Why is there such an emphasis on having a coding founder?

[thesauce25]

Why is there such an emphasis on having a coding founder, especially when applying to incubators? The two most common restrictions I've seen when applying to incubators are:

Chances are low if you're applying as a single founder.

Chances are low if you're applying as a non-coding founder.

I happen to fall into the worst part of that hypothetical Venn diagram. The catch is that the app that I'm working on was selected as a Staff Pick in the Android Market back in January. I'm not saying it's perfect (there's still a ton of work to be done) but it shows that it's possible to have success as a noncoding, single founder.

So, why is there such an emphasis on having a coding founder? Since I'm not a coder, I hired a great offshore team to develop the code based on my UI designs, process flows and logic, wireframes, an excel spreadsheet of the algorithms, and database requirements. It's worth noting that I didn't throw piles of money at my team, in fact the first version, the one that was selected as a staff pick, cost me $300 to develop the code. So why is this approach looked down upon by incubators?

I implement SAP for a living, and this style of work is done quite often. For example, much of the technical team is offshore while the functional team works onsite. So why are startups penalized for taking this same approach when applying to incubators? I'd argue that the ability to quickly scale your team based on current project scope is a very potent tool, which outweighs the argument that because of the time constraints of an incubator you have to have a code friendly cofounder to churn out code.

Just something I've been thinking about, I'm curious to hear what everyone else has to say. Thanks for your time.

Just to give reference, the app I built is called Amazing Grocery List, and it's available in the Android Market.

[ss_justin]

Before I got into my startup, I was a software consultant. I got quite a bit of business from people who had first tried outsourcing their work and had abysmal results. I wasn't the only one I knew making a living off those failed projects, either.

When I got into the startup scene, I started asking other companies and investors what their experiences were like with offshoring. Very, very few of the stories were good. The critical issues were always poor communication, limited agility, and mediocre code quality.

If incubator founders and interviewers are hearing the same stories I am, they're probably leery that your current success is sustainable. You may have nailed communication with your team, but until you've attempted to iterate your product a few times, neither you or the folks at the incubator know if you'll have the agility to move forward.

Having a technical co-founder guarantees two things, even if you offshore your work. First, you'll have someone who can properly write specifications around not only what you need today, but what you might need tomorrow. You'll also have someone there to make short-term hacks, fixes, and cleanups that might be difficult to coordinate with an offshore team.

[byoung2]

I think what you've proven is that you can outsource app development to an offshore team and get a solid product back without breaking the bank. Building a startup is a much bigger undertaking than just creating an app. An app may be central to what your startup does, but I think incubators like YC are looking for companies with the potential to generate more revenue than just $0.99 per download.

For example, your grocery store app may be a gateway to offer daily deals or market to your app users in some other way, or you may crunch the data and sell it to supermarkets.

These are the kinds of ideas that get bounced around when you have more than one founder, and the tech team is in-house (I know because at the startup where I work, we have these conversations all day long). We go from "hey have you heard of this technology?" in the morning to "I've implemented a proof of concept" by lunch to "it's running in production" by day's end. That's something that you can't easily outsource, and something that I think a technical cofounder brings to the table.

[true_religion]

It depends on the complexity of your work.

If it will take 6+ months to complete a project, then you'd need that amount of money to pay an offshore team. On the otherhand, if you or your co-founder can code then that capital can stay in house.

Additionally, there's less overhead (in costs of time) for transferring information to outsiders.

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That said, I am in fact surprised that your app only cost $300 to develop.

It's not just a to-do list. It apparently uses predictive modeling to make sure you don't forget to put items on the list.

Predictive modeling can be really simple (Bayes), but I am in fact impressed (albeit surprised) that you could sketch that into a process flow for someone to implement, whilst not being able to code it yourself.

perhaps you're not a coder, but you are technically competent... no?

[oniworks]

I'm also a non-technical founder, and I've got to say that you can't underestimate passion. Having a technical co-founder that believes in the project and works well with you adds that extra magic to the equation. As is always the case it's about team, team, team and it is difficult to find an outsourcer that will do anything more than exactly what is asked of them (if you are lucky). Sure it can be done, but having someone to question you, and predict problems before they arise is paramount.

Also as others have mentioned, it is tough to be agile with a continent and language barrier between you and the tech side of your company.

[sparknlaunch12]

Wow. Thanks for sharing. Great example of non coder building and marketing technology.

Where did you find your offshore coders? Did you have any problems in translating specs into product?

Is your app free or not? What is the revenue model?

Do you think a coder would have added much value to the process so far?

[tonyjwang]

I'm really curious how you outsourced your app development. Have you written a blog post about it? I'd love to see some of your documents that you used to communicate with the outsourcing team and a list of books/sites/references that helped you accomplish what you did.