Joao Coelho’s approach to open source entrepreneurship

As a techie, Joao Coelho always had an interest in working on his own passion projects and being the ultimate decision maker.

After working two corporate gigs — at AWS and Pollinate — he realized that who he works with can make all the difference in quitting a full-time gig and starting a company.

Working with people that believe in the company’s mission as well as those that celebrate its wins is motivating, he said. And, perhaps more importantly, having folks around that can commensurate with challenges can make keep you on the winding path toward success.

When he found that supportive team, he set out to build the open-source Multy, a platform that helps developers with cloud vendor lock-in.

I spoke with Joao about his open-source work, what he’s learned, and his advice for founders.

Tell us about your open source project.

Multy has been my biggest open-source project to date. It’s been really incredible to see developers getting together to solve the big problem of cloud vendor lock-in.

What have you learned from it so far?

What’s been most interesting has been to see how widespread the issue of cloud vendor lock-in is and learning the different ways it has impacted developers, from cost to losing customers because they built on the wrong cloud. Seeing developers relate to the problem and contribute not only their feedback but their time through contributions has been really rewarding.

Why’d you launch Multy?

The decision to start Multy came from having experienced the problem myself and realizing there were no solutions out there. Having the opportunity to change the way devs deploy infrastructure and breaking cloud vendor lock-in is very challenging but also very rewarding.

How’s building a company in the open-source space different from others?

Building an open-source company turns the traditional ways of building a business on its head. The focus is no longer on building behind closed doors, hiding away the core product, roadmap, and direction, but rather the aim is to build with the community. Developers want to have input in the products they’re using, they want to understand the vision and oftentimes contribute not only ideas but code.

How do you approach that difference?

This requires a significant shift in thinking and is often seen as counterintuitive to the old way of doing things. However, once you look past the initial worries about building open-source, you ensure that, when building with the community, you are developing a product developers actually want to use, and that's a very powerful thing.

What open-source trends are you watching?

One trend that I’ve been seeing become very popular in recent years is the shift from proven proprietary products into their open-source alternatives. From the likes of Medusa, open-source Shopify, Supabase, open-source Firebase or even OpenBB, open-source Bloomberg Terminal, this transition is something that can be easily understood when you consider the advantages it brings. An interesting website to look for these is opensourcealternative.to

How does that affect what you’re building?

This trend goes hand-in-hand with our mission at Multy, allowing developers to build products that can easily run on any cloud. When using open-source products, the customer dictates where and how everything runs. They are not beholden to a company that dictates things like pricing and availability. With this shift, customers are becoming empowered and learning that they can build with flexibility.

What were some skills you cultivated to become a well-rounded entrepreneur?

Some of the skills I’ve found that make me a better entrepreneur are communicating effectively and being open-minded and open to feedback. For Multy, it’s been crucial to talk to as many people as possible to get different perspectives on what we’re building. Being able to communicate your idea quickly to anyone and considering their feedback can sometimes be a hard thing to do but an important part of building any business.

Have you encountered imposter syndrome?

For me, I’ve definitely felt the imposter syndrome throughout my journey. As a first-time founder, this is a normal thing to feel and part of why it’s so exciting. The most important thing to overcome this is to build a network of people around you, whether that be co-founders, angels, or advisors, that are able to help you on your journey and fill the gaps.

Any advice for founders?

The idea of building something and turning that into a business can seem daunting, it often feels like you don’t have what it takes to succeed. When you look at successful founders, it’s important to remember that they didn’t have it all figured out in the beginning, there’s no startup that hasn’t had its setbacks. I would encourage people who don’t feel they have what it takes to listen to podcasts of other founders and understand the journey of being an entrepreneur.

Also important to remember that having your startup fail is not a bad thing. The experience and the network you built along the way are invaluable. Ironically, one of the biggest things VCs look for when investing is if people are repeat founders because having gone through the journey before means you understand the pitfalls.