San Jose Startup Attorneys & Lawyers

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Grant M.

Grant Maynard

128 reviews
Grant represents high-growth companies in all aspects of formation, financing, and intellectual property issues. He has previously done general corporate, intellectual, and real estate work at Nebraska's oldest law firm before transitioning to a more virtual lifestyle. As an entrepreneur himself, he understands the need to balance legal and business interests.
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Jon P.

Jon Parsons

9 reviews
Over 45 years of hands-on experience with how business works, including formation, operations, compliance, employment law, contracts, trademarks, copyrights, and real estat... read more
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Monica W.

Monica Winghart

6 reviews
Monica is the founder of Voltage Law and specializes in working with tech, SaaS, consumer products and healthcare industries. Throughout her career, Monica has held leaders... read more
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Sanjiv D.

Sanjiv Dhawan

26 reviews
Sanjiv Dhawan is the managing attorney at InnovaTech Law Group based in Santa Clara, California. He focuses primarily on general corporate and business law. InnovaTech emerged when Sanjiv decided to start his own practice, seeing a need for uncomplicated, inexpensive legal advice. An entrepreneur himself with several startups under his belt, Sanjiv understands the needs of business owners.
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Wanli X.

Wanli Xu

16 reviews
Wanli has over 15 years experience serving as outside general counsel and trusted legal advisor to companies across multiple industries and through all stages of growth, he... read more
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Gene R.

Gene Rhough

15 reviews
Harvard Law/MIT grad, UpCounsel top 25% ("𝘴𝘵𝘦𝘭𝘭𝘢𝘳" 𝘣𝘢𝘥𝘨𝘦), UpWork top 10% ("𝘛𝘰𝘱 𝘙𝘢𝘵𝘦𝘥"), Klout top 2.5% (𝘷𝘦𝘯𝘵𝘶𝘳𝘦 𝘭𝘢𝘸), top 1.5% (𝘐𝘗). Practiced at top law firm Wilson Sonsi... read more
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Meng L.

Meng Li

13 reviews
I have a decent technology background of computer science and technology combined with experience of cyber investigation and forensics. With the recent hype of blockchain a... read more
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Russell M.

Russell Murphy

12 reviews
I am the founder of lex[array], p.c. a virtual law practice in California. I have over thirty years’ experience working in private practice and as outside general counsel a... read more
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Ranvir S.

Ranvir Sandhu

10 reviews
20+ years of experience working at reputable Silicon Valley law firms. Represented clients large and small, some notable *Craigslist - capitalization and org matters *S... read more
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Adam B.

Adam Binder

6 reviews
Adam Binder is a corporate attorney with almost two decades of experience. He is licensed to practice law in California and obtained his Juris Doctor degree from the McGeorge University School of Law. Adam is highly experienced in labor and employment law, and specializes in drafting and negotiating commercial contracts. Adam has been the vice president of legal operations at Percolate Industries, Inc. since June 2017.
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Legal Tips and Information

 


 

Protecting Your Intellectual Property

 

For many startups, the most valuable asset(s) they own are in the form of intellectual property – whether the IP in question is a unique technology, process, creative work, or brand.  It is therefore critical to the success of the business that these property rights are protected against present and future infringement.  If you fail to adequately protect your IP rights, your startup may quickly get pushed out of the market by businesses with financial and other infrastructural advantages.

 

Register Your IP

 

Registering your IP with the United States Patent & Trademark Office (UPSTO) is good practice for enforcement of trademarks and copyright, and legally necessary for enforcement of patent rights.  Registration can be extremely complicated for the layperson, as there are a number of regulations affecting the submission of a valid application.  Further, you’ll have to consider certain strategic aspects related to your IP, such as how protectable it would be even if registration were granted.  A skilled startup attorney can advise you and how to restructure your IP to ensure that it is protectable.

 

Hire a Dedicated Patent Attorney

 

If you believe that you may have a technology or process that is patentable, then you’ll have to register it with the USPTO.  Without a patent grant, you will not be legally entitled to protect such IP from infringement.

 

Though a patent application can be submitted by an attorney who has not passed the patent BAR, and can even be submitted by a non-attorney, it is a good idea to work with a dedicated patent attorney if you’re going to be submitting a patent application to the USPTO – a successful patent application is complex, expensive, and benefits greatly from specialized experience with the process.

 

Confidentiality Agreements and Provisions

 

Trade secrets should be protected through the use of strict confidentiality agreements (and/or provisions inserted into employment and service contracts).  IP damage can occur even without full infringement.  If a former employee or business partner leaks partial information to a competitor, it could hurt your positioning in your industry.

 

Pursue Infringers

 

Your startup attorney should either have the litigation experience necessary to pursue infringers on his or her own, or should be able to connect you with a skilled IP litigator who is equipped to do so.  Potential infringement must be dealt with before it negatively affects your market position and the power of your brand.

