20-yo tech millionaire – advice?
I'm posting this knowing it will attract some envy/hate, but I'm genuinely looking for advice. Originally from Europe, came to the US for college, dropped out after 1 year, got a E-2 Visa and moved to SF. For the past years I've been running multiple tech businesses and made enough money to not worry about daily expenses, burn rate, etc. They aren't big VC-backed companies, but small startups I've bootstrapped and scaled to $10M+ ARR by myself (with a few hires). I'm extremely grateful for my financial situation and the freedom that it brings, however I'm puzzled as to what I should do next. I don't have a network in the valley – moved here last year and with a fully remote team, I don't get to interact/meet a lot of people. I'm itching to take on new challenges. I'm a very good product person – can code/design/market/operate fairly well, although since I never had a proper job I feel like I'm lacking certain skills. I know this isn't a lot of context, but I'd really appreciate your opinion. I'd say my #1 struggle right now is personal fulfillment. I have the money, but I want to make a far greater impact and feel like I'm wasting my potential. Thanks!
You’ve got the financial stability. Take on a big problem that will take a long time to solve instead of a small one.
What’s skills do you feel you lack? You could work for some incubator helping other people while continuing to run your businesses.
Mainly management / operations. I had to do everything for my startups – hiring, delegating, financials and I'm convinced there are much better ways to do all of those. When you say work for an incubator, you mean join one with a new idea or help companies in the incubator?
I mean help run the incubator and mentor others. I think joining a new idea would be a bigger commitment
A feeling of fulfillment usually comes from helping others and giving back to the community. What can you do to help people? Whose life would you improve if you could?
I don't feel like giving back to the community is the best use of my abilities. I think there are smarter ways to make an impact at a much larger scale.
Maybe think about how to make a large scale impact that genuinely helps people. Every good product solves a problem. Can you build one that solves a problem that is extremely painful for people, maybe such as people who are in a hardship situation of some sort?
Retire, and slowly degrade on a tropical island, surrounded by beautiful women and an endless supply of booze. This is what I would do. And I know I'll never have the chance with such way of thinking, but still day dreaming feels good.
How did you get an O-1 with just one year of college and no work experience (that you have mentioned)?
I have enough press, I speak at conferences all over the world, I have good technical skills and have proven some level of success in business.
Who are you?
Don’t be a Zuckerberg. Be a MySpace Tom. Be grateful with your newfound wealth. Don’t make the world worse off with it like Zuck did.
You need a vc for guidance and networking and it never hurts to build something with someone elses money. Good luck!
That's what I'm leaning towards. Since I don't have a solid network here, would it make more sense to go the incubator route or hit up VCs one-by-one?
Up to you but if you go entrepreneur in residency you are limiting yourself to one vc. Do you know what you want to do or need ideas?
I’m really curious, could you give a rough idea what kind of tech business you are running? Like is it SaaS, B2B, consulting, etc?
SaaS, B2C
I’m perplexed this makes as much money. What is this, the proverbial bingo card creator biz?
Invest in research or science to invent or revolutionize a certain market. If you can do that, you'll be able to give back to the community at a greater scale. Look up "80,000 hours" or "third industrial revolution" for ways to create meaningful impact
weird flex, but ok
Very helpful. Appreciate it