Startup Therapy Podcast

Episode #226


Ryan Rutan: Welcome back to another episode of the start up therapy podcast. This is Ryan Rutan from start ups dot com, joined by my friend, the founder and CEO of start ups dot com will schroder. Well, today we're gonna take a deep dive into the often misunderstood relationship between founders and investors. There's this phrase that we often hear about. We're on the same side of the table. When was the first time you heard that? And what was your reaction then? Versus maybe now

Wil Schroter: the company is a pretty long time. It was like 15 years ago and I was raising, I think it was maybe my second company that I was raising for how it didn't come up in the conversation with the first one, but we're sitting down and we're getting close to deal terms and we're going through like all the term sheet items like, you know, write a refusal and, and participating prefer and all all this stuff that usually confuses most founders. But what the investor said to me to kind of reassure me was, don't worry about these terms. All we're trying to do is get on the same side of the table so we can share in the upside. And I remember thinking about it. I'm like, listen, I know I'm relatively new at this at the time, but that doesn't make a lot of sense to me. How are we on the same side of the table? And they're like, well, our upside is your upside. I'm like, I don't think you understand what's happening on this side of the table. If you

Ryan Rutan: want to be on the same side of the table, let's sit on my side of the table together instead of your side of the table together. Yeah. So at that point, it's essentially a sales pitch. They're trying to bring you a level of comfort and trying to get you to overlook terms that may or may not have been onerous, but probably would have at least given you some pause and thought like, is this really worth it?

Wil Schroter: I wasn't so much thrown by the, hey, just sign these terms. So we're on the same side of the table. Like I, I get that part. It was, they actually believed that we were about to be on the same side of the table. It's like I was like, oh hold on, hold on. You know what it reminds me of? It reminds me of if I were to say my wife and I both delivered a baby. No dude, you're in the same room. Yeah,

Ryan Rutan: you're in the same room. Very different sides of the table. Yeah, very, very different.

Wil Schroter: Yeah, it was like, it is not the same thing. And so, II I genuinely believe that, you know, in investors are well intentioned when they say this, I'm not, you know, trying to vilify investors. What I'm trying to say is I think what they mean and what is true are just different and I think that's what we should talk about because this is one of the most common tropes among that founders buy into almost just without thinking about it. Like, ok, yeah, I guess if we're on the same side table and, and here's kind of the pitch here, here's their pitch. And this is, this is what they mean. They mean that once we get a deal done from that point forward, our upside is your upside, right? If we can make this thing 100 times bigger, it becomes 100 times bigger for you comes 100 times bigger for us, you know, and by way of that, we're on the same team, we're on the same page, right?

Ryan Rutan: Amazing how easy it is to be on the same team when everything goes. Right.

Wil Schroter: Exactly

Ryan Rutan: that scenario. Sure. Everybody's happy. What happens when we're paddling a leaky boat back in the harbor at some point? Like, are we still on the same side of the table? You hold the paddle? I don't think so.

Wil Schroter: That's what I'm saying, like, and, and now that I understand how this actually works. You know how, you know who's actually on the same side of the table, et cetera, that phrase. And that concept is such bullshit. I can't even believe it comes out of anybody's mouth and yet it does time and time again. It's almost like, like the most popular phrase in a fundraise.

Ryan Rutan: I think it's the one you probably hear other than no more than anything else. Right. Like, there's two things you're going to hear a lot. We're on the same side of the table and no, look, it's an illusory statement, right? It's an illusion of alignment. There isn't correct exactly alignment. There are points where it aligns, but it's like two intersecting lines that are running nonparallel paths, they intersect at one point where everything goes perfect, they're aligned and they cross and everything's great at that one specific point in time and in chance, which is like is exactly like,

Wil Schroter: what are the 1% of outcomes? So, so we are, we are very much on the same table in the 1% chance. This aligns together. We go IP O to make so much money. You don't think about it. So let's talk about the other 99% of circumstances, which is what, what will actually happen, which always seems to be the theme of our podcast, which is, here's everything you've heard and here's what actually

Ryan Rutan: happens. Here's the 99% of time that will actually occur. Right?

