There is a version of Indiemaker that made sense in 2015. A version that made more sense in 2019. And the version that exists now, in 2026, that is perhaps the most defensible of all – not because the idea got better, but because the world got more legible around it.
Three things have converged.
The first is the sheer volume of digital assets in existence. The creator economy, micro-SaaS, mobile apps, niche newsletters, AI tools built in a weekend – the internet has spent fifteen years producing small, often profitable, often under-monetised digital things. Most of them were never built with an exit in mind. That doesn't mean they can't have one.
The second is AI. Not as a product feature, but as an infrastructure shift. A single person can now operate what used to require a team. The cost of building has dropped. The number of people building independently has risen. And when more people build, more people eventually need to sell – or want to acquire without taking on a large organisation. The supply side of micro-liquidity was already growing. AI has accelerated it by an order of magnitude.
The third is cultural. Ownership is being reconsidered. Not in a political sense – in a practical one. The people who came of age watching platforms collapse user bases, algorithms punish creators, and employers offshore entire functions have drawn a conclusion: the asset is safer than the salary. A profitable niche SaaS is safer than a job. A newsletter you own outright is safer than a platform you publish on. That instinct is correct, and it's spreading.
What's been missing is a place to make these transfers happen cleanly – better discovery, cleaner listings, less friction on both sides. Small exits deserve to be taken seriously.
The market for micro-exits isn't emerging. It already exists. It's just been underserved.
We're taking them seriously. And the timing, finally, makes it obvious.
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