Bound by a non-compete, and offers to work at a competitor startup

I recently had to layoff everyone on my consumer SaaS travel metasearch startup because we ran out of funds to continue as a team of 3 (2 other engineers, and me being also a tech founder). I was talking to a bunch of ppl about our problems and word got out that we were shutting down and and suddenly a bunch of companies from the same industry started calling me to ‘acquire’ us, but in reality it was mostly unserious calls just to fish intel as much as possible.

For the serious callers, they all concluded that they needed to hire me, as I am a key hire for them to raise their next round. Turns out, acquiring wasn’t an option for them because it’s too much work if all they want is me.

There’s a reason why we were the leaders in the industry in terms of product and the other competitors were copying every move we make. That said, we lacked in sales and marketing which is what killed us.

Take note that we have 2 angel investors for the company and I want to maintain a good relationship with them, and they want a stake or some sort of ROI for my next move. I don’t mind doing this, but things get really complicated with the legal aspect of me getting hired esp since I’m behind a non-compete. The shareholders can release the non-compete if I get bought out as a package so they can get something out of it but the buyers are trying to avoid that.

I’ve also recently started working on a new startup on the side since the beginning of April, and even though it didn’t get accepted in the last YC cohort applications, the new company has been receiving some decent traction lately and my previous investors want a stake of that for no cost if I don’t end up selling the old company. Bare in mind that I did use some of the assets that the old company had, to build this new company (I had no choice since the I don’t own ‘my’ laptop).

So I’m left with a couple of choices:

– Either refuse any offer to ‘sell’ my previous business and build my new startup while giving up equity to previous investors (again I don’t mind doing that, and they could add value in the future with connections, etc., though they are not ‘smart investors’ meaning they haven’t invested in the same industry before. The problem with this choice is that my parents are tired of me staying at home freeloading and not pursuing a job or finishing my CS degree (I am 22), and who knows when we’ll have enough traction to be seed stage ready to build this with less personal pressure.

– Or, get hired, find a way to give my employee option stock to investors and continue to build my startup on the side without personal issues. The only problem with that is that the acquiring company might want a piece of that meat or think I’m not focused enough into their own vision by building something else. In fact this new company is kinda a branch of my old company is going to be considered a competitor.

What do?