For Cy Bader

The rest of that conversation.

Following up from the 25th, with rough numbers and how I could help.

The player

  • You're building for power listeners first, the way I heard it.
  • The twenty-year-old storefront stopped serving them years ago.
  • A full DSP, built for how they actually listen.
  • You know the listener and the business better than anyone I'd bring in.
  • I can take the build side off your plate, what it takes and what it costs.

Closing the open 20%

  • You said the deck's most of the way there, with cost and timeline still open.
  • That's the piece I'd help you close.
  • Happy to work under an NDA, whenever you want to walk me through it.
  • We'd pull the prototype out of the black box and write the version you raise on.

From the call

A part-time retainer to start, before a build team1099, part time

Napkin math from the call. Round numbers to show the shape, not a quote.

Baseline player, apps and web, Toon Global, live streaming$250–400K
Full version, the interaction layer, iOS and web$600–750K
Licensing via aggregators$50–75K a year

Contacts already moving. Three to six months to raise against.

I price in engineer-months. $12K a month per engineer, all-in.

A lot of this is built with code-gen tooling now, so an engineer-month goes further. Useful when you defend the number.

How I'd come in

I'd come on as an advisor on the deck, not a CTO.

Two ways I could plug in, take one or both.

In your corner

Phase one. Strategy, architecture, the roadmap, the deck, the fundraise, the meetings. A flat retainer.

Building with you

Alongside your team later, if it's useful. Bigger and separate, and only if you want it.

Comp is your call

However you want to handle it. A 1099 cash retainer, or part equity over a cash floor. Never 100% equity. Your cap table's yours, obviously.

The build, when you raise

  • No team spins up until you've raised and you're ready.
  • I'd staff the bench from people I've shipped with, sized in engineer-units.
  • Bring your own UX lead and designer in at day zero, and my crew builds around them.
  • I skipped that at Vers1ons and paid for it in three brand pivots.

Who I am

  • Yungsten's my shop, and I'm CTO at Vers1ons.
  • Dan knows us both, so he can fill in whatever I've left out.
  • You wouldn't pick a build partner off a website anyway, so let's just talk.

Next

  • Grab a time below whenever your week opens up.
  • I'll start on the cost and timeline in the meantime.
  • No clock on any of it.

— Paul