Re: IPO? Investor? Sell the business? or what?

I tend to agree with both John and Mike.  If you think the "you don't have a
business" message is too harsh, welcome to the business world.

I'm not sure what you mean by "take it to another level."  I think (from the
rest of your post) that you want to hire other programmers to do the work. 
And, I assume that means you'll do the marketing, business development, sales,
billing, collecting, and cash management (just as you are now).  The only thing
is, you'll be adding project management, supervision, and quality control for
the programming that you're doing now.

You're facing the same problems that all of us outsourced labor types
have...cloning isn't available yet.

Write a business plan.  Use your experience as a selling point.  Include a good
amount of salary for the new-hires as a start-up expense, then go sell the
plan.  Anyone who gives you money is going to want a certain amount of say-so
in the business.  Maybe you can structure some sort of "trip wires" in the
agreement, where you keep control as long as you're making money, but have to
give some up if the business starts to slip.

You're not big enough for an IPO, and you don't have any assets to base it on
anyway.  Same for selling the business.  So, looks like you're stuck with
investors.  Perhaps you could find a programmer to "partner" with as a
half-step.

Anyway,  good luck!!

Terry Ballinger
DTech Consulting, Inc.

"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."  -
Arthur C. Clarke