Silicon valley start up

Back in the late 1990s, when Silicon Valley start-ups were booming, law firms eager to obtain their business often agreed to perform work for simply an equity share in the company.But the subsequent dot-com crash made many rethink this arrangement, as the value of client companies plummeted. Now a number are deferring legal fees rather than forgoing payment, but still taking stock in the client company, the Wall Street Journal reports.“I charge a small retainer, and then defer billing,” founding partner Antone Johnson of the one-man Bottom Line Law Group tells the newspaper. In addition, he notes, “I’ll charge a special rate for start-ups, and in return I’ll ask for equity of about 1 percent.” … [Read more...] about Post Dot-com Crash, Silicon Valley Law Firms Still Want Start-Up Clients, But Take New View on Fees

According to a recent article, Silicon Valley tech firms are using marketing tactics geared more towards fraternity brothers than programming savants. The problem? Not only is it sexist at times, but it is alienating a large chunk of qualified tech professionals. Here are a few examples:Sqoot, a site that offers application programming interfaces, advertised “perks” for a recent hackathon event, including this not-so-thinly-veiled sexist one: “Women: Need another beer? Let one of our friendly (female) event staff get that for you.”Recently, a start-up pitch presentation given to potential investors featured a recurring photo of leaping, bikini-clad womenA programmer was quoted as saying he was invited by tech industry recruiters to a party in Malibu “where there were naked women in the hot tub.”Klout, a social media analytics company, displayed a poster at a Stanford University career fair that stated: “Want to bro down and crush code? Klout is … [Read more...] about “Brogrammers” Giving Silicon Valley a Bad Name?

In January, the National Law Review had pleasure of attending the Annual Marketing Partner Forum in beautiful Rancho Palos Altos, California. Programing was provided by the Legal Executives Institute at Thomson Reuters and featured over 15 hours of dynamic workshops. Hundreds of  marketing partners, managing partners, in-house counsel and senior-level marketing and business development professionals were in attendance.The “New Competition” program featured emerging legal technologies within Silicon Valley. Catherine Hammack of Jurispect, Monica Zent of Foxwordy, and Daniel Lewis of Ravel Law each showcased their innovative technologies and shared their thoughts as to where innovation is taking the legal industry in 2015. “ Jurispect will help fundamentally transform how companies operate by providing organizations with a real-time analytical view of both exposure and opportunities to take proactive steps to manage legal and regulatory risk. ”  - … [Read more...] about The New Competition – Emerging Legal Technologies Out of Silicon Valley

Episode 20 of Silicon Valley explores numerous classic conflicts: consumer-oriented v. enterprise business model; engineers v. sales; revolutionary vs. safe; long-term goals v. short-term profits; Erlich v. Jian-Yang … Richard’s plan has been to transform the world by giving away the basic version of Pied Piper’s revolutionary compression technology, rapidly building a huge user base, and hoping to charge for premium features one day (the consumer, “freemium” business model). However, CEO “Action” Jack Barker and his new sales team—preoccupied with implementing his “Conjoined Triangles of Success”—want an immediate focus on revenue and insist that Pied Piper make enterprise software they can immediately sell to big business customers. Worried even that won’t be easy enough to sell, Jack’s team strips away every cool and revolutionary feature until they’ve transformed Pied Piper into a business-facing … [Read more...] about Jack’s Box (Silicon Valley – Episode 20)

There are so many legal issues in Episode 15 of HBO's Silicon Valley that it’s hard to know where to begin, so I’m going to start at the end: porn.  Pied Piper is competing against nemesis Endframe for a $15 million contract from the online porn company Intersite.  If Pied Piper wins the contract it will allow Pied Piper to stay afloat and avoid being absorbed and obliterated by Endframe.Episode 15 was not explicit about the terms of the deal.  Does Pied Piper plan to license its technology for deployment on Intersite’s current platform, or is Pied Piper offering to host/store and serve Intersite’s content?  Based on Pied Piper’s website I assume that Pied Piper plans to compress, host and serve content provided by its regular users and its business customers—starting with Intersite’s pornographic content.  Are there any legal issues Pied Piper should consider before launching this business model and jumping into bed … [Read more...] about Other Peoples’ (Adult) Content (Episode 15) of Silicon Valley