The founder seat
You know the work. Run the company.
We form companies on a closed-loop agentic platform. We are looking for people who have run operations in one of these industries, know where the money leaks, and want to run one. You would be running that company — not joining Midwest as an employee.
What the seat is
Chief executive of a Midwest company. Your own board, your own investors, your own name on the door. We hold founding equity and build the product; you run the business, and the moment you have your own team, the roles we were filling transfer to them.
You are not an employee of Midwest, and you are not waiting for an idea. The company already exists, the industry has already been through the gate, and the closed loop is already underneath it. What is missing is the person who knows the buyer.
What you own
An option pool is carved before the round, sized to the seat, on standard vesting. We publish the mechanism rather than a range, because our companies are structured differently and a range we could not hold to would be worse than none. In one of our companies the pool is 15% of the company at close; in another, the founding and executive team hold 30%. You will see the actual cap table before there is any conversation about terms.
What we will not do is arbitrate how the operating team divides its own allocation. That is yours.
Kora is what this looks like when it works. Joel Houenou knows the labels and managers on the continent. He is the CEO. We hold studio equity and build the platform.
The process, and where it stops
Every stage ends in a condition, not a date. If the condition isn't met, we stop — and so can you.
Stage 1 · 4–6 weeks
Prove the pain
You and one of us go into the field. Operator interviews, site visits, real workflow observation. No production code is written in this stage — none, deliberately.
Stage 2 · 6–8 weeks
Prove the build
The runtime is pointed at the workflow. One process, instrumented end to end, in one real operator's environment.
Stage 3
Prove the company
Convert pilots to paying customers, prove the motion repeats, raise the round with you leading it.
Either of us can walk at twelve weeks
Named, deliberate, and expected. Twelve weeks is long enough to know and short enough to survive being wrong.
What we ask
Full time from the moment stage two starts, and the willingness to kill your own idea at a gate you agreed to in advance. Having failed before doesn't count against you here — we just want to hear exactly what happened and what you took from it.
Straight answers
Am I a founder or a hire?
A founder. You run the company, you own part of it, and you can fire us as the supplier.
Do you already have the idea?
Yes. It has been through the gate and scored against the published tests. If you think it's wrong, tell us at stage one — that's what stage one is for.
What do you take?
Founding equity, sized to what we contributed, diluted on the same terms as everyone else. The company also pays for what we build. Both are on the deal page.
Do I get paid?
Yes, from stage two. The figure is discussed openly at terms, not held back.
What happens if it fails?
We stop at a gate we both agreed to in advance, and we say so. [N−5] ideas have not made it out of the gate. Stopping is the process working.
Who owns the code?
The company. On creation. No licence-back, no lien.