Wil Schroter: Yeah. What shocks me is that we have hundreds of episodes on just, this is what actually happens. There shouldn't be this much content but there is, here's where it starts and this one, this one's dead obvious. This is her only bet. So I'm talking to my investor, whomever the investor is and she's like, look again, we're on the same side of the table. My outcome is your outcome. And I'm like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa If this doesn't work, if this thing implodes, I'm screwed. My team is screwed. Right. We have nothing to show for it. It's one of 20 or 100 bets you've made, you're gonna have maybe a tough conversation with your spouse at dinner and that's it. Your life isn't affected meaningfully whatsoever. And I also want to point out there's, you know, different stratification of investors. There's the friends and family slash like early angel investor and in some cases that's real money to them. Right? So I don't want to discount that class of investors.

Ryan Rutan: Sure. 100%. It's not that they don't have skin in the game. Here. There's a different amount that gets lost at the

Wil Schroter: end. But statistically the likelihood that somebody put everything they have into your endeavor is very unlikely. And by the way, if they did, then I will stand behind their statement that you are on the same side of the table. That's usually not the person giving this bench. That

Ryan Rutan: investor's name is usually right. Exactly. Exactly. They started on the same side of the table now. But, but again, like, let's hit on that for just one more second, right? Founders, this is your dream. This is your one bet. This is your life on the line here, right? I don't want to over dramatize this. But like this is your everything for right now. At least it's your everything. We've done a lot of episodes on what happens after. Yes, you can move on. But for right now, this is everything, right? And so the the emotional toll that that takes on you as a founder versus somebody who loses one out of 50 bets or even one out of five is extremely different, right? And so I think that one of the things that we want to keep pointing out here is there's a lot of reasons why this alignment is illusory. This is one of them, right? This is one of the factors that keeps you from truly being able to be on the same side of the table, even if that's what both of you want fundamentally, right? You may both be really well intentioned, like we really want to be on the same side of the table. It's problematic because there are number of things that just will not be true for both of you. And this is a big one and the emotional toll here. So, so different.

Wil Schroter: Absolutely. And, and the investor will say again, if you're talking about a VC, somebody sitting behind a fund. Look, this is my reputation. This is my career. If this doesn't work, you know, this reflects directly on me. Ok. Sure. That is entirely true. But you're gonna make your mortgage payment when we're done.

Ryan Rutan: Exactly. Right. The consequence is very

Wil Schroter: different. The consequences aren't even remotely close. Dude. I put all of my personal savings into this. You know, I hunted on, on paychecks. I could have gotten, I did everything into this if this bet works great. If it doesn't, I am catastrophically screwed. You are not, we are not on the same page. That's, we're in the same team, but our consequences are not the same whatsoever. And we can't pretend like they are so tied to that is whether or not I even have a guarantee of a paycheck. So let's talk about kind of what that actually means, right? Let's start by talking about like a VC investor and they're guaranteed to get paycheck

Ryan Rutan: check mark that, that box is

Wil Schroter: checked. So again, we're talking about a spectrum of investors, right? There's everybody from your parents investing in your, your company all the way through a VC for a second. I'm only gonna talk about V CS because they have a very specific and consistent pay structure for those that aren't aware the way A VC gets paid. This is somebody that works at a venture capital firm where they've raised an outside fund from outside investors, limited partners. It's not their own money, typically. Not. So, so not the balance of the way this works is they get paid by getting 2% of how much they raise every single year for a period of about 7 to 10 years, depending on how it's structured. What does that mean? That means if they raised $100 million fund, which by fund standards is very small, they get the equivalent of $20 million of that guaranteed in fees before they do anything. Right. Because

Ryan Rutan: that's, that's 2% per year for 10 years for those that are trying to follow them out. And so you

Wil Schroter: can roughly say, you know, 20% of the total, it doesn't exactly work out like that, but it's close enough. The second part of it is they raise multiple funds again. I want people to really understand what's going on behind the scenes here because I didn't, when it first started, they raised multiple funds. So I'll raise $100 million fund and in a few years from now I'll raise another, well, guess what, both of those pay fees that $20 million is now 40 million or more. I am guaranteed that money short of something catastrophically going wrong, which doesn't happen that often for the next 10 years. Silicon

Ryan Rutan: Valley bank going out of business and all of our money. Right. But it's the Black Swan events,

Wil Schroter: a 10 year salary. Usually a seven figure salary in a lot of cases for 10 years, every single time I raise a fund. So the next time I raise a fund extend that another 10 years with money on top of that, I'm getting a salary on top of a salary. It's crazy. Now, I'm not here to, to talk about whether or not they deserve those fees. I'm just pointing out that they're getting them and we are not, we

Ryan Rutan: are not exactly.

