Practice area
Built right from the first decision.
Founding-stage legal counsel for startups — entity, equity, contracts, and the structures that make growth possible.
Startup Legal Advisory
Built right from the first decision.
The legal decisions made in the first months of a startup often shape the company for years — and the mistakes made then are the most expensive to fix later. We serve as outside general counsel to founders and early-stage companies, helping them build the legal foundation that makes growth, fundraising, and eventual exit possible.
We help founders choose the right entity structure, allocate equity among founders and early contributors, and put in place the vesting, assignment, and protective-provision arrangements that investors will expect to see. We prepare the founder agreements, intellectual-property assignments, and contractor documents that make sure the company actually owns what it is building — a detail that becomes critical at diligence.
As the company grows, we handle the commercial contracts that make the business operate — customer and vendor agreements, terms of service, privacy policies, employment arrangements, and the partner and channel relationships that extend the product into the market. We work to keep the legal work proportionate to the stage, so that a seed-stage company is not carrying enterprise-grade overhead, and a growth-stage company is not operating on handshake terms.
Because many of our startup clients operate in technology and cross-border markets, we bring particular depth in SaaS and software agreements, data privacy, and the international questions that arise when a product reaches users in multiple jurisdictions. We help founders see the legal horizon early, so that a decision made today does not become the obstacle tomorrow.
01Entity selection & formation
02Founder equity, vesting & IP assignment
03Early-stage fundraising & SAFEs/convertibles
04Commercial contracts & terms of service
05Employment, contractor & advisor agreements
06Intellectual property protection
07Privacy & data compliance
08Outside general counsel services
What we handle
Entity & equity founder structures
SAFEs & rounds seed through Series A
Commercial & IP ownership & operations
Outside counsel ongoing advisory
Your next move
Good counsel changes
what is possible.
When the stakes are high and the path is unclear, the right conversation can open the next chapter.
Strategic counsel for a world in motion.
Office
One World Trade Center
85th Floor, New York 10007
+1 212 220 7434
contact@lakinberglaw.com
New York · Global