Difference between Founder and Co-Founder

Key Difference: A founder is basically a person who founds or establishes something. The term is commonly used in the context of business and startups, where the founder is basically someone who founds and establishes a business or start-up. A co-founder is basically a person who helps the founder set up the company, and lends their skills or resources to the business and idea.

Founder A founder is basically a person who founds or establishes something. The term is commonly used in the context of business and startups, where the founder is basically someone who founds and establishes a business or start-up. The founder can also be known as an entrepreneur, or in the case of a non-profit or charity foundation, a philanthropist.

The responsibilities of a founder include coming up with a feasible and often profitable idea for a business or company, deciding what products and services the business or company will be offering, for coming up with a business model, as well as for acquiring human and other required resources. However, the founder’s main responsibility is to ensure that the company is a success and profits, rather than fail, as many people count on his to lead the company until it can stand by its own.

A co-founder is basically a person who founds the company or the business with the founder. This could mean that the co-founder may have helped the founder come up with the idea for the business or the company. However, most commonly the co-founder has skills or resources that can help the founder with his idea and business. These skills can be technical in nature, experience in business or startups, capital or resources that can be invested into the business.

Depending on the business or startup, a co-founder can be an existing company, or entrepreneurs, engineers, hackers, venture capitalists, web developers, web designers and others who can lend their expertise to the company.

After the company is set up, the founder and co-founders can run it and act as the company’s CEO, Chairman, or heads of their respective departments, as well as sit on the company’s Board of Directors, or they can instead also step down and let other people such as the appointed CEO and Chairman run the company. The founder and co-founders can also sell the company, take their profit and walk away.

Comparison between Founder and Co-Founder:

	Founder	Co-Founder
Can also be	Entrepreneurs, philanthropists	Entrepreneurs, philanthropists, engineers, hackers, venture capitalists, web developers, web designers and others. Can also be promoters.
Description	A Founder is someone who founds the company and/or business.	A co-founder is someone who helps the founder found the company. Can also be a company.
Responsibility	Fully responsible for the company’s success or failure.	Responsible for helping the founder establish the business.
Role	Comes up with the idea about what the company and business should be and/or what products or services should it be offering. Responsible for coming up with a business model Responsible for acquiring human and other required resources. Fully responsible for the company’s success or failure.	Helps facilitate the idea about what the company and business should be and/or what products or services should it be offering. Support the founder and the business. Lead their skills or expertise to the business. May be able to provide resources, or capital for the starting of the business.