Wil Schroter: Our salary situation works a bit differently. It's more like I probably won't get paid for a while. Oh, and then we raised some money. So now I'm getting paid again. Oh, then we're out of so I don't get paid again. And by the way, every time I do get paid, it's usually a wildly below market salary anyway because I'm getting so much, so, so to speak and so we are not aligned

Ryan Rutan: checks whatsoever. Yeah, that can be hard to stomach. Right. But again, it just, it points out the fact that there's a huge difference between what's at stake, what's on the line on either side of this table again, clearly different sides of the table. Right. We said this before. But the only chance you've got it all being on the same side of the table as your investor. If you only hold your meetings in roadside diners. Right. This is it. That's, that's your chance. Right. This way you can guarantee you're always on the same side of the table. Why do you think? Because I'm, I'm gonna keep coming back to this, this notion that like there's this illusion that we even need to be on the same side of the table. Why does that matter so much to everybody? What is it? We sort of all know it's bullshit. So why has this continued to be a trope? Why do we care so much about this?

Wil Schroter: I think invest want us to care about it. Investors want us to feel like like we're on the same side of the table so that we're earning for each other, right? Almost, you know, this team atmosphere instead of saying, hey, each of us are on a team, but technically, we're all playing for ourselves. You know, we're trying to increase our own stats. The idea is that we're playing as a team and, and who wouldn't want everybody to be playing as a team? It sounds wonderful. It also, again in the early stages, particularly around term sheet. It's also a clever way to disguise what's actually happening. I don't think investors are being nefarious when they say this. I actually don't believe that, but I find it to be very convenient. For example, term sheet gets presented and I say things like, yeah, you know, we've got participating preferred so that we're gonna get our money out first before you do. But don't, don't even worry about that. We're only investing 5 million. This thing is gonna sell for hundreds of millions. If not billions, that money is not even gonna matter. Right.

Ryan Rutan: Again, that money is not gonna matter in that 1% scenario where everything works out exactly as we planned it. Right.

Wil Schroter: Yes, of correct. Right. And again, I, I get it, there's other aspects to it where all the downside provisions that are sitting inside of a term sheet again, for those that aren't that familiar. Not sure why you even would be when you get a term sheet from an investor, there's roughly let's call it uh 10 to 20 major terms that will define what happens. Usually if things go wrong in the investment, we're used to things like what's the valuation, what's the amount of money being put in? Those are the easy things. That's not the complicated part. It's all the stuff behind that that says when stuff goes wrong, here's how we the investors are protected against you, shitty entrepreneur.

Ryan Rutan: The irony of that, right? That all of the terms are pointed to what happens when things go wrong. And yet all of the sentiment is pointed towards. Don't worry when this all goes right? Everything will be fine, right?

Wil Schroter: You know what it is. It's a pre something people are right. It's basically saying it's, it's me going to my wife and saying, don't worry about this document. We're getting married, we're on the same side of the table and her going uh hold on a sec dude. Yeah, if we stay married, but this document has nothing to do with us. Staying married. It doesn't control a single thing of staying married specifically for the opposite. Exactly. Right. So don't tell, don't sell me on the good times when you're presenting me a document of bad times. Now, that's essentially what we're often signing up for. That's usually where this sentiment comes from. Kind of like a, don't sweat it. We just want you put these in terms in place so that we can go focus on the big things and making money and it sounds cool. But I think there's another part to this and the part that actually bothers me is when investors genuinely believe that we're on the same side of the table. And by way of that, Ryan, what we're talking about ignoring what's actually happening to us, right? Dude, you're guaranteed a paycheck for decades, right? I'm guaranteed a paycheck for weeks, right? Like you go plan fancy vacations, you can take out a mortgage, you can do all this cool

Ryan Rutan: stuff. I can watch you do that on Instagram. Yeah. Yeah.

Wil Schroter: Yeah, I don't, I have no visibility and what we're really talking about safety. I have no safety. You have gobs of safety because this isn't your only bet you have gobs of safety because you're guaranteed personal income. I don't have that. And dude, if we were talking about anything that points to the fact that we're not on the same side of the table. I don't think anything could Trump safety. You know what I mean? You know, something that's really funny about everything we talk about here is that none of it is new. Everything you're dealing with right now has been done 1000 times before you, which means the answer already exists. You may just not know it, but that's ok. That's kind of what we're here to do. We talk about this stuff on the show, but we actually solve these problems all day long at groups dot start ups dot com. So if any of this sounds familiar, stop guessing about what to do. Let us just give you the answers to the test and be done with it.

