269: 4 Non-Technical Founders Who Built Billion-Dollar Tech Empires
Sep 10, 2025
Most founders think you need to be technical to build a billion-dollar company.
But some of the world’s biggest tech giants were started by people who never wrote a single line of code.
In this episode, Sophia Matveeva unpacks the journeys of four non-technical founders who rewrote the rules of business.
In this episode, you will hear:
- How Steve Jobs proved that design instincts can beat coding skills
- Why Jack Ma’s 30 job rejections became his unfair advantage in building Alibaba
- The broke rent payment that sparked Airbnb’s $80B global empire
- What Katrina Lake’s Stitch Fix IPO teaches about trusting customers over investors
Resources from this Episode
https://www.techfornontechies.co/blog/how-companies-really-use-ai
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TRANSCRIPT
0:00:06 - Intro
Welcome to the Tech for Non-Techies podcast. I'm your host, tech entrepreneur executive coach at Chicago Booth, mba Sophia Matveeva. My aim here is to help you have a great career in the digital age. In a time when even your coffee shop has an app, you simply have to speak tech. On this podcast, I share core technology concepts, help you relate them to business outcomes and, most importantly, share practical advice on what you can do to become a digital leader today.
0:00:44 - Sophia Matveeva
If you want to have a great career in the digital age, this podcast is for you. Some of the world's biggest tech emperors were not built by engineers. They were built by non-technical founders who became billionaires, and, in fact, one of the people you'll hear about today, he did not see his first computer until he was in his 30s. So today you're going to hear about four non-technical founders who have changed industries and proved that you do not need to be a coder to build a tech giant. Hello, smart people, how are you today? In this lesson, I'm going to share examples from four non-technical founders who have shaken up their industry and, as you listen, ask yourself which one of these people do I most identify with? Whose advice is most appealing to me? Whose journey am I most interested in? Because I want you to see that massive global success is possible for non-technical founders, but also I want you to see that there are different types of non-technical founders, because there are different types of people and there are different types of journeys, right? So if you have chosen this path, research these people, research the ones that resonate most with you and follow their path. And if you have an idea for an app or a tech venture, which I'm assuming you do because you're listening to this podcast. But if you're not a developer, then I have a class for you next week. It's a free class and it is called Build a Startup Without Learning to Code. We are going to cover the framework for how to go from your idea to a live product. We're going to cover what's worth investing in and what's just waste, which is super important. And in this age of AI hype, we're also going to cover when to use AI and when you actually need to hire professionals. And this class is going to be free. It's going to be online, so you have no excuse. If you're a non-technical founder, you have to be there. And this class is the basis of the flagship course, tech for Non-Technical Founders, which you've heard me mention before, and I'll tell you about the course in the class as well, so you can register at techfornontechiesco forward slash free class or just go to the link in the show notes. And that's techfornontechiesco forward slash free class.
And one more thing before I tell you about the non-technical founder billionaires, I wanted to actually tell you about something that happened to me last week, which I think is random to you. So I got headhunted for a really well-paid job at a big tech company and, honestly, it looks like a really interesting role and the package is really high and it's actually the biggest job package that I've ever been offered. And I'm turning it down because, frankly, I make about the same amount of money leading Tech for Nine Decades and I really believe in what we're doing here. I like having these conversations with you and, honestly, I think we're just getting started. But the lesson from this is for the founders, for the people among you who are terrified for their careers and for their finances, and, oh, I really know how you feel, because the early stages of entrepreneurship usually mean that you don't have any money, you're not earning much or maybe you're not earning anything at all, and this is terrifying, especially if you're leaving a well-paid job right. But what I've seen from my own example that I just shared with you, and from my students, is that actually your founder experience can get you a more interesting and lucrative job than if you had just stayed on the same corporate track.
Because the thing is, if you had just stayed on the same corporate track? Because the thing is, if you create a tech product, you get some people to use it not millions, but just some people and you make some money. I'm not talking about profit, I'm talking about revenue. Just make some money. Then you've gone through the whole tech innovation cycle and if you make sure that people know about what you're doing and you keep posting about it on LinkedIn, you will be seen as an innovation leader. You will be seen as a thought leader in tech, as a thought leader in tech in your industry, which is much better than being seen as another middle manager. So let's say, let's just picture the worst case scenario. Let's say you start a startup and then, after three years time, you decide that for some reason it's not working out and you decide to go back to corporate. From what I see is that you could make a career and salary job that just was not available to you if you had stayed on the same corporate track for three years. So if you have been thinking about starting your tech venture but afraid for your career, then take this as your reassurance.
