Incorporation & Equity
Incorporation and Equity: Getting Your Startup and Your Co-Founder Split Right
Incorporation is one of the first real decisions you make as a founder, and one of the easiest to get wrong. Delaware or California. C-corp or LLC. When to file. What needs to be signed before you take a dollar from anyone.
Then there's the conversation most co-founding teams keep putting off: who owns what, and why. Equity splits often get settled fast, on a handshake, before anyone has done much work. That's also the hardest thing to unwind once the company has momentum and real money is on the table. Kit will cover how to run that conversation while it's still easy, what vesting and cliffs are actually protecting you from, and what your options are if your split was set early and no longer matches who's carrying the load.
Kit Ryan, Associate at Pillsbury, walks through how these decisions get made in practice, what a rushed setup costs you a year later, and the paperwork every early company needs in place before it hires or raises.
Kit will also introduce Pillsbury Propel, a new resource built by Pillsbury's emerging growth team. Founders get customizable incorporation packages, advisory and consulting agreements, hiring documents, and a library of guidance written for companies at this stage. Low cost, no catch.
What we'll cover
Entity choice and jurisdiction, and what actually matters at your stage
How to have the co-founder equity conversation before it turns into a standoff
Vesting, cliffs, and what happens when a co-founder walks away early
IP assignment and what your company needs to own
When you need a lawyer and what you can handle on your own
Who this is for
Founders who haven't incorporated yet, co-founding teams who haven't nailed down a split, teams heading into a raise, and anyone who filed fast and wants a second set of eyes on it.
Bring your questions. We'll leave time for them.
This workshop is part of the SBOP program through Accelerate California, the Inclusive Innovation Hubs initiative led by the California Office of the Small Business Advocate (CalOSBA).