It’s increasingly possible to bootstrap a company of one
Nostalgia is the best word to describe Emily’s feelings as she sits beside her colleagues at a conference table in a sleek high-rise building.
“Remember when we had bosses?” John chuckles.
“Remember when we had office politics?” Olivia asks.
“Remember when we had all that stress?” Saar adds.
“Feels like another lifetime,” Emily says. “Now, our biggest headache is running our own companies better than our competitors. Our solo companies.”
Years ago, Emily and her colleagues would gather at the water cooler—not to discuss business growth, but to vent about their bosses and workplace frustrations. Commiserating this way is natural. People lacking power often draw strength from comparing notes about their daily hassles. NBC’s The Office humorously depicted this reality. So did Workaholics and the film Office Space.
But that’s so pre-2025.
As we straddle the 2030s, technological tools can now produce viable companies of one. Goodbye, W2 employee drudgery. Hello, entrepreneurship.
This is the promise of tech visionary Tim Cortinovis’ new book: Single-Handed Unicorn: How to Solo Build a Billion-Dollar Company. As he told me in our recent interview: “You don’t need a full-time staff anymore—just the right problem to solve and the right mix of AI tools and freelancers.”
Sam Altman agrees with this notion. In this interview, OpenAI’s CEO said, “We’re going to see 10-person companies with billion-dollar valuations pretty soon…in my little group chat with my tech CEO friends there’s this betting pool for the first year there is a one-person billion-dollar company, which would’ve been unimaginable without AI. And now [it]
will happen.”
Once upon a time, people assumed billion-dollar companies required massive teams and deep funding. Altman and Cortinovis think otherwise. A key message from the latter’s book is that old-school startups were often built by engineers seeking problems. According to Cortinovis, “Under the new model, you should still identify your problem, then source the right AI to solve it.”
This is what our fictional character Emily did. Note: As a storyteller, I find the best way to explain ideas is through narrative. Emily personifies Cortinovis’ vision. Like many young people today, Emily did not see herself as a business owner. Neither did her coworkers. Growing up, she was nudged into going to college then working for someone else.
The (office) struggle continues to be real.
But she didn’t like being a W2 employee. She felt out of control in her own life. Whenever her boss told her to do something, she was expected to do it immediately—no questions asked. Emily dreamed bigger. She wanted to start her own e-commerce company. But she wasn’t an engineer. Or a coder. However, using Cortinovis’ logic, she saw a problem AI could fix: smaller brands were hemorrhaging money on losing Facebook ads. Emily could turn to no-code AI platforms to solve this challenge, going into business for herself.
Simple as this sounds, it’s not farfetched.
Consider some available tools to bootstrap a company of one. Bubble is a coding platform for non-coders like Emily—maybe even for you. As TechCrunch explains: “Coding is not a bubble, and Bubble wants to empower the democratization of software development and the creation of new startups. Through its platform, Bubble enables anyone—coder or not—to begin building modern web applications using a click-and-drag interface that can connect data sources and other software together in one fluid interface.”
Continuing with our story, once Emily built a stronger e-commerce dashboard via Bubble to help clients advertise on Facebook, she could leverage AdCreative.ai to produce sales copy and visuals for optimal performance. According to Semrush, the AI tool “uses a large, high-conversion ad creative database to generate highly customized ad creatives for advertisers, whether they are startups, ecommerce businesses, agencies, or global enterprises.”
Not having a team to brainstorm with didn’t hinder Emily either. Though she didn’t have creatives on hand like the show Mad Men, she had AI. She could turn to ChatGPT as a thought partner whenever she ran into a snag, even when it came to dealing with clients and their personal issues.
Again, the secret to Emily—or anyone else building a solo company—is what Cortinovis proposes: not starting with the technology. It should always begin with identifying the problem, then deploying the ideal AI tools to solve it.
The new water cooler dynamic he imagines comes from scaling in this novel way. “In the past, companies relied on massive teams. Today, AI makes that model obsolete. It’s not needed anymore. Not when you have AI. The biggest challenge isn’t technology. It’s thinking like a problem-solver.”
Growing your mind and your company still requires a human component, one that Cortinovis explored with me. CEOs and founders routinely feel lonely at the top. Their station in life often precludes them from venting to their staff, much less strategizing new ideas with vulnerability.
Organizations like Vistage and YPO arose to address just this challenge. As Inc.com explains: “Mastermind groups provide a confidential space where CEOs can discuss critical and sensitive issues and receive invaluable feedback and insights. These groups typically comprise six to nine like-minded leaders, creating a safe environment for open dialogue. The value of participating in a mastermind group cannot be overstated. CEOs gain access to diverse perspectives, accountability, and collective wisdom that can drive both personal and professional growth.”
You don’t have to go it alone.
When it comes to managing a solo venture it’s easy to imagine scenarios where one feels terribly alone. As Cortinovis told me, the solution is finding time to regularly meet with peers to work through your challenges together. This is the brainstorm session Emily and her old work colleagues were enjoying at the start of this article. Using the tools and logic Cortinovis suggested, they became silopreneurs, giving them freedom and abundance for fuller lives.
To date, we haven’t seen a one-person company become a unicorn. But that day is coming fast. The further we go into these exciting 2030s; one undeniable truth becomes clear—technology can empower us in previously unfathomable ways. Was anyone talking about the radical idea that a single entrepreneur could start and run a billion-dollar company a few years ago?
Not really.
Unless they were influenced by science fiction ideas stemming from Philip K. Dick crossed with Robert Kiyosaki. But Cortinovis’ book trumpets a new class of pioneers—ones willing to bet it all—on themselves.
Yesterday’s water cooler is on the outs. Instead, new conversations are happening. Filled with optimism, these chats suggest what’s possible when we dispense with the old ways of doing things and embrace the new. Amidst all the hubbub there’s no longer a question if a one-person billion-dollar company will someday emerge. The question is: who will build it first?
Maybe you.