Ryan Rutan: No, I I don't think so either. And look again, we're not, we're not begrudging investors, the fact that they have safety here. We're just trying to point out that as you enter into these dynamics with an investor that you need to be aware of these things, right? You need to make sure that you're protecting yourself. You're understanding what you're truly getting into and understand when they say these things, what it means to them versus what it means to you, right? Like your your examples, right? You know, we both have skin in the game. Cool. Yeah, we do. We'll both lose something if this goes south. I as the founder happened to lose a lot more than you as the investor, right? Hey, look, this isn't going well. We're both sad, right? The problem is that I think in a lot of these things, if you just look at it strictly from a check box perspective, yeah, we're disappointed this is going poorly. My level of disappointment and your level of disappointment are very, very different. So I think it's the spectrum that the investors are missing out on the depth of the emotion, the depth of the tragedy when it goes wrong for us. Look again, we all get to celebrate and when there's, when there's an upside, that's fantastic. Forget about that. Right? When there's downside and there often is, right. Statistics will clearly support me on this one. When there's downside, there's a different depth to the downside. And I think that's what it really comes down to. So again, to your point, they're not being nefarious, they're not being disingenuous, but they're not being completely honest with themselves. It's not that they're, they're not being honest with themselves around what's actually gonna happen here. Right. Yeah, we'll both be sad. I'll be sad. Ryan's going to be laying down behind this very day, crying his eyes out and wondering what the hell to do next. Different story altogether.

Wil Schroter: Right? You're sad. I don't feed my kid. We're not on the same page, right? Not the same. Let's play this out further. Let's talk about the fact that there are potential outcomes and how we're still not aligned, how it's so hard for us to ever actually be aligned. Ok. So here's a not atypical situation. Let's say we've raised $5 million right over the course of a number of rounds. Maybe we never made it to series a anymore. With pre seed, seed, multiple seed rounds, you can easily get to $5 million. It's not unreasonable. I've got plenty of friends who have done it and they're all kind of in the same bucket, which is I've raised, let's say $5 million. I'm anywhere between, let's say 5 to 9 years into this, which is not hard to do, right? It is not hard to, to get that far along and you know what, this isn't gonna be a big outcome, right? This is the problem. We had a couple mechanics here that are working way against us again, why we're no longer on the same side of the table number one, the $5 million that we've raised and we talked about this in a previous episode. The $5 million we've raised, likely needs to get paid back first. Ergo if we sell for $5 million right? And you and I as the founders get nothing right. That is not alignment whatsoever, right? In other words, the up side there, we are not aligned on, OK. You're taking care of Mr Investor. I am not, there's

Ryan Rutan: some preferences in place there. Again, going back to the term sheet. These would have been things that were specified at the time that you signed this document where you were told. Don't worry, we're on the same side of the table, you

Wil Schroter: bet. And I'm gonna go so far as to say, that's actually not the one I'm so concerned about, although it's very real. It's the second part, which is, let's say we're so fortunate that anybody wants to buy our stuff. Right. And they come to us with $10 million. Here's where we're not aligned. The investor needs a return and they have some expectations on what a return should be. More importantly, they have the option to not take it. We just need to get paid, we gotta buy houses, we gotta pay off debt, we got real bills and we don't have the option or luxury of saying no, I mean theory we do, right? But in practice, we need that money

Ryan Rutan: differently. We would say yes. If it was left in our hands, we probably would say yes. Right. As the founder, you'd say, look, it is what it is. This is probably the best deal we're gonna get. I would say yes to this. Right. You bet. But it's not in our hands,

Wil Schroter: but it's not in our hands. That's the thing. Once again, not on the same side of the table. You investor have the luxury of saying no, we do not, we do not because generally speaking, we don't know if there's a better offer. And I gotta tell you what, let's say that there's, there's three of us Ryan and we sell for 10 million, we have a $5 million preference. And for those of you have missed the previous episode, that just means the investors get their money back first, fine, $5 million preference. 1st 5 million goes to them. They have participating on the rest of it. So they also get part of their share, whatever their pro rata was. You, you bet, man. Let's say that each of us own 10% of the company at that point, which would be pretty typical, right? We each get a million dollars, a million dollars is life changing, right? Especially when you don't have it. We've done a whole episodes on that. Now, imagine a million dollars for us. Ryan will help us buy a house, we'll pay off debt, we'll be put a little cash aside just to help us live, et cetera. Right?

