Yeah, so week 3 at Techstars was not a smooth one. In particular Tuesday was rough. At the end of the day Tuesday I been through about 8 straight days of mentor madness. Mentor madness is just days stacked pitching your product/idea. Towards the end of the day I had gotten some general feedback from mentors. They do not tell us who said what and I totally understand why. But the feedback was not inline with what we discussed in any meeting I was in.

I heard things like the management team was “so-so” and that a “pivot was likely”. Nothing we had talked about. It was really just the straw that broke this camel’s back. You see earlier in the day I spent an hour on the phone with my business partner and dear friend Tom, his new advisor Rick, and a trusted friend and lawyer Rush.

The purpose of the call was to finalize our stock sale. I was going to sell my interest in a company that Tom and I built over the last 14 years (Servis Technology). While it had morphed over the last 5 years it was the foundation that brought Tom and I together. I was exiting that business for good. In exchange I was buying stock from Tom in Bawte. I needed to do this to get our cap table in order so that in the future we could take on investors. I will save you the logic behind why, but trust me it was necessary.

As things tend to do when money (or in the case of Bawte, potential money) is involved, it got complicated. From my side Tom was getting total control of a known entity. He could take that business and run with it for the next 20 years as it was cash flow positive, profitable, and showed no signs of stopping. I was losing pretty much all long term security.

From Tom’s perspective, we had been 50/50 on Bawte with the exception of a little money I put in for marketing 6 months ago. We had been through a lot with Bawte and had significant investments. Tom was giving up the pay day…or at least the same payday as I would get if Bawte made it big time. Still a .1% of that happening, but it is something.

Now, I had very little day-to-day interaction with Servis Technology, but since we were partners I got a salary while working on Bawte. The thought being is that Bawte could be this rocket ship and since we were 50/50 in everything it really didn’t matter. Tom, on the otherhand, had very little interaction with Bawte. It was my idea and we agreed that I would run with it…and I did. Well enough to get us into Techstars which I would argue is pretty damned good.

So, back to the call. I felt like this new advisor of Tom’s, Rick, was sticking his nose where it didn’t belong. You see Tom is a great communicator and I am certain he told Rick our entire history in order to get proper guidance, but unless you rode the roller coaster that has been our lives for the last 14 years you have no fucking clue what you are talking about. So him talking about what is “fair” made me want to rip his face off. I am sure in any other situation Rick and I would get along great. Tom likes him and I like Tom, so I would probably like Rick. But not here. Not now.

Rush, our long time lawyer (and someone who I consider a good friend) was trying his damnedest to mediate as he was acting as the lawyer for the business not for either side. I thought he did great. So after an hour, we concluded and I was not in a good mood. Mentor meetings followed. A bunch of them. Some good some so-so.

Then I got that feedback I mentioned above. I was not in the mood. That is when I felt like shit was getting real and my sturdy wall, my facade, was crumbling. I was torn between crying and beating the shit of the next thing that pissed me off. I knew neither would really help. So I went to bed early.

Wednesday was better. I had a clear head yet again. Despite my demo day pitch sucking, it was a good day. Tom and talked again. That may have been Thursday, not Wednesday, but for the purpose of this post it doesn’t matter. I won’t go into details, but I think we both believe we are giving up more than our fair share which is probably a good sign of a fair trade. By the end of the week we had the paperwork finalized and that is yet another weight off my shoulders.

This has been one of the hardest weeks of my life. The most difficult was when my mom passed away in 2006 of ovarian cancer (I love you mom). Next was when a business that Tom and I worked so hard to build was dismantled by litigation in under two weeks. Then week 3 of Techstars.

So I am no longer a shareholder in Servis Technology. That makes me sad. And Tom is no longer a director in Bawte. He is, however, still a significant shareholder. But because we are not true 50/50 partners anymore I am scared that we will just drift apart. He has been such an integral part of my life for the past 14 years its hard to imagine that. He was the one person who always knew exactly what I was going through. Even if neither of us had the answers, we always had each other’s back. I guess time will tell if the relationship was really based more on friendship or on business.