Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 17, 2009

These periods of time can leave a founder very vulnerable in the future. Assuming normal valuations at fund raising rounds you’ll be down to 6-12% after you’ve created a stock-option pool and raised capital. But these people seldom make retirement money from the stock options on these companies.

Founder Vesting 365

Founder Vesting Intellectual Property Stock Options IP 365

View from Seed

DECEMBER 4, 2014

Editor’s note: Understanding how to divide founder equity at a startup can be tricky, even to the point of reaching emotional riffs between founders. I like to say that “there are only co-founders” — it’s extraordinarily rare for a successful business to have just a sole founder.

Equity 315

Equity Founder Sweat Equity Cofounder 315

Agile VC

APRIL 17, 2011

Kayak was started here in my backyard of Boston… co-founder & CTO Paul English and the product/engineering team is based here in Concord MA. Co-founder & CEO Steve Hafner and the business team are based in Norwalk, CT. I co-founded NextView Ventures , a seed-stage VC firm based in Boston, in 2010.

Pre-Money Valuation 113

Pre-Money Valuation Liquidation Preference Dividend Common Stock 113

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 3, 2010

years ago and told me, “I just got offered the chance to buy this company because the founder doesn’t want to continue. Sometimes this involves co-CEO’s. If they raise a bunch of capital little ole you isn’t going to be around to have your option pool topped up. I promise they’re not.

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Merger Technical Review Early Stage Dilution 276

Hippoland

APRIL 10, 2016

Dear elizy : I started a company in school with two co-founders. But, Ada wants to split the equity 50% her, 20% Bob and 20% me with a 10% option pool. Although there are no set numbers, your professor should be considered as an active advisor or a co-founder who has left rather than a full-time co-founder.

Cofounder 48

Cofounder Cap Table Equity Vesting 48

Pascal's View

JULY 9, 2017

Andrew Krowne and I recently co-wrote an article in Tech Crunch , Why SAFE Notes Are Not Safe for Entrepreneurs. The CEO/founder often has leeway to influence or negotiate the cap value (especially when the headline cap is softened by a discount).

Post-Money Valuation 49

Post-Money Valuation Valuation Cap Table Covenant 49

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 5, 2015

How much is in the option pool? Well, if you have an option pool of only 6% and have many more execs to hire to build out your team you’re going to ask for more options to be created in the future. If you’re a solo founder and haven’t built out your team or engineers I’m likely to want 15+%.

Pre-Money Valuation 150

Pre-Money Valuation Option Pool Post-Money Valuation Dilution 150

Hunter Walker

AUGUST 7, 2017

But employee option pool is important enough that I wanted to briefly expand upon my comment above. Since Homebrew typically leads/co-leads seed rounds, we assist in helping founders design and manage their pool against their hiring forecast. As you can see, Weekend VC Twitter gets pretty wild and crazy!!!!

Equity 96

Equity Pre-Money Valuation Option Pool Founder 96

thinkspace.com

SEPTEMBER 7, 2012

How to Divide Equity to Startup Founders, Advisors, and Employees. The part that I’d like to zero in on is when you’ve got a high growth company what are some of the best practices out there to distribute equity to the founders, advisors, and employees? Equity for Founders. Strike price of options: meaningless.

Equity 62

Equity Employee Founder CTO Hire 62

The Next Web

OCTOBER 21, 2013

Neil Rimer is a Partner and co-founder of Index Ventures. Yet, surprisingly, we continue to come across founders who have made significant mistakes in their early capital raises that we suspect go against their own instincts and jeopardize the foundations of the businesses they are building.

Cap Table 128

Cap Table Option Pool Angel Investor Entrepreneur 128

Gust

NOVEMBER 8, 2012

Then sit down with your co-founders and divvy up the equity based on the contributions you all believe each of you will make…providing for reverse vesting, a large option pool, and a clear decision-making structure. original post can be found on Quora @ : [link] *.

