More entrepreneurs than ever are building companies without hiring anyone, and these numbers prove it. Carta, a platform used by many startups to manage their schedules and track ownership, reports that the share of new startups started by a single founder has increased from 23.7 percent in 2019 to 36.3 percent by mid-2025, meaning that more than one in three new companies will now start life with just one person at the helm.
The Small Business Administration puts a similar figure on the broader economy, reporting that more than 80% of small businesses in the United States have no employees at all. A few years ago, running solo meant drowning in admin. Now this basically means choosing the right systems.
Why solo is not meant to be isolated
Solo founders rarely do everything with their own hands. Many quietly build a network of contractors and software that fills the gaps that traditional recruiting typically fills.
Contractor custom
In its 2025 New Business Formation study, payroll and HR software company Gusto found that one in three sole proprietors hired at least one contractor in 2024, and more than half of them plan to expand their contractor base in 2025.
This pattern appears continuously. A solo founder can hire a designer for a week, an accountant for a quarter, or a lawyer to review one contract. None of them require a payroll group, benefits package, or HR file. It just requires a system to pay people and sign documents quickly, without anyone losing speed waiting for approval.
Get paid without a finance department
Payments are usually the first thing a self-employed person automates, because cash flow problems happen faster than any other. Instead of manually chasing invoices, many rely on payment platforms that automatically manage recurring billing, late reminders and tax documents.
According to Gusto, 77 percent of sole proprietors are profitable in their first year, compared to 54 percent of businesses with employees. This number shows that solo operators not only survive; they run lean operations that turn revenue into profit faster because there are very few overhead costs to cover.
Agreements and documents on autopilot
Document handling is where many solopreneurs waste afternoons chasing signatures via email or printing out documents to scan. That friction is largely gone. Today, most customers know How to add a digital signature to Word iphone and expect the same from contractors. A signed deal that takes three days of back-and-forth can now happen before someone has even finished a cup of coffee — and that’s now the standard for all spaces, not just technology.
Sign documents from anywhere
The same logic applies to onboarding new contractors, submitting NDAs, or finalizing vendor terms. Solo founders tend to standardize on a few document templates, then reuse them for each new client or hire instead of designing from scratch each time. Multiple systems are repeated in nearly every solo operation, regardless of industry.
- Payment processing: Automated invoicing and recurring billing instead of manually tracking late payments.
- Contract templates: Reusable contracts reduce project preparation time to minutes instead of hours.
- Digital signatures: Verification is done without printing or scanning anything on your phone or laptop.
- Automation of accounting: Expense tracking and tax categorization run in the background instead of year-end collections.
None of these tools replaces an individual team, but taken together, they eliminate most of the reasons a founder needs one.
The true cost of staying small
The first rent arrears will be paid on a prorated basis. Carta’s data shows the expectations of solo founders an average of 399 days before their first hire, founders who start out with a partner take an average of 480 days, giving solo operators more time to generate income before hitting the payroll.
This space is added. A founder who waits an extra four months before his first hire gets four more months of runway, four more months to prove the business model works, and four more months in his pocket instead of covering the revenue salary.
However, most solo operators eventually reach a point where automation is no longer enough and the first hire becomes expensive.
That leaves solo founders today
None of this is to say that solo founders avoid complexity; they manage it differently. Contracts still need to be signed, invoices still need to be sent, and customers expect a fast and professional process, no matter how many people are behind the business. Founders who make it through the one-person phase are usually the ones who built clean systems early on, not the ones who tried to run everything manually for as long as possible.
