Question
At my startup there is another co-founder and a few employees, all of whom have some amount of equity in the company. At what point (if ever) in my startup's life cycle should I stop offering (or significantly reduce) equity to new hires?
Answers: 1 public & 0 private
There is only so much equity to go around and there is no requirement that you distribute equity to mere employees / ICs (i.e., those not contributing capital) in the first place. If your budget does not allow you to actually pay people, and you are left exchanging sweat equity for their services, you may need to pound the pavement and raise some money. You may never want to stop offering equity, at all, as part of a compensation package, but "when," chronologically, you may want to adjust your current practice will depend on your business model, number of employees, budget projections, participation rights, and a host of other factors not present in the information you've laid out. At a minimum, you may want to explore distributing profit interests vs. voting interests and, again depending on your market strategy, reserve all interests to those who will presumably be around long enough to enjoy the windfall of a buyout. Speak with local counsel to get actionable advice on your corporate legal matters.
Recent questions
I sometimes see questions on forums like Quora about how to stop people stealing your invention i...
4 5386 2I am looking for useful sources on protecting copyright. I am in the process of writing a book ba...
3 6114 2What is the current wisdom on compiling news feeds on a third party website so far as copyright i...
1 3962 0This might be a silly question but I’m a bit confused by ‘prior disclosure’ as it applies to pate...
2 4823 1Do you have a question about your invention or intellectual property?
Search the questions below or post your enquiry to one of our experts via Directory.
(User questions are no longer posted publicly on this page.)