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Tax shelters would be my initial guess.

I should clarify that the goal is not tax optimization but rather being able to focus on getting product market fit instead of spending time "managing" the company.

Typically low “managing” overheads is an additional perk of the tax havens.

This is what I had in mind too.

Yes, but besides Cayman I don’t think investors would really be happy to invest in tax havens. Also you normally run into issues with substance requirements, opening bank accounts, bad reputation of the jurisdictions and of course tax authorities that will immediately question and investigate your setup.

From doing a lot of research I get that the general recommendation is to avoid tax havens (at least the obvious, shady ones - US, Ireland, Netherlands etc. are of course fine).

If you want investors then incorporate in the US, as the cheapest money by far is in the US and they prefer to invest locally. If that’s how your funding the company then it’s probably the dominate concern.

It really depends on how you want to grow. If you’re bootstrapping on profits then tax implications can become very important. You can have a subsidiary in ‘non shady’ jurisdictions for any squeamish customers.

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