Founder 134

Founder Option Pool Vesting Cofounder 134

Eric Friedman

DECEMBER 30, 2020

This is a fun area for me as there are founders and companies I am supporting in the space, and its great to see how they have grown during the “crypto winter” of the last few years. 4/ Streaming equity – venture funds + employee stock becomes more liquid. 5/ The rise of operator angels + micro VCs explodes in 2021.

Stock 120

Stock Private Equity Option Pool LP 120

David Teten

DECEMBER 3, 2019

To learn more about this space, I suggest join an online community I co-founded, PEVCTech. . Tim Friedman, Founder, PE Stack , said, “If I could offer one piece of advice to today’s managers, it would be to take the time to understand the demands of the modern institutional LP. The 11 Steps of Investing in Private Companies.

Technical Review 78

Technical Review Software Review Analytics Private Equity 78

thestartuplawyer.com

FEBRUARY 24, 2010

He obviously never launched a startup and got shafted by a co-founder. He obviously never launched a startup and got shafted by a co-founder. You can start by examining every aspect of the co-founder relationship. Don’t leave anything out just because you and your co-founders already talked about it.

Cofounder 40

Cofounder Founder Preferred Stock Startup 40

Business Plan Blog

NOVEMBER 20, 2013

Stage 2: Co-Founder. You do not have the funds to pay this person, so you decided to add them on as a co-founder. In reality, your company is probably worth close to nothing and your new co-founder is taking a huge risk. You bring someone in and quickly see the added value of this person.

Equity 61

Equity Option Pool Cofounder Vesting 61

www.inc.com

SEPTEMBER 24, 2011

Chip Morse , cofounder and partner with Morse, Barnes-Brown & Pendleton P.C., If youre offering the consultant stock options, youll also want to take into consideration what the exercise price is going to be and how long the options will be outstanding. based in Waltham, Mass.

Fractional CTO 40

Fractional CTO Equity Iowa Technical Cofounder 40

The Startup Lawyer

FEBRUARY 4, 2011

But before your startup signs up and cashes that $[XX,000] check, your startup’s co-founders should sit down and evaluate the incubator’s offer. Most incubators take common stock and sit “side-by-side&# with the founders, but some may want some (weak) preferred stock and/or dilution protection.

Incubator 105

Incubator Pre-Money Valuation Option Pool Advisory Board 105

venturehacks.com

MARCH 21, 2008

Many advisors want options they can exercise immediately —that’s fine. If your company hasn’t raised a Series A, increase the advisor’s equity by roughly 30%-50% to account for dilution from seed investors, Series A investors, option pools, swimming pools, and the like. Learn more.

Advisory Board 44

Advisory Board Cap Table Vesting Equity 44

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 22, 2011

Hopefully each lead or co-lead their round so there is more harmony in the configuration. When you consider that they’ll also want a 15-20% option pool in the company you’re talking about founders owning as little as 40% after just one round. That’s a different story. The Pitfall of One.

Dilution 314

Dilution Cap Table Due Diligence Option Pool 314

venturehacks.com

DECEMBER 9, 2012

We’re founders (AngelList, Epinions), investors (Twitter), students (life), and advisors (billions). How to pick a co-founder. The Option Pool Shuffle. Pitching Hacks , Cap Table , and Co-founder Interview. Every post in one book. Constantly updated. Check out the free sample (pdf). Part 2: Deck.

Advisory Board 50

Advisory Board Cap Table RSS Cofounder 50

venturehacks.com

SEPTEMBER 22, 2011

They don’t even try to get market price for their investment; they limit their holdings to leave the founders enough stock to feel the company is still theirs.” Ask the Attorney” – Founder Vesting. We’re founders (Epinions), investors (Twitter), students (life), and advisors (billions). How to pick a co-founder.

Equity 40

Equity Cap Table Valuation RSS 40

The Next Web

AUGUST 14, 2013

This is a guest post by Wade Foster , co-founder and CEO of Zapier, which originally appeared on his blog. But since I’m relatively fresh off of the experience I get asked by first-time founders how they should go about raising money for their startup. Usually those aren’t first-time founders though. It certainly did me.

Founder 142

Founder Incubator Cofounder Accredited Investor 142