the problem is how to identify capable non-technical founders.

I suspect the ratio of capable non-technical and technical founders is nearer 0.1-0.5:1

any thoughts on how to identify the unicorns?

This can be a blog post, hell, may be even a book on its own.

For quick starters, look for someone who tinkered, cobbled, hacked, juggard[1] his/her way through an MVP with no-code, low-code, dump-code, Figma-ed, etc. Better yet, s/he had tried selling that idea, napkin-diagrams, to customers. Avoid anyone that smooth talks with nothing to show for (MVP/Customers/Prospects).

While talking (do this for as long as you are comfortable moving ahead), watch out if s/he can articulate and build an idea maze[2] of what his/her current thoughts are.

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jugaad

2. https://cdixon.org/2013/08/04/the-idea-maze

Watch out though because those people are often busy selling 'you' and you have to also find one with integrity and properly values your input.

Look for people who have revenue and traction, not just an idea. Some of the best non-technical Founders I've worked with:

- Built a business trip packing / iterinerary recommendation system, using just Google Sheets plugins

- Built a video transcription + recutting service in Bubble.

Each of these made five-six figures of revenue with the MVP. The Founders couldn't code, but they used every tool at their disposal to get enough $$$ to find someone who can code. True grit!

>- Built a business trip packing / iterinerary recommendation system, using just Google Sheets plugins

Hey, can you point me to this tool? I would love to use this tool.

I'd say 0.1:1 from personal experience. Often you see founders who want to build facebook-but-better type of stuff from day 1. My advice is to avoid first-time tech founders, it's very hard to coach them into adopting the lean startup mindset until they feel the pain.

Thanks for those two links. I'm in the exact same place as the OP, and would love to start something of my own, but I have only technical skills, meaning all my startup ideas are for devs, a domain that's absolutely saturated. In the best case, I would pair with someone who is a "nerd" of a different domain, but somehow I find it rather difficult to meet such people. In case you (or anyone else) know of similar programs for Europe (esp. Berlin), I would be grateful for pointers.

Meetup is still a good source for making lots of surface-level connections, here's a quick search I did: https://www.meetup.com/find/?keywords=startup&source=EVENTS&...

edit: You'll probably have more success, as I don't know the German terminology for things like 'startup' - Geschaeftsaufstellung?

Nah it's still startup, just capitalized like any other noun.

Englisch klingt so butterweich.

Another place I've seen non-technical founders looking to pair up is at https://www.indiehackers.com/