They know nothing about building technology so are never in the right. This happens often enough that most startup accelerators pre-flag it as criteria to not invest in founders (with an out of balance equity split).
It's a broad over-generalization but it's a good rule of thumb. They must have access to demonstrable money and/or power before they're worth an 80/20 split, well above what most random business guys can bring in from even elite universities.
Edit: A decent somewhat recent example is Theranos. No biotech VC would touch them because they do due diligence on the basic scientific viability of their investments, but Holmes and her cofounder were able to bring in huge tech investors from family connection and even get people like Henry Kissinger on their board, who also helped them get more investors. That's the kind of connections that might be worth an uneven split.
https://www.hackerneue.com/item?id=43815768
>Agreed. The tough thing, though, is that it's (generally) a lot easier to spot a bad engineer than a bs "ideas guy".
>>It behooves everyone to be able to spot a narcissist, and that eliminates a huge swath of bad "idea guys" and bad MBAs.
I’ve easily seen more start-ups fail because the technical co-founder got pedantic about something with zero commercial relevance than I have where the non-technical founder rolled over their tech team. Mostly because the latter fail early while the former can sort of look like it’s not a trash fire for a little bit longer.
As you say, the unequal split is a red flag. Not the direction it leans.
Can you think of examples of the opposite? There are a few variables here for technical/business/commercial and fail/succeed so I won’t write them all out, just curious what you have seen to be honest.
But for random nobodies who think high of themselves, hell no.
It's all about what each of you are bring to the table. It's possible he priced the tech side perfectly AND being the best option available to make you better off.