The key piece to that is creativity. I've encountered a fair few people who basically just have the sales nous and the cash, like the Silicon Valley version of "I've got an idea for an app," but the money isn't put to good use in building an effective team and you essentially have to bring all of the vision, direction and creativity to the table so the founder can take the credit and cash out on it all a few years later.

The other side of that is when the startup struggles, it's the product and eng team's fault and not the founder's. This is fine if it's clear up-front that they're just bankrolling the op and not actually leading it.