Ryan Rutan: Size. The salary, we've probably foregone for the last 2 to 10 years,

Wil Schroter: right? And that same money is meaningless to the investors. Think about that. It's me. It, it, it actually is meaningless. I'm not, I'm not just saying that I'm saying first off that 1st 5 million, they just got back the money they already had.

Ryan Rutan: It's not what they're trying to do.

Wil Schroter: If you use the same time mechanic, you could say, well, yeah, if I'm the investor right now, I'm like, hey, that $5 million over the course of eight years, had it just been accruing interest, right? Would have been more than my return on selling this company. So don't tell me that you're being so put out because I'm not getting anything out of this, which is my point, which is my point. We as founders, we don't have to get an Roy, we don't have to get that money back, right? We just have to get money so that $10 million offer comes in and the investors like that's a shit deal for me. And by the way, it probably is, by the way, it probably

Ryan Rutan: is. But again, that's what we're talking about here. This is that malalignment, right? This is the the difference between what's good for them. What's good for us when you have these types of spreads, right? When there's a spectrum of what can be good for me, what can be good for you. This is exactly why we're not on the same side of the table going back to the THEMA today. This is one of those fundamental points where you just can't be all the time, right? And again, don't have to be either. And there's nothing wrong with that being a bad deal for the investors. Something wrong with being a good deal for you. But it comes down to this power dynamic that exists and being able to say who gets to make the decision. And the fact that we're not both in the same set of the table means we will likely make very different decisions given the same set of

Wil Schroter: circumstances. Right? And the only way that we're gonna see the alignment that was implied by this whole statement is if there is a massive outcome. And, and I think even at that point, the only reason we're saying we're aligned is because the number is so big, we just can't complain about the misalignment anymore, right? We're at least

Ryan Rutan: fundamentally willing to make the same decision at that point. Right? We can, we're on the same side and that we say we both say yes. Right? And it's, it's not worth arguing about at that point, right? The outcome will be enough for the investor, it will be enough for the founder. There's gonna be very little disagreement about it. Is it fair? Is it equitable? Is it what everybody wanted? Forget any of that for the moment. It, it's the, the fact the transaction can happen at that point. Right.

Wil Schroter: I remember years ago when Pandora, I don't know if they went public or got sold, but there, I think they went public. There was a huge cash event, by the way, Pandora started in 2000 if you can even like wrap your head around it. Right. Isn't that crazy? Yeah, it was almost 25 years ago in the grand scheme of things. Right. Anyway, I'll never forget this quote by the founder, Tim Rre. They said to him, it must have been public because that the cap table was public and it showed how much he owned. And the reporter the journal was like, hey, are you upset that you only took $20 million off the table for having built Pandora, which at the time was like Spotify, right? You know, as far as the reach and then the value of it. And he was like, no, he's like, what the hell else I was, was I going to do for the last 10 years to make $20 million right now? Which the reason I'm saying that is because also that was two

Ryan Rutan: 1000 right? Yeah. Yeah.

Wil Schroter: To what the investors made, he made pennies. But my point is the reason I'm using this story other than the fact that I think it's, it was such a great response. He's also saying this is what's meaningful to me. You may look at it as an outside person and say, oh, well, this person, you know, the investors got 99% of the deal and he got 1% of the deal to investors. That'll mean a lot. But to Tim, he's like, dude, I just made $20 million. I'm not mad. Yeah. Right. One other example, I, I always thought it was funny. So a friend of mine was the uh chairman Ceo of Marble before it sold to, to Disney. He helped orchestrate the deal and he lived in my building at the time in Los Angeles and I would talk to him all the time. We'd go up from time to time. He's kind of a quirky guy. But anyway, when I talked to him after they'd sold, uh Marvel to Disney for like, $4.5 billion. Like David, like, you know, I, I heard he made 15 million on that. Right. And I was like, I'm not to be a dick. I'm not, I'm not, you know, knocking anybody's investment. I'm like, dude, $4.5 billion. And like, and you're the one who like launched Iron Man. And you did, you know all these things that the Avengers and in turn of this, you know, it wasn't like

Ryan Rutan: he was just in cruise mode hanging out or had just shown up there.

