VC Adventure

AUGUST 16, 2020

Despite how much time companies talk about the importance of their employees and, in many cases, how every employee is also an “owner” of their business through their option program, most companies are pretty ad hoc (or down right sloppy) about how they plan for and execute their option program.

Programming 149

Programming Vesting Equity Software Review 149

Scott Edward Walker

OCTOBER 19, 2020

In a couple of cases, the founders played lawyer on their own; in the other cases, the founders either used (i) a Web service that did not address IP issues or (ii) an inexperienced law firm. This would arise as a result of a founder improperly “moonlighting” (i.e., Any IP created by a founder (e.g.,

IP 52

IP Software Review Founder Technical Review 52

Up and Running

DECEMBER 1, 2015

If you’re thinking about extending equity to an employee or a vendor (as in the example above), you should know that the topic is multi-faceted. If however you are giving a “normal employee” an incentive stock option plan (more on that later), that’s entirely different. Finding great employees first. What is equity compensation?

Equity 60

Equity Employee Stock Options Vesting 60

View from Seed

JANUARY 5, 2016

At the beginning, a startup team is typically just a couple of co-founders. What we suggest at this juncture is that founders get acclimated to the tactics of scaling beyond the founding team. What to Address During Genesis Team Building: How do we divide and conquer responsibilities as co-founders? Below, I take a look at each.

Founder 120

Founder Cofounder Startup Early Stage 120

K9 Ventures

OCTOBER 27, 2016

One of these norms is how founder vesting and employee vesting works. I won’t get into employee vesting today as that has much more to consider than I have time to cover in this short post today. Here is a good summary post from Cooley GO on Founder Vesting. The first is fairly obvious.

Founder Vesting 48

Founder Vesting Vesting Founder Term Sheet 48

The Next Web

NOVEMBER 20, 2013

With all other things equal, that means that a 50/50 split between two co-founders (evenly split if there are more than two), or a 66/33 split based on the premium for coming up with the original idea, and for starting the initial development efforts and sourcing the original team. Whose idea was it? How important is this person’s role?

Cofounder 136

Cofounder Equity Founder Seed Stage 136

SoCal CTO

NOVEMBER 1, 2010

I had a recent email dialog with the founder of a company looking for a CTO for their startup. And I tried to evaluate the idea and figure out: What did the founder really need here? Was it a Startup Founder Developer Gap ? And do I fit as a Part-Time CTO , Technology Advisor , CTO Founder , Acting CTO ?

Technical Cofounder 241

Technical Cofounder CTO Hire Equity Sweat Equity 241

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 8, 2015

Every startup founder loves to prompt for questions from investors and potential key team members about their vision, and the huge opportunity that can be had with their disruptive technology. Most founders like to talk about their many months or years of sweat-equity , but cash invested is a stronger commitment.

Technical Review 120

Technical Review Due Diligence Sweat Equity Burn Rate 120

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 10, 2016

Every startup founder loves to prompt for questions from investors and potential key team members about their vision, and the huge opportunity that can be had with their disruptive technology. Most founders like to talk about their many months or years of sweat-equity , but cash invested is a stronger commitment.

Sweat Equity 120

Sweat Equity Burn Rate Technical Review Intellectual Property 120

Feld Thoughts

SEPTEMBER 2, 2011

The founders each have common shares that will vest over four years. The vesting schedule protects each of the co-founders in case one gets hit by a bus or decides to drop the project after a short period of time. As first time entrepreneurs they did not create an employee options pool; we’ll fix that in a little while.

Cap Table 133

Cap Table CTO Hire Technical Cofounder Cofounder 133

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 20, 2019

One of the things that founders have the most angst about is whom they should have on their board and at what stage of the business. Why you should set up a board at the seed round of funding I know these days with SAFE documents and rolling convertible notes many founders prefer not to set up a board early on.

Venture Capital 236

Venture Capital Startup Angel Investor Silicon Valley 236

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 9, 2011

I covered what I call “the co-founder mythology.&# Either you’re not technical and you think you need a technical co-founder or vice-versa. It is increasingly popular to have “founder dating&# or “startup weekend hackathons&# of some variety or the other. Hire your co-founder. Vested over 4 years.

