From research paper to a tech startup - help!

Hi!

I'm a CS master student that loves being creative. I’ve always wanted to start a business. I have gotten offers to join other startups when I took my bachelors, but personally I never believed in the startups, so I’ve always ended up politely declining on any startup offers. But my master thesis idea is very intriguing. However, I still feel very lost. I can’t even think of any good company names, or where I would even find enthusiastic co founders. 

My master thesis as an AI startup with large potential. As of today, I have not started on the product itself. I will write a paper on the product, and finish the thesis in August 2026. My supervisor suggested that this is a good startup idea, and has a large market potential. I want to try. I’ve written about my goals, milestones, and some questions. Feel free to help me in any way, by answering my questions below.

Goal: 

• Learn about startups and non-technical part of it (business, finance, sales, etc) (I'm clueless here)
• Build the business part time
• Try and fail

Milestones

1. Complete my paper on the product
2. Create MVP for customers to test
3. Validate idea and check market
4. Find company name, acquire domain and launch SaaS 
5. Get feedback, do networking and improve the product
6. Join a Startup Lab and find Cofounders. The following roles would need to be filled 
   1. CEO (Me, Vision and tech expert)
   2. COO (Business strategy, operations, and scaling.), 
   3. CMO (marketing and sales responsible, working to acquire new business)
   4. CPO (Product design, user experience, and frontend development) 
7. Formally create the company, divide shares, hold weekend work meeting, pick company name (again)
8. Goal: create product for an industry (the product can be tailored to different industries) and get the first clients. Work that needs to be done:
   1. Tech: Create the product for the industry 
   2. COO: pitching competitions, define the sales pitch, and how to price the product
   3. CMO: find out how marketing should be done, and what companies to contact for demo
   4. CMO: design company logo, design web page for business usage, create front page of the website 
9. Growth + Profits

Questions

1. Between now, and until I have the working demo, what should I do with my time? I have courses where I learn technical skills for the company. It does not make sense to create the website for the product, when I don't know how the user would interact with the product. 
2. Should I start the company even before the product is made? (While I'm a student and working on the paper)
3. How can I acquire non-technical skills for running a business? I prefer reading books.
4. How can I learn about software companies (practical skills)? For example:
   1. How to lower hosting costs? 
   2. How to price a product for customers and a product for business? (Software contracts)
   3. How to guarantee  privacy when it comes to business documents? 
5. I’m planning on searching for co-founders, after I have validated the idea myself. Should I instead find co founders before I have even created the product? (with no guarantee that there would even be a product?)
6. Should I try to make the product without co-founders? (This is my first startup, so it might tank within the first few months)
7. Any experience with starting a software business while working full time?

Thank you for all the help!