 


 

Qualities of a Great Startup Attorney

 

Every attorney has a unique set of strengths and shortcomings.  There are, however, certain qualities that are often shared by the best startup attorneys.  As you search for a startup attorney in San Jose, try to filter for attorneys who demonstrate the following qualities.

 

Engaged and Dynamic

 

Your attorney should be highly-engaged with clients and provide dynamic services in response to client needs.  What does this mean, exactly?

 

Suppose that you hire an attorney to register your startup business as a corporation and draft some employment contracts.  The attorney does the bare minimum work necessary to accomplish their task.  They listen to what you want done, register the business, and draft the contract as requested.  This is not how a great startup attorney works with clients, however.

 

The best startup attorneys offer their own perspective as input.  They work with a client to ensure that the client is aware of alternative options.  A dynamic startup attorney in the above example would explain alternative corporate forms that might be worthwhile to consider, and they would discuss the employment agreement provisions with you to make sure that the terms of the agreement are favorable to your goals.

 

Finger on the Pulse of Change

 

Regulation is always subject to change, in nearly every industry.  Your attorney should not only be familiar with regulations as they are now, but should also be “plugged in” to potential changes coming down the regulatory pipeline.  If significant regulation will be implemented in a year, your San Jose startup lawyer should be informed about it and should work with you to help your business prepare for it.

 

Experience in Your Industry

 

Though it’s not a pre-requisite to receiving quality legal services, you can benefit a lot from working with a startup attorney who has experience in your industry.  Industry standards do affect legal strategy, sometimes indirectly.  For example, in the consumer-facing software industry, aggressive litigation is received poorly and may damage your brand.  On the business-side, litigation is much more acceptable and is less likely to hurt the perception of your brand.

 


 

Avoiding Litigation

 

Civil litigation can be extremely costly for an early stage startup, from both a financial and time/effort perspective.  Generally speaking, each party benefits when costly civil litigation is avoided, assuming that some other compromise is made.

 

Of course, litigation is inevitable to some degree.  At some point in the life of your startup, you are likely to engage in a dispute with a third-party.  Thus, minimizing the risk of litigation is key to managing the long-term cost to your business.

 


 

Deal Fairly with Partners

 

To avoid litigation, make sure to deal fairly with your business partners.  The more fairly you deal with your partners, the less likely there will be a future legal dispute. 

 

What can you do to ensure fairness and transparency?

 

When drafting a contract, do not move forward with executing the contract until you are certain that the other party or parties fully understand the terms of the agreement.  Try to minimize the amount of last-minute changes, as they may come across as dishonest.  Finally, if you later are forced by circumstance to breach a contract, give as much advance notice as possible to limit the damages caused to the other contracting parties.

 


 

Use Preventative Measures

 

There are a number of preventative measure you can take to limit the risk of extensive litigation down the road.

 

First, you may want to consider including a liquidated damages clause in your contracts.  A liquidated damages clause sets a fixed damages amount to be paid out in the event of breach.  This brings a degree of certainty to contract breach.  Because each party is “prepared” to accept certain terms for breach, there is less likelihood of litigation.

 

Second, you may also want to consider having your attorney approach disputes with a compromising negotiation strategy before filing a lawsuit.  If a compromise can be reached between the disputing parties, then costly litigation will be unnecessary to resolve said dispute.

 


 

Consider Alternative Dispute Resolution

 

Alternative dispute resolution – and specifically, arbitration – is a great way to minimize the cost of litigation.

 

Arbitration, unlike standard court litigation, is a private matter, and as such the content of arbitration will not be revealed to the public (thus preventing damage to your brand).  Arbitration is also over much more quickly.   A neutral arbitrator is chosen by the parties to oversee the dispute.  The arbitrator assesses the evidence and argument of each party, then renders judgment.  Judgment is then confirmed by a court, and becomes final.

 

To make use of arbitration, ask your startup attorney to draft contracts that include an arbitration clause.

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Legal Services Offered by Our On-Demand San Jose Startup Attorneys

On UpCounsel, you can find and connect with top-rated San Jose startup attorneys & lawyers that provide a range of startup law services for startups and entrepreneurs that are starting a business. Any of the top-rated San Jose startup lawyers you connect with will be available to help with a variety of your startup law related legal needs on-demand or on an ongoing basis in the city of San Jose, CA.

From primarily dealing with things like business formation, contracts, leases, equity financing, securities, and intellectual property protection, the San Jose startup lawyers on UpCounsel can help you with a variety of specialized and general startup law related legal matters. No matter what type of startup law needs you have, you can easily hire an experienced San Jose startup lawyer on UpCounsel to help you today.

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