AITAH for having a fallout with my friends over our start up?
Me(21) and my college friends(all 21) set up a start up, under incubation with our college, which funds everything, we started this in April 2025, we started strong, but as time went by, they started working less and eventually not at all, i repeatedly informed them about it, that i was the only one working, while they left everything on my shoulders and since college was paying for everything and i was the team lead, i was responsible for answering them and as work slowed i got put under alot of pressure and had to take alot of the grunt from my project incharge(college faculty)
We had divided responsibilities and i informed my team that if they were unable to complete the work, to let me know beforehand so I can reassign it or do it myself, but they always informed me they would do it and I would end of doing it myself as we were past the deadlines, this was a recurring experience.
I couldnt take it anymore so I removed all of my friends and made a new team of people who i knew were capable and enthusiastic; after which me and my best friend(co founder M21) had a major falling out in december 2025 as the college threated to pull the plug, after exchanging alot of heated words, he acknowledged his mistakes and told me we will shall begin again, I refused and told him to never talk to me again in the heat of the moment and something i regret, he was the main reason for the delays, for example, he took more than 3 weeks to complete a single task which another guy finished it in less than 7 hours, his job was drafting a bill for procurement of equipment(i had already given a draft copy of the tools and all he had to do was find the links of them, calculate total amount and format a bill),without which the entire project had come to a standstill. He’s always late for any of our meetings or work hours, im not exaggerating when I say he was not once on time, and it wasn’t 5-20mins, it was 1 or 2 hours, and when we have critical meetings with our HOD or dean or industry experts, we would end up such that, they were waiting for my co founder to come.
We started this company only to sell its IP and go on different paths in our career and we wanted to leave our mark in the college; we all come from a middle class background, need stable jobs and cant rely on a start up in our early years for our families.
And when I got a job abroad, he congratulated me through text a week after everyone wished me and I out of ego replied with a blande “thanks”
Because of our fallout the entire group broke apart, should I apologise and intiate a conversation since i will be leaving the country in a few months or did I cut off the wrong people?
