The CEO and two top executives of OH.io, a Columbus-based AI and revenue-as-a-service venture, say they were abruptly shown the door and have now fired back with a lawsuit that names co-founder Ratmir Timashev. The legal fight is a sharp twist for a project publicly sold as a big bet on Columbus’s tech future, and it is already raising uncomfortable questions about who really calls the shots in one of the city’s most closely watched founder-backed experiments.
According to reporting in Columbus Business First, CEO Jeff Schumann and two senior leaders were terminated, then responded by filing suit that names Timashev as a defendant. The piece by reporter Carrie Ghose walks through the timeline and identifies the parties involved. At this point, the court complaint is the central public document that lays out the dispute.
Background on the venture
OH.io launched this year as a Timashev-funded push to recruit United States-based sales and go-to-market teams for dozens of B2B AI and software startups, with those teams based in Columbus. As detailed by Ohio Tech News, Timashev had been described as the sole funder of the initiative, and Schumann pitched the project as a way to help founders "realize the American dream."
On its homepage, OH.io says it embeds full-time, payroll-based commercial teams inside portfolio companies and is building a flagship Columbus hub it brands as "The Grid." According to OH.io, the long-term vision is to scale those embedded teams across dozens of startups as part of a multi-year rollout.
Why this matters for Columbus
OH.io’s public roadmap has included a multi-year goal of attaching to as many as 100 startups and recruiting hundreds, potentially thousands, of sales and operations hires into the region. Local economic development partners have pointed to that plan as a possible jobs engine. The lawsuit now hangs over that story, creating uncertainty around the pace of hiring, the stability of partnerships and the ability to market Columbus as a reliable commercial launchpad just as the venture was ramping up.
Legal questions ahead
The case could turn on written employment and governance agreements, the authority of a sole funder in a private venture and how compensation or equity promises were documented. Reporting in Columbus Business First remains the earliest public look at the filing. The complaint and any formal responses are expected to be the clearest record of what the plaintiffs are alleging and what specific relief they are seeking. As with many disputes inside founder-funded, founder-led operations, how a court views the matter is likely to depend heavily on contracts and governance documents rather than informal understandings or expectations.
This story is still developing. Court records, public statements from the parties and any reaction from local partners will reveal how disruptive the clash becomes for OH.io’s hiring plans and programming. We will update as new filings and official comments surface.
