I left my Head of Engineering role at a startup after 20 years in IT to build my own AI company in Melbourne. Here's what nobody tells you about that transition.
I spent two decades in IT, the last stretch as Head of Engineering at a startup. Good team, interesting problems, all of it. Then I walked away to build Avataari, an AI platform that helps people preserve their life stories and wisdom as interactive legacies their families can talk to.
That was about a year ago. Here is what I did not expect.
**The identity shift is the hardest part.**
- When you have a title, people know how to place you. "Head of Engineering" is a clean answer to "what do you do?" "I'm building my own AI startup" gets a much slower nod. Especially in Melbourne, where the startup ecosystem is real but still not the default story people tell about their careers.
- The first three months I kept second-guessing whether this was the right move. Not because the product was struggling. The absence of external validation is just disorienting when you've had it for twenty years.
**Building solo changes how you think about everything.**
- Every decision sits with you. Pricing, architecture, positioning, customer conversations, support. There is no committee and no one to approve your direction. This is genuinely liberating and genuinely terrifying at the same time. Some weeks I move faster than any team I've led. Other weeks I talk myself in circles for three days about a button label.
**The Australian market is a validation challenge, not a growth engine.**
- Australia has sophisticated, thoughtful early adopters. But the category I'm in, personal AI and family legacy, is more emotionally resonant in North American and South Asian markets right now. I am building for global from day one, which means learning how to sell remotely into markets I don't live in.
**What's actually working:**
- The product is live at avataari.ai. Text and voice conversations with your AI avatar, guided story capture, family sharing, privacy controls. Free to start.
- The thing that surprised me most is the emotional weight of this product. People cry recording their first story. I did not design for that. It happened anyway.
Happy to answer questions about the transition from engineering leadership to founder, building in the AI space from Australia, or anything else. This community has been a good sounding board and I want to give back.