEO — an experienced engineer, management consultant and three-time venture-backed entrepreneur who’s served as an exec at dozens of companies — frequently serves as a mentor to our non-technical founder clients. And in a move you may not expect from a professional services firm, we don’t try to maximize our relationship by billing you hourly. Instead, 8base Labs works for an agreed-upon fixed fee.
Just as you would evaluate a CTO candidate by checking their references, we think it’s important you know the company we keep as well. We’re an official AWS and Salesforce partner, a Clutch Top Web Developer, a Makerpad Platinum Ecosystem Partner, a Linux Foundation member and a GraphQL Foundation founding member.
When you choose to work with 8base Labs, you’ll get the expertise of a technical co-founder without having to give up equity before assessing market fit. Many of our founder clients have actually chosen to hire a CTO after we’ve built their product, which has allowed them to avoid significant equity dilution (in addition to expensive salaries). Being further along in their company’s journey has even allowed them to hire an accomplished CTO when the time is right. Attracting a competent CTO to a startup outside of Silicon Valley is incredibly hard and the polish of 8base Labs can help increase your appeal.
The digital products built by 8base Labs can be counted on to have a modern, aesthetically excellent look-and-feel, and they are architected leveraging decades of experience in industry-specific, enterprise-grade systems. 8base-built products also don’t require our clients to maintain back-end infrastructure. How and what we build is ideal for those who like to iterate and release new capabilities quickly.
Photo by rawpixel from Burst
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