Build an App with AI: A Founder's Journey with Claude Code

8/10/2025

From Zero to Deployed: How One Founder Turned $1,000 & a Dream into a Real App with Claude Code

It’s a story we hear all the time, right? The brilliant, non-technical founder with a game-changing idea, stopped dead in their tracks by one massive hurdle: they can’t code. For years, the only paths forward were to either spend a fortune on developers or dedicate months, even years, to a coding bootcamp, all while your startup idea gathers dust. It’s a frustrating, often soul-crushing experience.

But what if that narrative is starting to change? What if you could go from a simple idea to a revenue-generating app, not in years, but in months? And not for tens of thousands of dollars, but for less than the price of a new laptop?

Honestly, it sounds like pure hype, but it’s happening. I recently stumbled upon the story of a founder, William Roberts, who did just that. Four months ago, he couldn't write a single line of code. Last week, he crossed the $1,000 revenue mark with an app he built almost entirely with the help of an AI coding assistant. It’s a pretty incredible journey that signals a massive shift in what it means to be a "technical" founder in the age of AI.

This isn't just about one person's success. It's a roadmap. It's proof that the barrier to entry for building and launching a software product has been radically lowered. So, let's break down exactly how he did it, what tools he used, where the money went, & what this means for other aspiring entrepreneurs.

The Problem: A Real-World Need He Understood

Every successful product starts with a real problem, & VCEHub was no different. This wasn't some random shot in the dark. The founder, a former VCE student himself, knew the pain point intimately: students needed study materials that were perfectly aligned with the current curriculum, all consolidated in one easy-to-access place.

This is such a critical first step. He wasn't trying to build the next Facebook. He was solving a niche problem he had personally experienced. This gave him a HUGE advantage. He didn't need to spend months on market research or customer interviews to understand the user. He was the user. He knew what features would be genuinely useful & what would be fluff.

This is a lesson for any founder, technical or not. Before you even think about code or AI, ask yourself: What problem am I solving? Do I understand it deeply? Have I lived it? That insider knowledge is your greatest asset.

The Toolkit: Leaning on AI for the Heavy Lifting

Here’s where things get interesting. Instead of hiring a freelance developer or enrolling in a coding bootcamp, Roberts turned to AI, specifically Anthropic's Claude Code.

Now, if you haven't been following the AI space closely, you might be thinking of simple chatbots. But tools like Claude Code are on a completely different level. They are what's known as "agentic" coding AIs. This means they don't just suggest snippets of code; they can help plan, edit, debug, & even manage entire projects. You describe what you want in plain English, & the AI does the heavy lifting of writing the actual code.

For someone starting from scratch, this is a total game-changer. The founder of Claude Code at Anthropic, Boris Cherny, revealed that it started as an internal productivity tool before becoming a massive success. It’s designed to be a true collaborator. You work with the AI.

The initial investment for VCEHub was shockingly low. Here's the breakdown:

Claude Pro Max: $200/month
Apple Developer Account: $99/year
Domain: $12/year

That’s it. For about $31 a month (plus the initial developer account fee), he had his core development environment. No massive startup costs. No equity given away. Just a few subscription fees.

The Process: From MVP to First Paying Customer

The timeline here is what will blow most people's minds. This wasn't a year-long slog. It was a rapid, iterative process that focused on getting a product into the hands of real users as quickly as possible.

Day 1-3: Building the Minimum Viable Product (MVP) Using Claude, the founder built the first version of the app in just three days. The goal of an MVP isn't to be perfect. It's to be viable. It needs to do the one core thing your app promises, & do it well enough to get feedback. He focused on the essential feature: providing up-to-date study materials.

Week 1: Launching & Validating He launched a free version of the app to see if anyone would actually use it. The results were immediate & promising:

50 downloads on the first day.
An 87% retention rate after one week.
Users were already asking for more features.

This early validation is EVERYTHING. It’s the signal you need to keep going. It proves you're on the right track & that people find your solution valuable.

Week 2: Adding Premium Features With validation in hand, it was time to think about monetization. He used Claude to build out the features that would sit behind a paywall:

An AI-powered study assistant.
Progress analytics.
A practice exam generator.
Offline access.

Here’s an example of a prompt he used to implement the paywall, which shows how you can interact with the AI in natural language:

"Implement a subscription paywall in my iOS app using RevenueCat. ... - Family sharing support. Include all code, configuration, and App Store Connect setup instructions."

Think about that for a second. He didn't need to become an expert in Apple's complex payment systems or the RevenueCat SDK. He just needed to know what to ask for.

Week 3: The First Dollar Then came the magic moment: the first paying customer. Someone subscribed for $9.99/month, specifically for the AI assistant feature. That first dollar is more than just money. As the founder put it, "The app was capable of making money from day 1. I just didn't believe it was." It’s the ultimate validation. It's proof that you've created something of value that someone is willing to pay for.

