Honestly, the story doesn't add up. Unless I misinterpreted the article, the Simon Incident happened so fast that there's no way that the company had more than a few weeks of operational budget in the bank when it started working with Simon.

What I learned when I tried to run a startup is that some people just live in their imaginations when they try to run a business. It's easy in software, because, in a way, software is living in one's imagination.

I think the company was more desperate than the article lets on.

Hi, We have taken responsibility for what went on. Simon was not the cause of the downfall of the business. The fact that we could not monetise and didn't have a commercial business was not his fault. We have said that to each of our investors in person. We have still maintained a good relationship with all of them and they were involved in our board meetings around this (as they have all of our board meetings) right the way through the business.

The reason I wrote the article is not to say I didn't do anything wrong - obviously we were terribly naive in many aspects of the business and far too trusting. I didn't expect this many people to read it, I thought my friends would read it locally and be forewarned about getting involved (I only posted it on facebook to my friends). Turns out it got more attention