Take Risky Startup or Stay Put
Transition from large company to risky startup with 6 months runway? Current role: — Currently contracting and would convert FT in a few months. — Convert $125 when it happens — likelihood of conversion is high Startup: — They did $12M in Series A November 2022. But at any one time are sitting on about 6 months of runway. So should anything go wrong, the company goes under and I’m out. — Equity is 2500 RSUs but those don’t really have any value unless they’re bought out or go public, so not counting it. No 401k match. Good benefits otherwise at startup. Overall: I like Data Science (current role) but DE is more interesting to me through my studies and would love a chance to take that challenge on. But worry about my future. Single, living with girlfriend. Paying student debt, girlfriends community college, rent, credit cards. Total to around $4k a month just those things.
Ask for total pool of RSUs (do you mean options or actually RSUs?), otherwise it's fairly meaningless. Startups can issue millions of stock options. 2500 seems very low, especially for Series A. With normal levels of options dilution, I would say offer should be 10k - 100k options for equity.
If they only have 6 months of runway, they shouldn't have employees to begin with. They are totally reliant on VC money to survive cause their product doesn't sell.
These are all helpful points. Thank you to everyone who has voted or commented. Specifically, I think I will steer clear of this opportunity. They are keeping financials close to their chest, but keep telling me that “6 months runway, maybe 8” Which has worried me. But I don’t know enough about startup world to know if that’s good or bad. So I appreciate everyone who has helped me see — that’s pretty bad. I will keep searching for the right DE opportunity in the meantime and keep self studying to find an opportunity that fits my financial needs as well as growth needs. If anyone knows of any places looking for DEs (I’ve got good Databricks experience, primarily Azure), definitely give me a shout! I’m coming from Data Science but can flex both muscles. Thanks again everyone I really do appreciate the input and feedback.
Why are you paying you gf's community college?
Need bigger tc jump for the risk, and 6 mos runway is too near