Notes
Field notes on building software companies.
What we've learned building and running companies — strategy, culture, investing, and product.
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AI Coding Agents in Production: What Actually Works in 2026
After a year of shipping real products with AI coding agents, here is where they excel, where they fail, and the guardrails that make them reliable.
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- Strategy6 min read
The Metrics We Actually Watch (and the Ones We Ignore)
Most dashboards measure activity, not health. The handful of numbers we check across every product, and why vanity metrics get no screen time.
Sep 3, 2026 - Technology8 min read
One Auth, One Billing, One Email: Shared Infrastructure Across a Product Portfolio
Running many products only works if the undifferentiated parts are built once. How we share auth, billing, email, and observability — and where sharing goes wrong.
Sep 1, 2026 - Growth7 min read
Getting the First 100 Customers: What Worked Across Our Portfolio
The first hundred customers never come from a scalable channel. The unglamorous tactics that got our products off zero, and the ones that wasted our time.
Aug 27, 2026 - Product7 min read
Web First, Mobile Second: When an Indie Product Deserves a Native App
Native apps cost more than they look, and most indie products do not need one. The three signals that tell us a product has earned an app store listing.
Aug 25, 2026 - Productivity6 min read
Managing Context Switching When You Run Multiple Products
Context switching is the hidden tax of a product portfolio. The systems we use to make switching cheap: externalized state, batching, and one-product days.
Aug 20, 2026 - Growth6 min read
Why We Build in Public (and What It Actually Does for Distribution)
Building in public is often oversold. Here is what sharing our numbers and process actually earns us — and the parts of the strategy that are myths.
Aug 18, 2026 - AI7 min read
Automating Customer Support With AI Before You Hire Anyone
How we handle support across a product portfolio with no support team: AI triage, self-serve fixes, and the escalations that still deserve a human.
Aug 15, 2026 - Entrepreneurship6 min read
How Much Does It Cost to Launch a SaaS in 2026? Our Real Numbers
A transparent breakdown of what launching a SaaS product costs our studio in 2026 — infrastructure, tools, AI, and the costs nobody itemizes.
Aug 13, 2026 - Product7 min read
From Idea to Launch in 30 Days: Inside Our Startup Studio Sprint
The 30-day sprint we use to take a validated idea to a live, paying product — week by week, including what we deliberately leave out.
Aug 11, 2026 - Growth8 min read
Programmatic SEO for Indie Products: A Practical Playbook
How small products win search traffic with programmatic SEO — picking the page pattern, clearing the quality bar, and avoiding thin-content penalties.
Aug 8, 2026 - Technology7 min read
The Solo Founder Tech Stack We Use for Every Product (2026 Edition)
The exact stack behind every FGA Labs product in 2026 — and why choosing it once, for everything, matters more than any individual tool.
Aug 6, 2026 - Entrepreneurship6 min read
Micro-SaaS Ideas Are Everywhere. Here's How We Pick Which to Build
Our filter for choosing micro-SaaS ideas worth building: markets we can reach, problems that recur, and products one person can run.
Aug 4, 2026 - Strategy7 min read
How to Validate a Startup Idea in 7 Days (Without Writing Code)
A practical one-week validation process we run before building anything: demand tests, pricing signals, and the kill criteria we set upfront.
Jul 30, 2026 - AI8 min read
Where AI Actually Saves Time (and Where It Doesn't)
An honest audit of where AI earns its keep in daily operations — and the tasks it quietly makes slower.
Jul 8, 2026 - Entrepreneurship9 min read
The One-Person Portfolio: Running Many Bets Solo
How a solo operator keeps a dozen products moving without dropping the ones that matter: let most things sleep, standardize ruthlessly, and manage attention.
Jun 24, 2026 - Productivity5 min read
Deep Work in a Notifications World
Focus is not a discipline problem when a dozen product teams are engineered to interrupt you. Guardrails that make deep work the default, not the exception.
Jun 10, 2026 - AI8 min read
Shipping Faster with AI Coding Agents
AI coding agents shift the work from typing to specifying, reviewing, and deciding. What actually changes in your workflow when an agent writes the first draft.
May 27, 2026 - Strategy7 min read
Killing a Product Without Killing Momentum
If you run many bets, you will kill many products. How to deprecate a project cleanly, harvest the lessons, and carry the momentum into the next thing.
May 13, 2026 - Growth8 min read
Distribution Is the Product: Marketing as a System
Great products do not market themselves. Why a repeatable content-and-audience engine beats another feature, and how we treat distribution as part of the spec.
Apr 29, 2026 - Productivity5 min read
The Weekly Review That Keeps Many Projects Straight
The lightweight weekly review that keeps a wide portfolio from drifting into chaos: look at everything on purpose, pick a priority, then defend the pick.
Apr 15, 2026 - AI6 min read
Prompts as Infrastructure: Treating AI Like a Teammate
Reusable prompts, house style, and context files — investing in AI the way you'd onboard a hire.
Mar 25, 2026 - Strategy6 min read
Pricing Indie Products: Charge Before You're Ready
The most common indie pricing mistake is waiting. The case for putting a price on your product early, and what charging teaches you that free users never will.
Mar 4, 2026 - Culture5 min read
Small Teams, Sharp Scope: How We Stay Lean
Staying small is a choice we make on purpose. How tight scope, few dependencies, and leverage over headcount keep the studio fast and understandable.
Feb 18, 2026 - Strategy8 min read
Building Scalable Startups: Lessons from FGA Labs
Scaling a portfolio of small companies is different from scaling one product. Lessons that held up across every launch: scale the studio, plan distribution.
Jan 15, 2024 - Culture5 min read
Creating a Strong Remote Team Culture
Remote culture is the sum of small defaults, not rituals. How we keep collaboration and momentum across time zones by writing things down and protecting focus.
Jan 10, 2024 - Investing6 min read
Our Investment Philosophy: Beyond the Numbers
We build and operate the companies we back, so our investment philosophy is really about where to spend attention. The qualitative factors behind each bet.
Jan 5, 2024 - Technology9 min read
The Future of AI in Business: What We're Betting On
Cutting through the AI noise: where emerging AI is genuinely earning its keep in business today, where it is still mostly theater, and what we are betting on.
Dec 28, 2023 - Strategy6 min read
Bootstrapped to Success: Our Journey
Bootstrapping is a set of trade-offs, not a badge of honor. What building without outside funding gains us, what it costs, and why it fits a portfolio studio.
Dec 20, 2023 - Product6 min read
Product Development: From Idea to Market
How we turn a rough idea into a shippable product: start with the smallest honest version, ship to learn, and let evidence decide what's next.
Dec 15, 2023