Episode 669 | 10 Years to Overnight Success: Bootstrapping to a Multi-Million Dollar Exit

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.

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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:

• Rick Hymanson | LinkedIn
• detamoov
• The SaaS Playbook
• TinySeed

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!

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Listen to Episode 669