Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 17, 2009

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. It you have a great software engineer that’s awesome.

Founder Vesting 365

Founder Vesting Intellectual Property Stock Options IP 365

VC Adventure

NOVEMBER 1, 2018

There are times in a board meeting when the CEO (or board chair if that’s a different person) needs to step in and say “we’re going to have to push the engineering discussion to next meeting; I need us to stick to the schedule. Discussion item or decision item. It’s best if you do this from the outset.

Design 257

Design Option Pool Operations Conversion 257

venturehacks.com

FEBRUARY 24, 2010

Breakups are hard If you’re going to fall out with your co-founder, do it early, recover the equity into the option pool to keep the company going, and recruit someone else great to fill the missing slot. Engineer heavy startups are common now, so doubling or tripling your development team at the outset is incredible.

Cofounder 101

Cofounder Founder Technical Cofounder Technical Review 101

Hunter Walker

MAY 7, 2014

If you’re scaling a service, the difference between an average smart engineer and a few dozen people who have successfully done it before with Google, Facebook, YouTube, Dropbox is enormous. Accordingly, some of their capital raise was aimed at hiring two mobile iOS engineers. Sounds great. Will You Be Hiring for Culture Fit?

Hiring 108

Hiring Option Pool Early Stage Term Sheet 108

thinkspace.com

SEPTEMBER 7, 2012

Lead Engineer 0.5 - 1. 5+ years Experience Engineer 0.33 - 0.66. Manager or Junior Engineer 0.2 - 0.33. Percent of the outstanding option pool: meaningless. Strike price of options: meaningless. Below is an example of how some companies may approach distributing equity to employees. Title Range (%).

Equity 62

Equity Employee Founder CTO Hire 62

VC Cafe

OCTOBER 16, 2010

Short answer: we posted in Craigslist for “Founding Engineers&# when we were starting and couldn’t pay salaries. 5 engineers. Then look after your little group, keep them updated, share cool stuff, surprise them and repay the favour by showing equal enthusiasm for their projects and ideas. See also [link]. Nothing else.

Option Pool 88

Option Pool Analytics LLC Startup 88

David Teten

DECEMBER 3, 2019

ff Venture Capital hired two full-time engineers to build out Totem. The Long Term Stock Exchange is building out a set of tools for founders for managing their cap tables, 409A valuations, cash on hand, options pool, investor relations, etc. Fincura specializes in serving lenders.

Technical Review 78

Technical Review Software Review Analytics Private Equity 78

techcrunch.com

FEBRUARY 25, 2010

You could make the same argument about acquisitions and option pools. Why aren’t we surprised when three months later that company can’t hire enough engineers? Now consider what would happen if the same company raises another $10 million, expands the employee option pool to hire more executives and to support 300 people.

Liquidation Preference 63

Liquidation Preference Founder Option Pool Acquisition 63

www.instigatorblog.com

OCTOBER 23, 2010

This is especially true when you think of a tech startup, where the first few hires are typically engineers/programmers. You can’t have an option pool that takes up 50% of the company’s shares, and you have to leave room for future employees as well. 1% is just not a lot. Not a bad payday. Not a bad payday.

Equity 41

Equity Employee Startup Vesting 41

www.paulgraham.com

APRIL 28, 2010

Theyleave 20% as an options pool for later employees (but they setthings up so that they can issue this stock to themselves if theyget bought early and most is still unissued), and the three founderseach get 25%. So after this the option pool is down to 13.7%). [ Theres only common stock at this stage.

Technical Review 76

Technical Review Startup Software Review Angel Investor 76

www.mattbartus.com

DECEMBER 9, 2012

You have a 20% option pool, so you know this will take your ownership down from 80% to 60%, and the VC will get 25%. Option Pool. Option Pool. Developers, designers, support engineers & more! Take a look at the numbers: Pre-Money. Post-Money. Series A. -. Post-Money. Series A. -. Warrants. -.

Warrant 40

Warrant Valuation Pre-Money Valuation Term Sheet 40

www.startupnorth.ca

OCTOBER 23, 2010

Lead Engineer 0.5 – 1 5+ years experience Engineer 0.33 – 0.66 Manager or Junior Engineer 0.2 – 0.33 Table 1: Options Grants in Silicon Valley for Series A from VentureHacks The numbers from VentureHacks are guidelines. They are rough estimates.Any one have sample option grants in Canada?

Employee 41

Employee Founder Salary Equity 41

thestartuplawyer.com

FEBRUARY 24, 2010

Before I bring in any principals I will have the company all set up, some engineering done and patents pending. When I find, and hire on options, the three perfect CEs/directors must I consider them co founders and treat them accordingly? He obviously never launched a startup and got shafted by a co-founder.

Cofounder 40

Cofounder Founder Preferred Stock Startup 40

www.payne.org

SEPTEMBER 22, 2011

For example, if youre the 5th engineer hired after the company has been around for 6 months, the company will compare your offer to other engineers. Youll probably get a little bit less than similarly skilled engineer #2, because youre coming into the company later.

Equity 56

Equity Employee Vesting Preferred Stock 56

BeyondVC

MAY 20, 2004

Rather than go into a diatribe on the ineffectiveness of Black Scholes and the Binomial Pricing model, I want to focus my efforts on what happens when stock option expensing goes into effect. It will eliminate broad-based option pools for public companies and private companies.

Stock Options 60

Stock Options Stock Securities and Exchange Commission Option Pool 60