Rinat reaching $250k ARR

Hey - It’s Guy & Farzan,

Bit late today with the newsletter, but we made it. We have 2 founder stories, 1 founder playbook, and 1 founder tweet for you.

Estimated reading time: 9 mins

Founder story (1 of 2)

See how Rinat bootstrapped Sally.Ai and reached $250K in annual recurring revenue.

See how Rinat Khatipov has:

🚀 Started SallyAI in 2022, crafting AI-powered solutions for sales technology.
💰 Achieved $250K annual recurring revenue.
👥 Built a team of 15 employees.
💌 Attracted 500 subscribers.
💻 Bootstrapped the startup, demonstrating financial independence and strategic growth.

Top 5 takeaways from Rinat Khatipov's journey:

👉 Pursue your passion and leverage your expertise to fill market gaps.
👉 Identify shortcomings in existing tools and develop innovative solutions.
👉 Network and collaborate to expand your reach and capabilities.
👉 Utilize creative methods like AI-powered outreach to secure clients.
👉 Stay disciplined and resilient in the face of challenges, focusing on sales to drive growth.

"Fail to plan, plan to fail." This embodies Rinat Khatipov's strategic approach to entrepreneurship as they continue to innovate in the sales technology space.

Founder story (2 of 2)

See how Jeremy built a $5M/Year business from a van

Here’s a breakdown of how Jeremy (aka Vanman) built a $5M/year business that started from his van.

 Founder playbook

The Sam Altman Story: Uncovering the life and career of an AI innovator who’s transforming the future of technology

Key Highlights:

🚀 Early Entrepreneurship: Co-founded Loopt, a location-sharing app, at 19.
💼 Leadership at Y Combinator: Became president in 2014, helping launch successful startups like Airbnb and Dropbox.
🤖 Co-founder of OpenAI: With Elon Musk, founded OpenAI to address AGI risks and develop responsible AI.
💡 Achievements: Released revolutionary AI models like GPT-2 through GPT-4 and Dall-E.
🌐 Evolution of OpenAI: Transitioned from nonprofit to "capped profit" corporation, partnering with Microsoft.

Top 5 takeaways from Sam Altman's journey:

👉 Passion Drives Innovation: Pursue your passion to fill market gaps.
👉 Innovate and Improve: Identify and address shortcomings in existing tools.
👉 Collaboration is Key: Network and collaborate to expand capabilities.
👉 Creative Strategies Work: Utilize AI-powered outreach for client acquisition.
👉 Stay Resilient: Remain disciplined and focused on sales to drive growth.

Founder Twitter post

This is a very cool short thread about working away to get to a project that works.

A quote I love in this thread:
“Entrepreneurship is hard. And the brain struggles to understand non-linear outcomes. But if you stay in the game long enough (without sacrificing what's important to you), the reward is 1000x worth it. Just ship it.”

Quick reminder - If you like our newsletter, please do “add to address book” or reply. These are “positive signals” that help our newsletter land in your inbox. If you hate it, please unsubscribe (the unsubscribe link is in the footer).

See you next Sunday.

Guy + Farzan
Founderoo