How can we get good legal advice without exceeding a startup's budget?

質問

Hello! As a startup, we are often told to seek legal advice early do avoid huge problems and costs later. This seems to be especially true regarding Intellectual Property, which is probably what constitutes most of our value as a company at this point. However, as a startup we are also operating on a very tight budget, so it seems a bit unrealistic to hire a law firm for all kinds of legal issues. What would be the best approach here? Naturally, we would like to build a relationship with an individual lawyer/law firm, but that is expensive. Hiring a specialist here and there and trying to figure out the broader issues for ourselves does not sound like a great idea either. What is a good way for a startup to gain comprehensive legal coverage early, without over-stretching our finances?

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回答: 2 public & 2 非公開

Prateek beaconh
内容領域専門家

Hi, excellent question faced by a lot of startups. I suggest this to be a matter of trade-off; building relationship with, or hiring a single firm/attorney makes sense but is expensive; stop gap arrangements by your own efforts and plugging in experts wherever needed is economical but requires extra efforts which seems to be time wasted which could have been better utilized towards your startup. I suggest doing a simple analysis covering following points: funding that you have vs priorities that require those funds; time based priorities vs the risks of overlooking them; and so on. During initial stages, do as much research as possible to become aware of the basics, or spend time with someone wiling to explain intricacies of the same. Startup events, incubation centres, online forums and others are good sources. Google is your friend :) As an example with regard to IP, I suggest initially to engage a professional for your prior art search, drafting and filing of your patent application from your idea/invention. For legal/financial/regulatory compliances of your new business, it may be essential to hire an expert. I hope this can be of some help without being too vague.

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