San Diego Employee Non-Disclosure Agreements: What Should They Contain? The purpose of San Diego and California non-disclosure agreements ("NDA") is to protect your business and its commercially valuable trade secrets. Trade secrets and confidential information are often the key to keeping and expanding your company's market share. We have [...]
How Insurance Can Make a Buy-Sell Agreement "Easy" for Death or Disability For small San Diego and California businesses, it is important that the owners agree early in the process to a buy-sell agreement. This applies whether you are running your business as a general partnership, a corporation, a [...]
When is the Right Time to Convert From Sole Proprietorship to a Corporation? Research and observation shows that, when they succeed, businesses have certain natural stages of growth. Many a San Diego business might start off as a sole proprietorship. That is, the business is/was just you (with the [...]
Top Five Mistakes to Avoid When Starting Your New San Diego Business Congratulations! You have made the decision to finally start your own San Diego business - maybe on your own or with some good friends or trusted colleagues. This is exciting, but of course, risky. We here at [...]
Tips for Picking a Good Company Name: Lessons From Trademark Law One of the trickier aspects of starting a new San Diego business is picking a good company name. As we discuss below, it is generally a bad idea to pick YOUR personal or family name as the name [...]
Every Business Needs a Good Contract Management Method Even if you are just starting your new San Diego business, you are already beginning to accumulate contracts. Contracts are anything whereby you and your business agree to obligations that can be enforced in a court of law or court of [...]
San Diego Startups and Royalty Financing Every new San Diego and California startup needs some sort of working capital to get the business up and running. The usual method is some combination of self-financing, locating venture capital or investment financing, or finding an angel investor. Another less-well-known is something [...]
Top Reasons Partnerships Fail Surely everyone can agree that starting a business or being in a San Diego business with friends as partners can be rewarding at a personal or emotional level as well as an economic level. You and your friends enjoy each other’s company, share common visions [...]
Five Pitfalls to Avoid if You are Starting a New San Diego Business Launching your new San Diego startup is exciting and opens a new chapter in your life and in the lives of your family and your business partners. But, everyone knows that starting a new business can [...]
How Being an "Inc." or an "LLC" Enhances Your PR Campaigns Every business needs public relations ("PR") campaigns, and converting to a California corporation or Limited Liability Company can help your PR campaign be even more successful. PR campaigns are different that mere advertising -- that advertising is part [...]
Raising Startup Capital in San Diego: Comparing Regulation D vs. Regulation Equity Crowdfunding Most people have probably heard of “crowdfunding.” As the name suggests, crowdfunding is the obtaining of small amounts of money per person -- the “funding” -- from a somewhat large group of people -- the "crowd" [...]
Equity Crowdfunding: A Quick Primer for San Diego Startups Equity crowdfunding can be a viable option to help San Diego and California businesses and entrepreneurs raise startup working capital. However, because equity crowdfunding involves the offering and sale of "securities," anyone considering crowdfunding should make sure to get counsel [...]
San Diego Businesses: A Few Tips for Mining Your Data to Drive Marketshare Every San Diego and California business gathers data. "Data" does not have to be anything mysterious or processed by room-sized computers. Data can be as simple as your rolodex full of names, numbers, and addresses. Moreover, [...]
Tips for Starting Your Own San Diego Holiday Pop-Up Shop The holiday season is upon us. Along with everything else cheery and bright, the holiday season brings an infusion of pop-up shops. Some San Diego bars are converting to themes for the winter holiday and New Year’s and national [...]
Risks and Rewards of Taking a Political Stance for You and Your Business Businesspeople today often take political stances and air their views in the news media, but doing so may negatively affect their businesses. When considering whether you or your business should express political views to the public, [...]
California Business Licenses and Permits: Which Ones Do You Need? Nearly every business needs some kind of business license or permit to operate. Which licenses you need may vary depending on your location, type of business, products sold, customer base, and more. In California, the state government runs some [...]
California Startups Must Disclose Financial Information to Shareholders Many startups organized as private corporations keep the value of corporate shares a well-protected secret. Telling the public that share values have soared in recent years or that they recently dropped after a new product announcement could greatly affect a company’s [...]
