In episode 669, Rob Walling chats with Rick Hymanson, founder of detamoov and previously Shugo. They discuss Rick’s exit from Shugo in 2018 in what Rob calls “ten years to overnight success”. Rick recounts an early pivot for the company in finding product market fit, building the business with a day job, the logistics of the exit, and why he’s excited to join TinySeed with detamoov.

Episode Sponsor:

Find your perfect developer or a team at Lemon.io/startups

The competition for incredible engineers and developers has never been more fierce. Lemon.io helps you cut through the noise and find great talent through its network of engineers in Europe and Latin America.

They take care of the vetting, interviewing, and testing of candidates to make sure that you are working with someone who can hit the ground running.

When it comes to hiring, the time it takes to write your job description, list the position, review resumes, schedule interviews, and make an offer can take weeks, if not months. With Lemon.io, you can cut down on a lot of that time by tapping into their wide network of developers who can get started in as early as a week.

And for subscribers of Startups For the Rest of Us, you can get 15% off your first 4 week contract with a developer by visiting lemon.io/startups

Topics we cover:

1:59 – How Rick felt after exiting Shugo
5:10 – Deciding to start detamoov after the exit
7:09 – Creating a Shugo MVP and pivoting
11:15 – Building a SaaS product while working a day job
15:34 – Transitioning to full time and growing Shugo ARR
20:28 – Expanding the product feature set
22:11 – When did you know you had product-market fit?
23:28 – Finding an acquirer and navigating the process
27:38 – Starting and growing datamoov
31:12 – The value of relationship building
34:43 – IP ownership agreements

Links from the Show:

If you have questions about starting or scaling a software business that you’d like for us to cover, please submit your question for an upcoming episode. We’d love to hear from you!

Subscribe & Review: iTunes | Spotify | Google

九月简报：危机中的心灵、食物与夜空 | No News Is Good News