Do You Really Need a CTO Co-Founder to Build a Unicorn?

There’s a long-standing belief in startups that every tech company must have a CTO co-founder, someone with deep technical expertise who builds the product from day one. For many investors, the absence of a technical co-founder raises an immediate red flag.

But the startup world is nuanced. While most unicorns do have strong technical leadership from early days, a technical (or CTO) co-founder is not always required for success, and many high-valuation companies prove this.

How Common Are Technical Co-Founders in Unicorns?

Based on The Rise of the European Technical Founder by EU.VC, approximately 70% of founders behind U.S. unicorns have technical backgrounds. This is a strong signal that technical expertise is highly correlated with venture-scale success. However, it also implies the opposite side of the story: nearly 30% of unicorn founders did not come from technical disciplines. In other words, while technical founders are common, they are not universal, and a meaningful share of billion-dollar companies were built by founders whose strengths lay in business, product vision, or distribution rather than hands-on engineering.

Unicorns Without Traditional CTO Co-Founders

Calendly ($3B): Founder Tope Awotona (sales background).

Hims&Hers (~$5B+): Founders Andrew Dudum (entrepreneur), Hilary Coles (Marketing), Jack Abraham (VC/investor), Joe Spector (Business Development), no technical co-founder; technology platform was developed through Atomic Labs, a venture studio that provided the engineering, design, and product resources.

Warby Parker ($3B): Founders Neil Blumenthal (Business), Dave Gilboa (Business), Andrew Hunt (VC), Jeffrey Raider (private investments).

Pinterest ($13B): Founders Ben Silbermann (product/entrepreneur), Evan Sharp (design), Paul Sciarra (entrepreneur /VC).

These examples demonstrate that achieving unicorn success does not necessarily require a formal CTO co-founder. A clear pattern emerges: these companies are primarily B2C businesses with relatively straightforward technology, and many of the founders were serial entrepreneurs. This suggests that the most critical component of a founding team is a strong, capable leader who can set the vision, drive execution, and adapt quickly, often more important than having technical expertise on the founding team from day one.

Lessons for Founders and Investors

Founders:

• If you are not technical, focus on early validation and hiring smart engineers.

• Strong product thinking and domain expertise can substitute for early technical partnership.

Investors:

• Evaluate how technical risk is being managed, even if there isn’t a formal CTO co-founder, look at early hires, and product delivery velocity.

Closing Thoughts

In venture capital, one principle consistently holds true: there are no standardized rules. Patterns exist, but exceptions are everywhere. While having a CTO co-founder is undeniably advantageous for companies where technology is the core product, such as infrastructure, deep tech, and highly engineered platforms, it should not be treated as a universal requirement.

History shows that many outliers have reached scale without following this “rule.” These companies succeeded not because they ignored technology, but because they found alternative ways to deliver it effectively.

The key takeaway is this: investors and founders should focus less on titles and more on outcomes. What ultimately matters is whether the founding team can move fast, make sound product decisions, and consistently execute.

And always remember, the founder who leads the company is the one who sets the pace. Vision, clarity, and execution discipline often matter more than any single role on the founding team.