Getting funding with an unorthodox team

We have three co-founders...all of us business men and business owners. None of us are programmers. We have decided that finding one more co-founder(a coder), would probably be the best move for us. As of now, two of our co-founders live here in the Sacramento area, and one lives in Wyoming. We are all good friends and initially split the business in 3rds(no docs yet). As of now I am the only one that can dedicate full time hours. My other California partner will eventually be joining full time if we get traction. My out of state partner will probably not be able to come on full time.

My question is simple; Even with a good idea...will this team have a hard time getting funded?

Any help, advice or suggestions would be very appreciated! Thank you...

Funding is a hard question to answer. A lot of the time, people with money who want to fund companies are looking for a business (product and team) that will make them money. The best way to get funded is to self-invest. By this, I mean you simply put your time, and personal monies into the pot. If an investor was to come along, make sure you can show them how an investment on their part gives them the correct share of the company (based upon the sales, and all other investments), how long the monies will be in the company, and what their rate of return is.

Put another way...

If you came to me looking for $50,000 to invest in your widget company, the first thing I would want to know is what your sales were for the last 3 years, what your sales are for the next three years (and logical reasoning for it) and what your personal investment(s) are. So if you have 4 partners, and you've each invested time and monies (say $5,000 each), and you've seen sales like:

• Y1 : $100
• Y2 : $5,000
• Y3 : $7,000

but you're projecting sales of:

• Y4 : $50,000
• Y5 : $100,000
• Y6 : $250,000

It will look a bit funny. I'll want to know why your $20,000 and 3 years of work have only netted you $12,100, and you think my $50,000 will all of a sudden make a difference of $400,000 over the next 3 years.

You also need to think about personalities. If you're all passionate and into a product, that makes a difference, to the point where you have to stay with the product to make money. I've seen investors invest in crap ideas, making little money, because they saw the potential to get in with a smart person, and I've seen smart people with great ideas not get funding because they can't articulate, or because of a personality conflict.

Ultimately, funding shouldn't be something you're worried about now, especially if you're looking at something to do with software. If you're trying to push a product, and need capital to get started, keep in mind that the sooner you request funding, the more of your business you'll likely have to give up in order to secure monies.

I hope that helps, I think the downvote was due to the lack of specificity in the question, but IMHO it's unmerited. Let me know if this needs further clarification.