Uncategorized
Pitching your company to investors and trying to raise money involves meeting a lot of people you have never met before. This is true regardless of the depth of your network. To raise money for a startup, you have to work hard and meet a lot of new people. The
Uncategorized
The SEC recently issued guidance on angel groups and the general solicitation and general advertising of private company securities offerings. General solicitation and general advertising of private company securities offerings is a hot area. The JOBS Act allows companies that are raising money solely from accredited investors to generally solicit
Uncategorized
As the President of Seattle Angel, I’ve worked with a fair number of new angel investors over the years. I continually found that investors were exploring a personal interest and an investment return when they approached angel investing. This is a little different than a pure financial investor as
Legal Updates
The SEC recently issued guidance on what constitutes a "pre-existing, substantive relationship." The guidance is helpful for companies raising money for a number of reasons. The SEC guidance is especially helpful because there has been a fair amount of uncertainty about how to make sure a securities offering
Uncategorized
The SEC recently issued an important no-action letter for online portals, and for other issuers of securities (including startup companies), trying to raise money in compliance with the SEC's new 506(b) and 506(c) rules. We can thank Dan DeWolf from Mintz Levin and his colleagues for
Uncategorized
Once again I had the fun opportunity to work on a writing project with Lauren Hakala from Practical Law. This time we updated the previous piece we had written on General Solicitation, to take into account the recent SEC guidance. General Solicitation: What Are the Highlights of the SEC'
Uncategorized
Intellectual Property 101 - A Basic Guide to Understanding IP. from Ashley Long
Legal Updates
Q: Can a member of the board of directors receiving a stock option as compensation for board member service receive an incentive or statutory stock option (an "ISO")? A: No. A board member who is just a board member, and not otherwise an employee of the company cannot
Legal Updates
Update (September 2025): This post, originally published in August 2015, does not reflect Rule 148, effective March 15, 2021, which provides a safe harbor for demo day communications under specific conditions. For current guidance, review Rule 148 on the SEC’s website or consult a securities attorney. Is a Demo
Uncategorized
There is a lot of confusion in the early stage company ecosystem about general solicitation. When you are trying to sell shares in your company (or a convertible note, or convertible equity), how much can you say about that in the media? Can you post something on Facebook? On Twitter?
Uncategorized
Last Thursday the SEC issued guidance on what constitutes general solicitation. This guidance is helpful to companies trying to conduct Rule 506 offerings. Thanks to the JOBS Act, we now have two types of Rule 506 offerings. Those that cannot be generally solicited and those that can. This might sound