The First Few Months: Scaling Up From there, the growth was steady:

Day 23: Hit $100 in Monthly Recurring Revenue (MRR).
Month 2: Reached $500 in MRR.
Month 3.5: Crossed the $1,000 total revenue milestone.

This journey from zero to $1,000 wasn't about getting lucky. It was about a smart, methodical approach: solve a real problem, build a lean MVP, validate with a free version, listen to users, & then build premium features they're willing to pay for.

The "Why" Behind Claude Code: A New Way of Building

It's worth taking a moment to understand why tools like Claude Code are so effective for this kind of project. Many of these new AI coding tools run in the terminal or as extensions in your code editor (like VS Code). This might seem intimidating for a beginner, but there's a good reason for it.

The creators are focusing on building the simplest possible interface to the AI model itself. The AI models are advancing so rapidly that any complex user interface they build would be quickly outdated. By keeping the interface simple—a command line or a text file—they allow developers (or in this case, founders) to feel the raw power of the model directly.

Another fascinating feature is the concept of a shared memory. Claude Code can use a simple text file (often called

claude.md

) in your project's folder to store context & "memories" about the project. When you share this file with your team (or just keep it for yourself), the AI remembers past conversations & decisions. This creates a living knowledge base for the project, making the AI smarter & more helpful over time. It's a simple yet incredibly powerful idea.

The Human Element: It's Not All AI Magic

Now, it would be easy to read this story & think that the AI did all the work. But that's not the case. The founder's success was a partnership between human insight & AI execution.

The AI can write the code, but it can't tell you what to build. It can't identify the customer's pain point. It can't decide on a pricing strategy or a marketing plan. That all came from the founder.

He also had to learn the basics of how to work with the tool. In one YouTube tutorial about building a TV show explorer app with Claude Code, the creator emphasizes the importance of setting up your project folders correctly & how to interact with the AI through the command line. You don't need to become a senior engineer, but you do need to be comfortable with the fundamentals of managing files & running commands.

This is where many aspiring founders get stuck. As one Reddit user on r/startups put it, trying to become a "technical founder" by grinding through tutorials can be a brutal, soul-crushing experience. The key, he found, was to stop chasing tutorials & focus on building one real project—his actual product. He used AI tools like Claude & ChatGPT as "rubber duck debuggers with memory," helping him get unstuck & review his work.

This is the new skill set for the modern founder: not necessarily writing perfect code, but knowing how to effectively prompt, guide, & collaborate with an AI to bring your vision to life.

What About Customer Support & Engagement?

Once you have an app that people are paying for, you have customers. And customers have questions. This is another area where AI can be a solo founder's best friend. While the VCEHub story doesn't go into detail on this, it's the natural next step.

Imagine having dozens, then hundreds of users. You can't possibly answer every question yourself, especially not instantly. This is where tools like Arsturn come into the picture. A founder could easily use a no-code platform like Arsturn to build a custom AI chatbot trained on their own data—like FAQs, app documentation, & study guides.

This bot could be embedded right into the VCEHub app or on its landing page. When a student has a question about a subscription, a feature, or a specific piece of study material, the AI could provide an instant, accurate answer, 24/7. This frees up the founder to focus on bigger things, like developing new features or marketing the app. It's a seamless way to provide amazing customer support without hiring a team.

Furthermore, a tool like Arsturn could also be used to proactively engage users. The chatbot could ask new users what subjects they're studying & then provide personalized recommendations, creating a more meaningful connection with the audience from the very beginning. For a small operation, this kind of automated, personalized engagement is GOLD.

The Broader Implications: A New Dawn for Entrepreneurs

So, what does this all mean?

The "Technical Barrier" is Crumbling: The idea that you need a computer science degree to build a tech company is becoming obsolete. With AI assistants, the focus shifts from writing syntax to product vision, user empathy, & creative problem-solving.
Speed to Market is Accelerating: What used to take a year can now be prototyped in a weekend & launched in a few weeks. This allows for rapid validation of ideas. You can test a concept in the real market without betting the farm on it.
Leaner Startups are Possible: The VCEHub example shows that you can get to revenue with incredibly low overhead. This democratizes entrepreneurship, making it accessible to anyone with a good idea & the drive to see it through, regardless of their financial backing.
The Rise of the "AI-Augmented Founder": The most successful entrepreneurs of the next decade won't necessarily be the best coders. They'll be the best collaborators with AI. They'll be masters of prompting, guiding, & leveraging AI to build, launch, & scale their visions faster & more efficiently than ever before.

Of course, it’s not a magic bullet. You still need a great idea. You still need to understand your customer. You still need to market your product & build a business around it. But the single biggest bottleneck—the actual creation of the product—is now more accessible than it has ever been.

The story of VCEHub is more than just an inspiring anecdote. It's a practical, replicable blueprint for a new generation of founders. It's a sign that we're moving from an era of "learning to code" to an era of "learning to build," with AI as our tireless, infinitely patient partner.

Hope this was helpful & gives you a sense of what's possible now. It’s a pretty exciting time to be building things. Let me know what you think.