Introduction to Privacy and Business Ownership Many first-time business owners worry about the privacy of their personal information. For a savvy entrepreneur, running a business does not have to mean disclosing everything about your life to the public. Instead, use a variety of legal, financial, and common sense strategies [...]
One of My Startup Partners Wants Out - and Wants His Investment Back. What Do I Do? Learning that your startup partner no longer wants to work with you and wants back the money they invested in the startup is not easy. It is also often not easy to [...]
I Don’t Need a Lawyer to Start a Corporation - Or Do I? Many new business owners start out forming a corporation with the idea that they can do all the paperwork themselves and save on legal fees. It is true that the California Secretary of State provides a [...]
Changing Your Startup’s Product Midway Through - and How It Could Cause Legal Troubles If you work for a startup, you know that your target audience’s needs can change on short notice, and so you may need to adapt your product or service to fit the market. You may [...]
How Does the San Diego City Business Tax Affect Me? Businesses operating in the city of San Diego, California, must obtain a business tax certificate and pay the city business tax. San Diego Municipal Code § 31.0101, et seq. The law applies to any person engaging in a business [...]
What is a Fictitious Business Name Statement? A “fictitious business name” has been defined as “[a] business name that DOES NOT include the surname of the individual owner, AND EACH of the partners or the nature of the business is not clearly evident by the name.” Fictitious Business Names, Ernst [...]
How to Write Your Business Plan All business owners and potential business owners probably understand that they will need a business plan at some point. Hopefully, they also understand that the earlier a business plan is prepared, the better for the business because, let’s face it, the business plan [...]
Should I Use an Incentive Stock Option Plan? As with every aspect of business, there are pros and cons to establishing an incentive stock option plan; but before one can even make the decisions necessary, it is important to understand what an incentive stock option plan is. The incentive [...]
Understanding Preferred Instrument Term Sheets in Early Stage Funding Structuring early stage investments as preferred instruments, such as preferred stock, is significantly more complex than working with convertible notes; understanding preferred instrument term sheets in early stage funding is essential knowledge. This post will introduce some of the commonly [...]
Part Two: Positioning Your Startup to Appeal to Angel Investors A previous article introduced the concept of reviewing and structuring a startup to appeal to angel investors. That article briefly discussed some of the common points of inspection for the due diligence conducted by an interested angel. This article [...]
Understanding Convertible Note Term Sheets in Early Stage Funding Once an angel has decided to invest in a startup, they will either seek a convertible note or equity in the form of preferred stock. In either case, a term sheet is often used to communicate the basic details of [...]
Positioning Your Startup to Appeal to Angel Investors After initial seed money and the money from friends and family has been exhausted, early stage startups enter a challenging phase in the financial life of the company. For biotech startups in particular, this can be the beginning of a relentless [...]
Choice of Entity for Biotech Startups A key decision for any startup is which entity type to choose—and choice of entity for biotech startups is no exception. The primary advantage of forming a legal business entity is to shield the personal assets of the owners from the liabilities of [...]
Directors and Officers Insurance: Do Startups Need It? Among the many types of insurance startup companies might consider, Directors and Officers (D&O) Insurance may have the biggest impact in terms of making the company more attractive to interested investors and potential talent. D&O insurance covers specific risks not addressed [...]
Business Start-Up Strategies As you start a new business, it will take hours of planning to turn a dream into reality. Entrepreneurship requires determination, motivation, and knowledge. There will be many challenges before and after you launch, but we have provided you with eight strategies to help begin [...]
Start an Internet Business Over the last decade, the internet has changed the face of business. Before the internet, commerce was, in large part, dominated by those who had the means to open and support “brick-and-mortar” stores or offices. As the internet has gained more and more users, first [...]
Starting a Biotechnology Business Starting a biotechnology business entails many of the same legal and business principles required to start any business and reviewing the page “Starting a Business” is a good starting point. The following is an overview of the biotechnology industry beyond generally applicable principles: Biotechnology Business [...]
Starting a New Business Starting a business begins with planning. However, once the plan is in place, the plan must be executed. Below are the ten steps you will need to execute to transform your business idea into an operating business. #1. Write a Business Plan A well written [...]
