Ask HN: Has anyone tried alternative company models (like a co-op) for SaaS?

Hacker News Discussion ↗

Types of Alternative Structures Mentioned

  • Worker cooperatives: tech worker coops, a residential trash collection coop, local hosting providers; “no distinction between worker and owner,” often equal revenue distribution, little or no equity.
  • Consumer/customer cooperatives: grocery and outdoor retailers, credit unions, farm CSAs, banking/payment networks, and proposals for customer-owned SaaS (email, infra, publishing tools).
  • Hybrid / multi-stakeholder models: suggestions like split ownership between employees and customers, or generalized “fair shares commons” structures that represent multiple stakeholder groups.
  • Conventional entities with alternative purpose: standard corp or LLC whose shares are held by a foundation, coop, or SPV; profit-sharing LLCs where contributors get profit interests without governance power.

Customer- and Worker-Owned SaaS Ideas

  • Several people are experimenting with or have tried customer-owned or coop-like SaaS (hosting, email, dev infra, publishing platforms).
  • Advocates see it as a way to align user, worker, and product interests, avoid “enshittification,” and sustain open source.
  • Skeptics question whether disconnected SaaS users will accept membership/ownership complexity versus simple subscriptions.

Equity, Profit Sharing, and Governance

  • Equity alone may not ensure real ownership; voting rights and transparency over salaries/benefits matter.
  • Profit-sharing interests are seen as fair and motivating when founders are not aiming for hyper-growth or exit.
  • Dynamic/”fluid” equity and “exit to community” models are mentioned as ways to recognize contributions and eventually hand ownership to users/workers.

Legal, Capital, and Practical Challenges

  • Coops face issues with capitalization, bespoke legal work, and lack of turnkey “Stripe Atlas for coops.”
  • Governance, bylaws, and firing/discipline mechanisms are hard; DAOs are cited as promising but currently overhead-heavy.
  • Investment starvation and reluctance to modernize infrastructure are seen as common coop failure modes.

Perceived Benefits and Motivations

  • Desire for economic democracy, less exploitative ownership structures, stable long-term products, and resistance to hostile acquisitions.
  • Some argue a simple, non-greedy traditional company with fair pay and bonuses can achieve much of the intended “compassion” with less complexity.

Overall Tone

  • Strong enthusiasm for experimentation and many concrete resources/examples.
  • Simultaneous skepticism about scalability, governance complexity, and whether most customers actually want ownership rather than convenience.