Atrie

The problem

Founders and operators often struggled to explain why company metrics had changed because the underlying customer, sales, and product information was fragmented across different tools.

The approach

I ran discovery, narrowed the problem, and built a working pre-MVP that connected CRM and product analytics data, computed metrics, and generated AI-assisted explanations of what was changing in the business.

How it worked

The product was intended to connect company data at the level of individual customers and deals, then help an operator move from a changed metric to the entities and actions behind it. I built the pre-MVP in roughly two months and used live demonstrations to test the proposition.

Key decisions

• Move from a broad company-visibility problem toward entity-level explanations of business changes.
• Test a horizontal product for early-stage teams before committing to a narrower vertical.
• Stop before fundraising after deciding not to continue as a solo founder.

Outcome

I stopped work before fundraising in November 2025. Atrie did not reach repeatable product use, paying customers, or a committed founding team. It was a serious attempt, but not a validated business.

What I learned

The deeper problem was not simply the absence of a technical co-founder. I had chosen a technically demanding product without either the technical ownership or sufficiently strong market evidence to overcome that constraint. A future attempt should begin in a market where I have a clearer right to win, test willingness to pay earlier, and distinguish interest from committed use.