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Solo, together.

A three-month, in-person residency for 6 ambitious solo founders. Next cohort starts Jan. 23, 2026.

"0-to-1 is hell if you're truly solo.
With the right peer group, you're not."
- Aldo, SFP F25

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The Case for
Solo Founders

For decades, the startup world has pushed one narrative: you need co-founders to succeed. What if they're wrong?

Great co-founding teams build incredible companies. But after working with thousands of founders in ODF, I've seen enough solo successes to know there's another valid path.

Successful solo founding stories aren't new — look at Zoom (2011) and Vercel (2015) — but I expect they'll be more common in the future. AI gives solo founders unprecedented leverage. What once required multiple people can now be accomplished by one determined person who knows how to use the latest tools.

AI compounds the benefits of solo founding. As a solo founder, you maintain complete control and start with 100% ownership. This enables faster decisions. It also means you can offer more equity to early team members who become deeply invested while taking less financial and emotional risk.

There are tradeoffs. The journey can be lonely without a co-founder to share the mental and physical burden. You might miss having someone equally invested to celebrate wins and navigate challenges.

But here's the truth: neither path is inherently superior. For too long, we've been told that only one path exists.

The goal of Solo Founders is not to promote a particular path but to challenge the notion that co-founding is the only valid approach. Don't let finding a co-founder block your progress. Just get started. You might discover the perfect partner along the way—or realize you can succeed on your own.

INTRODUCING: THE SOLO FOUNDERS PROGRAM

Three months.
Six solo founders.
One residency.

THE SFP ADVANTAGE

Five fellow founders to build alongside.

1:1 support for everything from sales to fundraising

Group office hours for hard conversations and breakthroughs

Insane energy and momentum

Plus:

- Private bedroom at SFP
- Full-floor office
- $800K+ in perks/credits
- Stipend for personal expenses
- Alumni retreat

“The highest quality decision I made this year was to join SFP.

The quality of people and the momentum have been incredible.”

Chaitanya
Founder of Workers IO
Previously co-founded The Timeliners (acq. by TVF)

During the residency, SFP founders:

Raised millions from top investors

Grew MRR 50–130% MoM

Launched 7 products

Surpassed 35k+ GitHub stars

Landed governments and Fortune 500 companies as clients

"By the end of our first day, one company had launched, gotten 500k views, and had investors trying to lead the round."

Ryan
Founder of CreditGPT
Ex-Wall Street, former pull-ups world record holder (4,115 in 13 hours)

From the founders

I was told, 'you should find a co-founder.' No one believed. Julian did. I couldn't be more grateful to SFP and everyone in the program for these opportunities and incredible experiences.

Dhravya

Founder of Supermemory (raised $3M during SFP) 2x acquired founder, Ex-Cloudflare

I don't feel like a solo founder here. Here I effectively have five co-founders — available when it matters, while everyone still runs their own company.

Chaitanya

Founder of Workers IO Previously co-founded The Timeliners (acquired by TVF)

I didn't realize the impact SFP would have. Just having friends I can trust around me is huge. I learn from their past mistakes, and I feel better when I can guide them through struggles I've already faced myself.

Namanyay

Founder of Giga Developer and engineering blogger with 4M monthly impressions

Frequently Asked Questions

Yes. SFP is fully in-person in SF. All participants live at SFP with their own private bedrooms and work of SFP's attached office. Remote participation isn't an option. Participants who already live in SF/Bay Area also move into the SFP space for the duration of the program.

Housing: private bedroom at SFP

Workspace: 24/7 access to attached office floor

Community dinners: weekly shared meals with founders and guests

Weekly 1:1 and group office hours: Go in-depth on your business and learn from others to move faster. This continues after the 3 month residency with SFP F25 continuing to meet every week

Perks: credits for infra/tools

$15k stipend: covers personal expenses associated with building a company full-time

Alumni Retreat: get welcomed to the community by SFP alumni who are a few steps ahead.

As a solo founder you start with 100% of your company and get to use that equity to acquire talent, capital and network. We built SFP to increase each founder's opportunities, not constrain them. We charge 2.5% for participation so that you you don't need to choose between us and a traditional accelerator or pre-seed. We hate complicated terms and help our founders route around them from VCs when they're raising. As such, we have have no MFN, pro rata, side letter, or unique investor rights. We work with <20 founders a year at SFP and commit to being active supporters for the entire life of their companies. Alumni often live nearby after SFP wraps so we can continue to stay close — two are now downstairs neighbors at our home which is 6 blocks from SFP.

We look for velocity, clarity, ownership, and proof of shipping. Many accepted founders have already launched projects, raised funding, or sold companies — but that's not required.

SFP is for you if you:

are set on starting a company solo (or already have)

have a background that shows you would be a promising founder (that does not mean you need to have worked at a successful startup)

have a bias towards action

love the idea of serving customers

want to be fully immersed with 5 other solo founders for 3 months

It's not for you if you:

are not already full time or ready to go full time on building your startup

overly fixated on status / VC approval

are not excited about living/working alongside other solo founders

cannot commit to being in-person in SF for most of the program

Yes. Some founders join after raising or completing YC. Others are pre-funding. SFP is designed to layer on top of whatever path you're already taking and support wherever you want to go next — from an accelerator to a traditional round or bootstrapping to a venture-scale outcome.

We encourage it. Many founders kill what isn’t working and double down on better opportunities. “I pivoted right before arriving. SFP backed me in killing what wasn’t working.” — Chai

SFP cannot sponsor visas directly, but we provide advice and intros. Former residents have successfully secured O-1s and other visas while in the program.

There's no "graduation day." You'll leave with deep relationships (often described as "five co-founders"), massive progress, and a strong support system. Many alumni stay in SF to keep building with the community and most choose to continue living near SFP. We continue hosting weekly group office hours (and 1:1s as-needed). We aim to be your "first text" in the years to come. Alumni interview candidates for upcoming cohorts and welcome them during the alumni retreat. Some even angel invest in the new companies.

Be early to solo founding.

“I don’t want to compare us to the first YC batch, but I’d bet at least two of us are on NASDAQ in ten years.” - Aldo, SFP F25

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