Founder Documents
Ensuring the legal health of a company is every founder’s responsibility. Some of the most costly legal mistakes founders make happen at the initial stages of company-building. We want to help you avoid the painful process of correcting mistakes by getting your legal health in check from the onset. From putting together an advisor agreement to assessing the founder-friendliness of a template advanced subscription agreement from your pre-seed investor, we have put together example documents with explanatory notes so that you can educate yourself on best practices and ensure that legal decisions are being made on your terms.
Founder Documents
Ensuring the legal health of a company is every founder’s responsibility. Some of the most costly legal mistakes founders make happen at the initial stages of company-building. We want to help you avoid the painful process of correcting mistakes by getting your legal health in check from the onset. From putting together an advisor agreement to assessing the founder-friendliness of a template advanced subscription agreement from your pre-seed investor, we have put together example documents with explanatory notes so that you can educate yourself on best practices and ensure that legal decisions are being made on your terms.
Start
You are embarking on an exciting ride! No matter whether you are going on the journey of company-building solo or taking on co-founders, it is important you put together a founders’ agreement before going any further. This document codifies your rights as a founder and ensures that you’ve reached an agreement on key questions regarding equity split and time commitment.
View a template founders’ agreement by jurisdiction below:
Build
After you incorporate and sign a founders’ agreement, you can start putting the structures in place to protect your product, hire employees, and take on external counsel. The documents outlined below are standard documents most companies should have on file. That said, depending on the type of company you’re building, there might be additional documents you need. Please seek legal advice on these matters.
View template Build documents by jurisdiction below:
Raise
Taking on external capital is a way to supercharge your company’s growth trajectory. When angels and venture capital firms decide to take part in your journey, you are transferring part of your ownership to them. It’s an important and, at times, scary step to take as a founder. Whether you want to move forward with a priced round or an unpriced round, we want you to have full visibility of what industry norms are around fundraising documents. Take a look at example term sheets, unpriced rounds, and priced rounds by jurisdiction below. As is the case with any Seedsummit resource, the documents serve as a guide to speaking with investors and law firms on your terms. Please seek legal advice on these matters.
View template Raise documents by jurisdiction below:
