Founders Agreements. Done right.

Most startup disputes happen between founders who started as friends. A founders agreement decides equity splits, decision rights, IP ownership, vesting, and exit mechanics while everyone still agrees - which is the only time those conversations are easy. Without one, a co-founder who leaves in month six can still own a third of the company three years later.

Vesting means founders earn their equity over time rather than receiving it all up front. The standard is four-year vesting with a one-year cliff - if a founder leaves before completing 12 months they walk away with nothing, after which they vest monthly for the next three years. Investors expect this structure; raising without it triggers expensive rewrites at first close.

Every founder signs an IP assignment confirming that anything they create related to the business - code, designs, brand assets, customer lists - belongs to the company, not to them personally. This includes work done before incorporation. Without it, a co-founder leaving with the original codebase or brand identity is a real and recurring problem.

Day-to-day decisions sit with the CEO; defined major decisions (raising capital, taking on debt, selling the company, hiring senior staff, changing strategy) require board or unanimous founder approval depending on threshold. We bake in deadlock-breaker mechanisms - chair casting vote, independent director, or a buy-sell clause - so a 50/50 split cannot freeze the company.

Yes - we draft to standards UK and US VCs and angels expect, including share class definitions, drag and tag, pre-emption, and information rights that fold cleanly into a future term sheet. Founders who use generic online templates routinely pay £10K+ in legal fees to unpick them at first close; ours are designed not to need that.