Cofounder 393

Cofounder Founder Vesting Founder Vesting 393

www.avc.com

SEPTEMBER 22, 2011

Employee Equity: How Much? The most common comment in this long and complicated MBA Mondays series on Employee Equity is the question of how much equity should you grant when you make a hire. To be clear, these are hires we are talking about, not co-founders. And the fourth bracket are employees who are not in key functions.

Equity 64

Equity Employee CTO Hire Fractional CTO 64

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 11, 2021

Here are five of the most common examples: Failure to document a Founder agreement at the beginning. This oversight can lead to the so-called “forgotten Founder” problem. Trouble with the IRS over Founders stock value. Founders ignore non-compete clauses from former employers.

Cost 363

Cost Non-Compete Accredited Investor Cofounder 363

Scott Edward Walker

SEPTEMBER 28, 2011

Question My co-founders and I are working on a cool new site, and we’ll be ready to launch in a few weeks. Vesting Restrictions. The first deadly mistake relates to vesting restrictions. Otherwise, if one of the founders quits after a few months, he would take all of his shares with him.

Vesting 89

Vesting Software Review IP Intellectual Property 89

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

Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 1, 2022

By the way, you will normally only be offered “options,” which vest over a 4-year period after a 1-year “cliff.” Many employees forget that there isn’t even a market for startup stock, until after the company has gone public, which hasn’t happened positively to many companies in the last few years. 7% Product Manager,2 -.3%

Stock Options 343

Stock Options Advisory Board Stock Startup 343

Startup Professionals Musings

MARCH 23, 2014

These shares are allocated and committed, but not really issued and owned (vested) until later. Typically, vesting in startups occurs monthly over 4 years, starting with the first 25% of such shares vesting only after the employee has remained with the company for at least 12 months (one year “cliff”).

Stock 256

Stock Vesting Common Stock Founder Vesting 256

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 22, 2013

These shares are allocated and committed, but not really issued and owned (vested) until later. Typically, vesting in startups occurs monthly over 4 years, starting with the first 25% of such shares vesting only after the employee has remained with the company for at least 12 months (one year “cliff”).

Vesting 245

Vesting Common Stock Stock Founder Vesting 245

NZ Entrepreneur

SEPTEMBER 29, 2021

Startup founders are our ambitious problem solvers. Startup founders are driven to solve problems and make a difference – many want to literally change the world. Sometimes that will include pivoting the company, sometimes that will see the chair step in to act as CEO so the founder can fully recharge. Risk and reward.

Technical Review 88

Technical Review Software Review New Zealand Due Diligence 88

Agile VC

DECEMBER 4, 2014

I like to say that “there are only co-founders” — it’s extraordinarily rare for a successful business to have just a sole founder. But not all co-founders are equal in terms of title, ownership, responsibilities, and so forth. Sometimes co-founders put off the equity split question for some time.

Cofounder 255

Cofounder Equity Founder Sweat Equity 255

Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 19, 2013

Most entrepreneurs struggle with many startup Founders dilemmas in building their business, and these key dilemmas are probably the biggest source of pain and failure for the entrepreneur lifestyle. Should you start a company solo or find co-Founders to help you? The co-Founder relationship dilemma.

Founder 245

Founder Hockey Stick Cofounder Liquidity Event 245

Steve Blank

APRIL 10, 2019

VC’s have just changed the ~50-year old social contract with startup employees. For most startup employee’s startup stock options are now a bad deal. In tech startups stock options were here almost from the beginning, first offered to the founders in 1957 at Fairchild Semiconductor , the first chip startup in Silicon Valley.

Stock Options 333

Stock Options Stock Vesting Common Stock 333

Steve Blank

MAY 19, 2015

I got answers that sounded like the Tom’s – new stock grants for the executive staff, great new building, and oh, by the way, Tom and his co-founder got to sell some stock in the new round. These were the employees that had the institutional knowledge and hard-earned skills. Organizational debt was coming due. the company had.

Technical Review 120

Technical Review Salary Early Stage Software Review 120

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 18, 2015

Of course your friend’s company raised $50 million and offers it’s employees free kombucha and desk massages. And even this can’t stop their employees from fleeing after two years of vesting to move on to the next hot startup. For investors life is no different. You don’t need to be hot.