And now let's learn about some non-technical founder billionaires, all of the people that you're going to hear about today. They have created publicly listed companies. So we are going to go in order of company evaluation. Next week we are going to cover people who are non-technical founders on the way to building successful companies, so it's going to be a different flavor. But today let's get started with number one. The number one spot goes to Steve Jobs, the co-founder of Apple. Apple is one of the world's most valuable companies and its market cap is over $3 trillion today. Does Apple need an introduction? I mean, I'm assuming that if you're listening to this episode, then you have heard about Apple.
But did you know that Steve Jobs? He never studied engineering. He dropped out of Reed College, a liberal arts school, and you know he took classes on calligraphy there, amongst other non-techie things. So he was definitely not a coder. He was a product visionary and he really believed that technology alone was not enough. He believed that technology needed to be paired with other things. So he said that technology alone is not enough. It's technology married with liberal arts, married with the humanities, that makes our hearts sing. So, basically, use your unique talent and your unique insights and then get technology to enhance them, to scale them, and don't try to become a completely different person Because, for example, if you're really good with people or you're really good with design, these are unique, wonderful, really highly valued skill sets that actually you can really use to build an empire and don't try to think, well, okay, in the digital age, those talents are not relevant, those talents are very irrelevant. You just need to use technology to enhance them.
Now let's talk about number two. This guy is actually my favorite. There's Jack Ma. Jack Ma is the founder of Alibaba. Alibaba is China's e-commerce and fintech giant, so it's like Amazon plus eBay plus PayPal and a bunch of others rolled into one. It basically runs everything from online retail to wholesale logistics, to cloud computing, and then it has this fintech division called Alipay, which runs everything from payments to pensions, and, as of early September 2025, alibaba is valued at about $300 billion. So not bad. And now let me tell you about the founder, jack Ma, and maybe you will love him too.
So Jack started his career as an English teacher and he failed his college entrance exam. He failed his college entrance exam twice. He was rejected from 30 jobs, including from Kentucky Fried Chicken yes, kfc and he only discovered the internet in his 30s. So I love him because, you know, we, I think, get bombarded with examples of these. You know guys in their 20s who dropped out of Stanford and then created a billion dollar company. And then there's a guy who basically didn't see his first computer until he was in his 30s and got rejected from KFC, who is literally one of the most influential tech billionaires in the world. So don't tell me that if you're feeling bad that you're not a billionaire by 25, that like, okay, that's not a thing, that's not a legitimate thing. Just research Jack Bart and use him as your inspiration.
So when Jack finally saw the internet for the first time, on a trip to the US in the mid-1990s, he typed beer into a search engine and he found no results for China, and that's what gave him the idea of Alibaba. So he couldn't code, but he had vision, he had resilience because that's what you get after all that rejection and he could persuade others. So he convinced his friends and small businesses to join his early attempts to start a company. Then he convinced investors and employees to believe in Alibaba's mission and basically he turned this tiny you know first it was just an idea, then a tiny startup into one of the largest e-commerce platforms in the entire world, and they have millions upon millions of customers and businesses that they're serving every year. So he has literally changed commerce and finance in the world's second largest economy, and he was not building copycat products. So Andy Barber's products actually are an inspiration to Silicon Valley companies.
And he said your attitude is more important than your abilities. Similarly, your decision is more important than your capabilities. Your decision is more important than your capabilities. Basically, what that means is, if you believe that you can, you will. So I think you might as well believe that you can. It gets you good results. Okay, I've got two more for you.
The third spot goes to Brian Chesky, the CEO and co-founder of Airbnb. So Airbnb transformed travel by turning spare rooms and couches into a global hospitality network. So they basically really transformed the hotel, or actually disrupted the hotel industry. And as of early 2025, airbnb is valued at about $80 billion. So not bad.
Brian studied design, not computer science, and basically the founding story is that it's 2008. And he and his roommate were broke. They had no money and they didn't have enough cash to cover their rent, and so they thought, okay, how are we going to do this? We need some cash pronto. And so they rented out an air mattress in their apartment for a design conference in San Francisco, and they basically got some money to pay their rent. Then their other broke. Friends were like, oh, this is a really good idea, can you help us do the same thing? And eventually this became the tech behemoth that is Airbnb. And Brian Chesky was not the technical builder, but he did have a technical co-founder. So I think you know this is important to see that Chesky's gift of design and storytelling and building trust was mixed with technology Whenever. I really do actually recommend that you listen to some podcast episodes with Branschewski. I remember there was one on a show called Lenny's Podcast with Branschewski, which is really good, and you will really see that he is a design and a product leader, so he's really focused on.