Wil Schroter: I mean, you were all in a funny story just because it's, it's top of mind. I met him on the elevator in our building in L A and we're going down the elevator. It's just me and him like, so he's kind of a quirky guy and he's wearing a hull cap like the incredible hull cap, like when the Edward Norton version, like back when I did and it was the weekend that came out and I'm a huge marvel fan as you know, and so I turned to him and I'm like, hey, dude, I gotta ask you, you're a grown ass man wearing a Hulk. But it, but it's Hollywood. Right? So, you don't know. Right. And he's like, yeah, you know, he's like, I work at Marvel. I'm like, oh, my God, what do you do there? He's like, I'm the, I'm the new chairman and CEO, I'm like, you're now my best friend

Ryan Rutan: and I touch your

Wil Schroter: hat. Yeah, exactly. So, so I'm talking to him about this. It's just such a cool moment in time. I'm talking about this and I'm like, so what's the plan there? Because it's like one of the greatest, you know, IP assets ever. He said, yeah, we're gonna make five bets. The first bet we're making is on Iron Man, right? And I'm like, really? He's like, yes, he's my favorite character, right? How cool is that? Right? That is cool. And remember back then he made the bet on Iron Man, specifically Robert Downey Junior. He's not Robert Downey Junior as we know him now. He's a massive risk.

Ryan Rutan: Yeah, it was a lot to work on at that point. I

Wil Schroter: said, so what's the next one? He's like, I'm putting together Thor and I'm like, oh, man, that's a tough one because you've got like, you know, again, I'm super nerd. My, my son's middle name is Thor into this. I am. I'm like, that'd be tough to do for dialogue and all this other stuff. And he's like, yeah, but we found some soap opera star from Australia that we think would be perfect for. I'm like, who was doing this casting? And of course, it was Chris Hemsworth. Right. Well, it was like, and I think Hemsworth got paid like 100,000 dollars for that or $500,000 for that role. But doesn't matter anyway, that was a huge tangent. But it was just a funny moment in time and my bigger point was saying how David was so responsible for what came after with, with the Avengers bets and everything else like that and fast forward a few years later. And I'm talking about, you know, post deal and he's like, yeah, you know, we, um, you know, we sold it. I made $15 million and I'm like, are you happy with that? He's like, I'm happier than hell. He's like, what was I going to do to make $15 million? My point again with the Pandora example. And with David, is that what's meaningful to us personally versus what the outcome is, could be totally different, right? Like, I think it was Carl Icann. I know we bought Marvel out of bankruptcy, but I don't know if icann was the one that still owned it when they sold it. I gotta look that up because I forgot.

Ryan Rutan: That's interesting. Actually, I have no idea. Carl

Wil Schroter: Ian bought it for pennies on the dollar. Like, I think he, he might have bought Marvel for like $80 million by the way well

Ryan Rutan: played Carl

Wil Schroter: on this. Why Carl like that? Anyway, looking at that, what, what was valuable to Carl Icahn, you know, the incredible, incredible investor and what was valuable to David was night and day different, right? And that, and that's the same, the same concept here is what's valuable to us as a founder could be $15 million on a $4.5 billion exit, right? Or it could be a million dollars on a $10 million exit. The reality is our version of how we get out or how we get paid or what's valuable ain't the same. So we got two ends spectrum. Let me put it this way on one end of the spectrum, we have consequence, our consequences aligned. If stuff goes bad because 99% chance it's gonna go bad. Will we Ryan? You and I the founders still be able to pay our bills? The answer is probably no whereas the investors golden, right? The second side is the upside where you're saying, oh but yeah, but if things go well, we're aligned, dude, we're not that aligned. You need to make a return. I need to make any amount of money at all in the bank to make this worthwhile. To me. That is not the same thing, right?

Ryan Rutan: Not, not even close, not even close.

Wil Schroter: All I'm trying to say is that yes, in a best, best, best, best, best case we're aligned. But the truth is in 99% of cases and all the stuff we're going to deal with. There is no alignment. We would be better off saying we will be perfectly aligned in the 1% of times. But we are gonna be at the opposite ends of the spectrum for at least 99% of the cases for this entire start up experience. So in addition to all the stuff related to founder groups, you've also got full access to everything on start ups dot com. That includes all of our education tracks, which will be funding customer acquisition, even how to manage your monthly finances. They're so, so much stuff in there. All of our software including Biz plan for putting together detailed business plans and financials launch rock for attracting early customers and of course, fundable for attracting investment capital. When you log into the start ups dot com site, you'll find all of these resources available.

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