Software contract lawyer and SaaS attorney drafting app development agreements, software development agreements, SaaS contracts and software licensing agreements Andrew S. Bosin helps mobile app, software, SaaS and tech startup companies across the US and can be reached for free consultation at 201-446-9643.

Andrew specializes in helping mobile app, software and SaaS startups get off the ground. Whether that’s incorporating in Delaware or drafting and negotiating mobile app development agreements or drafting terms and conditions, privacy policies and SaaS MSA customer subscription agreements.

Based in New Jersey right outside New York City, Andrew has helped well over 300 SaaS, Mobile App, Cloud, Technology and web based startup companies, vendors, entrepreneurs, businesses and Delaware Corporations across the US with understanding their liabilities, risks and obligations with entering into SaaS and software contracts. 

Entrepreneurs from all over the US seek out Andrew’s SaaS contract lawyer legal advice on SaaS legal issues.

This is because he knows from his own entrepreneurial experiences how to build a SaaS startup having created and launched two Delaware corporation SaaS startups with partners.

Andrew’s entrepreneurial experience, this journey, having put in thousands of hours in building his own startups has led him to be able to help early seed stage growth and established companies make pragmatic and effective decisions that drive startup business growth.

Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) is an industry that is expanding each year as companies switch their business models and new technology is developed.

You should hire a SaaS law firm familiar with SaaS laws to draft SaaS agreements to fill your legal needs. 

If you have started a SaaS company and wondering about the legal challenges you may face you would be smart to look into hiring an attorney with a firm understanding of SaaS legal issues, as starting any company has certain legal issues that a highly specialized lawyer who understands SaaS legal issues such as Andrew S. Bosin can help your company with.

When you’re looking for a new SaaS Lawyer, what are some things you should expect?  

SaaS Legal Agreements and Contracts

The SaaS agreement is going to make up the bulk of the legalwork that a top SaaS Attorney will do for you, as it is probably your most important contract. This is because it is the agreement that you sign with customers. 

You will need to find and hire a lawyer to help you think through the language and terms of your SaaS agreement.

You will need to analyze the entire lifecycle of your dealings with your customers and plan accordingly.

You need to consider how payments will be processed, how will auto renewals work, are you offering a Service Level Agreement (SLA), can customers terminate for a non material breach reason and if they do are they entitled to a pro rata refund of the fees paid to your company?

You will also need to think about how disputes will be resolved, through arbitration, mediation or lawsuit and which state law will govern the interpretation of the agreement. 

Your SaaS agreement lawyer should also help you draft end-user-license agreements, MSA, subscription and licensing agreements, along with your Terms and Conditions and Privacy Policy, the latter two agreements to be placed on your website.

Unlike most SaaS agreements that customers just tick to move on, you need to acknowledge each time you update your operating system, and your users will actually read this contract in detail.

SaaS is in every industry, so you will be interacting with individuals working at all levels, CEOs, CTO’S, CMO’s and managers as well as your customers’ legal counsel. 

This is why it is so important to put as much plain English as possible in the agreement. The agreement should not be confusing or ambiguous or have language in it that is hard to understand.

Your lawyer must have a strong understanding of data privacy laws and regulations. Because SaaS companies operate on cloud storage, they are responsible for maintaining, serving and storing large amounts of personal information and data. 

Because SaaS companies that cater to enterprise customers are selling their software internationally, your attorney must have a strong understanding of laws outside the US including the European Union General Data Protection Regulation. 

A strong SaaS agreement will contain language that deals with data privacy and that limits your company’s liability, while affirming to your customers that your company is taking the necessary precautions to protect their personal and confidential information. 

It’s important to make sure that your initial SaaS agreements are done well. If not, you can potentially be held liable for things that could have been easily avoided with a contract that has been drafted properly.

Although you may be seeking to mimic template agreements offered by the online, DIY websites, it is unwise to do so. 

Early Seed Stage SaaS Startup Legal Checklist

Andrew often counsels early seed stage SaaS startup companies about Delaware incorporation, the pros and cons and what corporate structure may be the right fit for the company.

One of the most important messages that Andrew tries to convey to early stage startups is that while they might have created the best product but with no earnings it will take a serious effort to raise investor monies.

What Andrew tells his startup clients is that it takes more than grit or tenacity to raise capital. It also takes more than just a great product.

It takes early stage startups to realize that there needs to be a financial business end component supporting their startup.

When a startup pitches a savvy investor the investor is going to likely ask questions about expenses, anticipated revenues, losses and what market factors will affect all of these things.

Most startups do not create financial projections and this is a huge mistake.

If you are going to ask a sophisticated investor to put money in your company and you don’t know what your anticipated expenses will be in let’s say Q3 going forward, you’re probably not going to win over that investor.

From the hundreds of calls he has done with startup founders over the years, Andrew has learned that most entrepreneurs unless they are in their second or third startup have no clue how to create financial projections.

Making matters worse, startups don’t realize just how important financial projections are for raising capital.

Andrew understands that a successive SaaS relationship between vendor and customer can be achieved by hiring an experienced SaaS Attorney to draft, review or negotiate the agreement to minimize his clients risk and liability.