Software Review 150

Software Review Turkey Portfolio Syndicate 150

www.instigatorblog.com

OCTOBER 23, 2010

Changing Equity Structures for Early Startup Employees Tweet Recently someone asked me for advice on how much equity they should give to their early employees. His company had just closed an early round of funding and he wanted to cement the employee relationships. Those first employees will take 0.5-1%

Equity 41

Equity Employee Startup Vesting 41

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 22, 2010

It’s still important advice for startup founders and something that I’m passionate about. They make terrible employees. Why do job hoppers make such bad employees at startups? -. You’re a startup founder. You start fighting with your co-founder whom you thought you understood. That’s OK.

Hiring 392

Hiring Employee Vesting Silicon Valley 392

Agile VC

DECEMBER 4, 2014

I like to say that “there are only co-founders” — it’s extraordinarily rare for a successful business to have just a sole founder. But not all co-founders are equal in terms of title, ownership, responsibilities, and so forth. Sometimes co-founders put off the equity split question for some time.

Cofounder 173

Cofounder Equity Founder Sweat Equity 173

Gust

MARCH 16, 2014

These shares are allocated and committed, but not really issued and owned (vested) until later. Typically, vesting in startups occurs monthly over 4 years, starting with the first 25% of such shares vesting only after the employee has remained with the company for at least 12 months (one year “cliff”).

Stock 175

Stock Vesting Common Stock Founder Vesting 175

Altgate

JUNE 25, 2012

—————– Dead equity — equity held by employees and founders no longer working at the company — is a large and growing problem. Imagine how much tougher a dead-equity dilemma becomes when co-founders, who tend to hold large equity stakes, are involved. Noam Wasserman on Inc.

Equity 44

Equity Vesting Cap Table Technical Review 44

Andrew Payne

SEPTEMBER 9, 2017

In practice, most equity grants within a company are driven by broad calibrations with existing employees. But, how should founders divide things up in the very beginning , where none of these internal reference points exist? And, how can founders talk about percentages before any funding?

Equity 71

Equity Founder Vesting Dilution 71

Steve Blank

OCTOBER 24, 2017

Why do these founders get to stay around? Because the balance of power has dramatically shifted from investors to founders. VCs competing for unicorn investments have given founders control of the board. A pre-IPO board usually had two founders, two VCs and one “independent” member. Technology Cycles Measured in Years.

Founder 245

Founder Technical Review CTO Hire IPO 245

Reid Hoffman

DECEMBER 10, 2020

These are really good founders and I think this is an interesting space.” Further, when additional people kept mentioning Airbnb to me and praising the founders, I should have asked myself how a smart, capable person would refine the idea.). Those two minutes showed me that Airbnb’s founders wanted to play in the big leagues.

Hosting 69

Hosting Hockey Stick IPO Silicon Valley 69

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 10, 2019

Most entrepreneurs struggle with many startup founders quandaries in building their business, and these key dilemmas are probably the biggest source of pain and failure for the entrepreneur lifestyle. Should you start a company solo or find co-founders to help you? The co-founder relationship dilemma.

Hockey Stick 243

Hockey Stick Cofounder Liquidity Event Startup 243

Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 7, 2010

These shares are allocated and committed, but not really issued and owned (vested) until later. Typically, vesting in startups occurs monthly over 4 years, starting with the first 25% of such shares vesting only after the employee has remained with the company for at least 12 months (one year “cliff”). Vesting starts now.

Stock 214

Stock Vesting Common Stock Founder Vesting 214

Gust

DECEMBER 1, 2011

Notice what is missing from this list of priorities: The company itself – that is, a business entity, most often a corporation , that will own the entire business (however defined), issue equity to founders, take investment capital , enter into contracts, make sales, pay employees and contractors, and so forth.

IP 114

IP Intellectual Property Equity Liquidity Event 114

Altgate

AUGUST 25, 2012

—————– Dead equity — equity held by employees and founders no longer working at the company — is a large and growing problem. Imagine how much tougher a dead-equity dilemma becomes when co-founders, who tend to hold large equity stakes, are involved. Noam Wasserman on Inc.

Equity 28

Equity Vesting Cap Table Technical Review 28