Future Proofed Company Structures
Lawyers For Tech Start Ups in the UK
If you are a founder or owner-operator, have you ever stopped to ask yourself what your long-term goals are and what assets drive the value of your business?
If you haven’t, your corporate structure may not support your ambitions and could even slow you down. A company structure should facilitate the ambition of founding teams and protect the intellectual property or assets the value of a business is built on. Here Dragon Argent, corporate law consultants have taken a look at the importance of investing in the structure of your business early.
The Problem Statement
Too often, entrepreneurs are poorly advised at the point at which a company is formed, acting on siloed professional advice that can create issues that are time-consuming and costly to unravel later. A poorly planned corporate structure can:
Be difficult to adapt to changing needs
Can fuel risk for investors
Increase tax liability
Fail to protect founders long term interests
Ultimately, creating barriers that make it harder for founders and entrepreneurs to achieve the long-term objectives they set out with.
The Solution
If planned appropriately, creating a future proofed and flexible corporate structure can be straightforward and cost efficient if you consider:
The intellectual property or assets the value of the business is based on and how to protect them long term
Your likely expansion or joint venture ambitions
Future mergers or disposals opportunities
Joined up and commercial professional advice will consider these factors and result in a bespoke structure and framework that will help you achieve:
Appropriate tax treatment and protection of entrepreneur, EMI and EIS relief status
Flexibility to license or create Special Purpose Vehicles to adapt to opportunities and threats
Protection of shareholders’ long-term interests
Correct treatment of intercompany loans and other accounting considerations
These benefits become harder and more costly to realise the more complex a business becomes. There are a myriad of objectives a founder can implement at any given time, but ensuring you have a future-proofed company structure that mitigates risk and allows you to respond to opportunities in an agile way is something that will deliver value throughout the lifecycle of a business.
If you'd like to discuss how to better protect your IP or assets, tax relief status and long term interests, get in touch with our startup law firm on the details below as we'd love to learn more about your business.