Andrew also counsels technology startups and businesses with licensing their technology to other businesses as a key element of their strategy.

Andrew understands that his client, the licensor needs to be protected, to the extent possible, by the license or technology transfer agreement.

Andrew also helps clients enter into agreements with other businesses to develop technology jointly which often involves creating language to protect his client’s intellectual property.

What State to Incorporate In and Why

Based on legal experience in counseling SaaS startups and actually owning a SaaS startup with partners Andrew believes that if you need to raise capital to start your SaaS company or anticipate needing money in the next year or so to scale and support the business with employees, developers or contractors that you should give serious consideration to incorporating as a Delaware C Corp.

A Delaware C Corporation might also be the right choice for a startup that is short on cash and perhaps the only way to motivate let’s say a developer to do work for the company is to offer them sweat equity.

You should absolutely speak with your accountant before incorporating to make sure that a C Corp is suitable for the type of business that you will be operating if you are concerned about how much in taxes you will be paying.

With that said, unless you have tons of orders for your SaaS application before you have even incorporated the amount in taxes you “might” pay at some point should be the least of your concerns and making sales should be your top priority.

Why Startups love Delaware C Corps.

It is no mystery that VC’s love Delaware Corporations. A C Corp from a business management standpoint is much easier to operate than an LLC which requires continual amendment of an operating agreement every time your entity makes a serious business decision.

With a Delaware C Corp, let’s say you need to issue more shares to hire additional talent, all it really requires you to do is to draft a resolution authorizing the C Corp to take such an action and then take a vote of the shareholders.

Typically, early stage growth companies consist of a few people with one or two owning the majority of the stock so voting and approving of such resolutions should be quick and painless in a Delaware C Corp.

Issuing too much stock to founders will result in a negative effect on investors

If a VC sees that you have issued most or all of the shares in the first round to the co-founders leaving no shares for key hires or investors your company will look like a bunch of amateurs. This creates two major problems.

First, the C Corp, if it wants to bring on new talent or take on investor monies will have to issue additional shares and everyone owning stock will get diluted; long story short everyone who received shares in the first round well they will be worth less. This does not look good optically for any startup pitching a VC.

VC’s will also stay away from startups where the founders are fully vested in shares, so what is holding a founder back from quitting his or her own startup and taking all of their shares with them if a better opportunity presents itself.

A founder would be hesitant to quit his or her own startup knowing that they would be leaving stock on the table that has not yet vested.

If your company issues all of its stock immediately there will be no stock left over to attract key hires that you will need during the first year of your startup’s existence.

Any VC who is good at what they do will question why you now have to authorize the issuance of additional stock not only to hire additional talent but to feed the VC that is providing much needed capital.

These early moves that you make in your startup will most likely affect whether you are successful or not.

Don’t issue a lot of equity upfront to hires who do not have an effect on the bottom line

Some startups fall in love with key hires because they have a good reputation or are well known in their industry. Without sales there are no investors and without recurring revenues your company will likely not survive.

Thus, in the absence of much needed software development help the most important key hire is someone with a demonstrated record of sales in your vertical or industry.

You don’t want to overpay for this person. You need to be smart about the amount of stock that has been issued and put yourself in the shoes of a VC who is inquiring why your startup gave so much stock to a key hire when they have not proven themselves.

It is better to issue a key hire a little bit of stock upfront and then condition the vesting of their remaining stock on hitting certain milestones which should be reasonable.

If they fail to meet their targets and they are fired or quit at least you can show your startup’s VC that your company did not give up much stock and in return took a risk on a proven individual.

With that being said, one could look at the definition of “bottom line” differently in the context of hiring someone with a special skill set that will save the startup money and hopefully get the product to market quicker.

Case in point, if a startup has no money to pay for software development but has found a developer willing to work for equity.

Because of his hard work and exceptional personal service and attention to his client’s legal matters Andrew’s clients have given him twenty nine 5 Star Google Reviews.

https://saascontractsattorney.business.site/#testimonials

Andrew drafts, reviews and negotiates SaaS and software contracts and licensing agreements and EULA, MSA and subscription agreements for SaaS, technology, web3, cloud, software and mobile app startup companies, vendors, customers, licensees, providers and resellers in Los Angeles, New York City, Miami, San Jose, Phoenix, Denver, Boulder, San Francisco, California, Delaware, Brooklyn, Columbus, Cleveland, Ohio, Salt Lake City, Boston, Raleigh, Connecticut, Washington DC, San Diego, Silicon Valley, Baltimore, Maryland, Charlotte, Jacksonville, Tampa and Orlando, Florida, Atlanta, Memphis, Hartford, Cincinnati, Oklahoma City, Sacramento, St. Louis, Kansas City, Houston, Fort Worth, Austin, Dallas and San Antonio, Texas, Indianapolis, Nashville and Chicago.

What is Software-as-a-service (SaaS)? A way of delivering software by which access to customers subscribing or licensing the software is web based which differs from on premises software which is bought and installed on individual computers.

SaaS and cloud-based service products, applications, agreements and services have completely transformed the software industry.

Both SaaS vendors and customers need to understand how to structure, offer and pay for service offerings, create and negotiate agreements and manage their businesses in an ever changing environment.