Okay, when a person gets onto our app or onto our site, what is their experience like? What are they feeling? How can we make this better? How can we make this easier? How can we make this more trustworthy? And this is basically what good, talented designers do, and this is what I want you to see. Is that actually, you know you could have amazing engineering, but if you don't have good design, it's just not going to work.
And so Brian said, if we try to think of a good idea, we wouldn't have been able to think of a good idea. You just have to solve a problem in your own life. To think of a good idea, you just have to solve a problem in your own life, and I think this is why the most successful founders tend to have life experience and work experience. So I know that in the press we hear about all of these 20-year-old dropouts from wherever who started a company has gone really bad. So these are anomalies. That's not actually statistically what's most likely to be successful. So the people who are most likely to be successful as founders are people in their 40s. So I think it's late 30s to 40s. And it makes sense, right? Because, as Brian says, if you're just sitting there trying to think of ideas, you're probably not going to come out with anything good. But if you actually look at the problems that you're solving at work, at the problems that you're solving at home, you know, in your relationships, then you can start seeing, okay, where are the problems and where are the problems that actually people are willing to pay to solve. This is why people with experience tend to have ideas that are actually more thought out and also they have the network to build something successful and get their first, customers get their first investors.
Okay, last but not least, let's go to the number four spot. The number four spot in our list today goes to Katrina Lake, the founder of Stitch Fix. So, stitch Fix, they are an e-commerce company and they basically do e-commerce in really, really novel ways. So you go on their app or on their website and you fill out a quiz about your size, but also about your preferences and your lifestyle and what kind of styles you like, and you know how you actually live your life and do you work from home, do you need to go to an office, do you need to wear a suit and so on and then, based on your preferences, you basically receive a box full of clothes which has been curated by a stylist, and then you basically choose the stuff that you want and you give back the stuff that you don't. And to do this, obviously they can't just have only human stylists working on this. They have to use AI and data science and blend that with human stylists, and I did an episode on them and how they basically curate the human side and the AI side. I did that a while ago and we're going to post a link in the show notes, so if you're interested in how AI and people work together to create a really really good business model, basically listen to that. Anyway, stitch Fix is valued at about $700 million as of today.
And Katrina Lake? She studied economics and then she got her MBA, so she's not a technical person. She actually has a background closer to mine. So she was not a coder, she was a management consultant, and I think what's most important is that she liked clothes and she genuinely liked shopping, and this is different to, you know, most of the tech bros that we hear about, because most tech bros they do not like clothes, they do not like shopping. Look at what they wear, you can tell. So no wonder that Katrina Lake could create something that they could not.
So Katrina Lake took Stitch Fix public in 2017. She became the youngest woman to lead a company through an IPO, which is amazing and then she became one of the richest self-made women in America. And then she became one of the richest self-made women in America, and I think that is really amazing. And she says every time I felt a little bit of doubt. All I had to do was talk to our customers, and that inherently gave me so much conviction along the way, and this is honestly really good practice for you to follow, because you're going to get lots and lots of opinions from investors, from your friends, from colleagues, from advisors, from industry experts. You know you'll be bombarded with opinion and quite often there'll be conflicting opinions, but none of those opinions matter. The opinions that matter are your customers' opinions, because your customers are your bosses and nobody else. So talk to your customers, because by talking to them you will really be able to set the direction of your business.
So these are the four that I wanted to tell you about today. There are lots and lots more examples of really successful non-technical founders, but I'm assuming you've got things to do successful non-technical founders, but I'm assuming you've got things to do, so we're not going to be here all day. So, as I said, today, you have heard about the people who have already made it. Next week you're going to hear about the people who are on their way. So you're going to hear from Tech for Non-Techies alumni about how they're building their businesses as non-technical founders and you're going to hear the advice that they have to share with you right from the trenches, because they're in that building process right now. And if you're a non-technical founder, which I'm assuming you are because you've listened so far.
Do not forget to join next week's free class online called Build a Startup Without Learning to Code. This is the exact class that you need if you want to become a case study of how a non-technical founder has built a tech venture. So the link to sign up is in the show notes, or just go to techphanomtechiesco forward slash free class. That's techphanomtechiesco. Forward slash free class. That's techphilontechiesedu. Forward slash free class. And on that note, have a wonderful day and I shall be back in your delightful smart ears next week. Ciao.
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