Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

What Start-ups Should Know About Hiring a Lawyer

thedailymuse.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 44 posts

Re: What Start-ups Should Know About Hiring a Lawyer

#31

Post by cookiecaper »

mbesto wrote: post #29
cookiecaper wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you actually know a web firm anywhere that will charge $1000/hour? Such a rate is unheard of in software consulting as far as I know. Maybe someone like EDS who has huge public companies in their pockets will charge these rates, but I personally have never encountered it and I don't know anyone who charges it. The most expensive software consulting I've seen in the wild is $350/hr, and that was for a very specific…

> Such a rate is unheard of in software consulting as far as I know. $1000 is not unheard of at all. Yes, you're right, the likes of EDS, IBM, Accenture, etc. are easily charging the upwards of $1k/day. But any decently sized firm (50+ employees) is going to charge roughly that amount. You'd be shocked to hear some of the price tags on corporate website development... I think this is the overall point. Go for a small…

>Yes, you're right, the likes of EDS, IBM, Accenture, etc. are easily charging the upwards of $1k/day.

I said $1k PER HOUR, not per day.

I'd like to know of software consultancies that charge that much money per hour, excepting the typical fleecing when your deals are built on backroom backscratches like you'd find with the public companies served by EDS et al.

Percona has over fifty employees and they charge $350/hr for standard services and $450/hr for premium service. You only go to Percona if you have a very, very specific MySQL problem that needs to be resolved, and the staff at Percona is populated with as many major MySQL players as are willing. They definitely represent the big guns, when you really, really need your MySQL stuff fixed ASAP and can't fiddle around with people who aren't core MySQL developers, the people who invented the system. They are the top of the line in their niche, and they charge as much as a fresh-from-college lawyer.

A normal, generic consultancy will charge between $100/hr-$200/hr and often their employees aren't anything to sneeze at either, they're just less specialized and therefore have a less compelling case for such high rates. I know of no one in the realm of standard or even most niche commercial software consultancy that rakes in $1000/hr+.

If you know such a company, I'd like to learn their strategy so that I can start charging that much.

Re: What Start-ups Should Know About Hiring a Lawyer

#32

Post by arethuza »

kryptiskt wrote: post #30
atirip wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In US certainly, but here's what I learnt living in Europe. You basically do not need lawyer. Ever. You can live happy life and run happy business. Without lawyers, without fear that somebody/anybody can/will sue you of anything. Wthout fear of shady contracts, shady business practicies etc. And even in very rare occasion when somebody decides to sue you and this case goes to court, even then you do not always need a…

> Without lawyers, without fear that somebody/anybody can/will sue you of anything. Wthout fear of shady contracts, shady business practicies etc. That is just not true. Nowhere can you be happy-go-lucky about the contracts you sign. Even where there is a degree of protection for consumers like in Sweden, and I wouldn't just assume that everything will work out fine even then, b2b is very caveat emptor. > In Europe y…

"Navigating the UK legal system is wholly unlike doing it in Italy"

Especially as there isn't really a single UK legal system.

Re: What Start-ups Should Know About Hiring a Lawyer

#33

Post by rdl »

swampthing wrote: post #19
rdl wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IMO, this is true. 1) Saul: "sometimes you need a criminal lawyer". 2) Startups: "sometimes you need an entrepreneur lawyer". I've always heard that the difference between competent and great lawyers is that competent lawyers will tell you what you can do within the law (i.e. how you can handle a financing round, etc.), and great lawyers will help you figure out how to do the best thing for yourself and your business…

It's true, but it's also pretty hard to figure out whether you're actually remaining within the law since things are so rarely tested (at least in the startup world).

For really crazy stuff people get no-action letters from SEC in advance of doing crazy things ("private letter rulings").

Re: What Start-ups Should Know About Hiring a Lawyer

#34

Post by veidr »

meriksson wrote: post #28

TL;DR: Since dealing with high-end lawyers is often tough, contract someone to do it for you. At my company we went through a handful of lawyers, mostly from big firms. We were extremely unhappy with the experience, especially since we did not seem to get reasonable value for our money, ours being a very small account for any established law firm. Eventually we found a solution that was perfect for us. We now work wi…

This is such awesome advice. Find and hire one good lawyer, who the deals with all your other lawyers.

It might not apply if your investors have their own legal muscle that they can introduce. But, if you are insanely expensive (manpower-wise) to deal with finding, retaining, and managing decent legal counsel (to say nothing of replacing them due to a sudden conflict of interest, when you unexpectedly find yourself facing a huge firm like Apple/J&J/Halliburton/etc, who seemingly contract 99% of all law firms).

Re: What Start-ups Should Know About Hiring a Lawyer

#36

Post by veidr »

atirip wrote: post #20
jacques_chester wrote: post #6

Here's what I learnt in law school: Do you have a legal question? See a lawyer. A few hundred dollars now versus an uncapped downside later? You're basically crazy if you don't. Your lawyer and accountant are to your business what a doctor and a dentist are to your body. You see them regularly, they give you specialist advice and they can save you serious trouble if you take their advice. These individuals see more p…

In US certainly, but here's what I learnt living in Europe. You basically do not need lawyer. Ever. You can live happy life and run happy business. Without lawyers, without fear that somebody/anybody can/will sue you of anything. Wthout fear of shady contracts, shady business practicies etc. And even in very rare occasion when somebody decides to sue you and this case goes to court, even then you do not always need a…

I know posters below are ripping your 'in Europe' phrasing, because truly, there's no 'Europe' when it comes to legal systems and judgements.

But after stints in Malaga, Amsterdam, London, and Marseilles, I believe you. The legal systems there in Europe, in aggregate, do seem fairer and more logical than what the USA has. Especially with respect to small business.

Maybe "Ever." was overstating the case. But I do think that in most of Europe you need to worry about litigation so much less that it makes the US system seem bizarre.

(This is also true in Tokyo, where I live. This makes me suspect that some kind of weird outlier thing is going on in the USA with regard to litigation, as it is with infant mortality, literacy, etc.)

Re: What Start-ups Should Know About Hiring a Lawyer

#38

Post by shin_lao »

atirip wrote: post #20
jacques_chester wrote: post #6

Here's what I learnt in law school: Do you have a legal question? See a lawyer. A few hundred dollars now versus an uncapped downside later? You're basically crazy if you don't. Your lawyer and accountant are to your business what a doctor and a dentist are to your body. You see them regularly, they give you specialist advice and they can save you serious trouble if you take their advice. These individuals see more p…

In US certainly, but here's what I learnt living in Europe. You basically do not need lawyer. Ever. You can live happy life and run happy business. Without lawyers, without fear that somebody/anybody can/will sue you of anything. Wthout fear of shady contracts, shady business practicies etc. And even in very rare occasion when somebody decides to sue you and this case goes to court, even then you do not always need a…

You obviously never had to fire anyone, had a customer who refused to pay you or had to sign an important deal with a large company.

Re: What Start-ups Should Know About Hiring a Lawyer

#39

Post by ky3 »

veidr wrote: post #36
atirip wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In US certainly, but here's what I learnt living in Europe. You basically do not need lawyer. Ever. You can live happy life and run happy business. Without lawyers, without fear that somebody/anybody can/will sue you of anything. Wthout fear of shady contracts, shady business practicies etc. And even in very rare occasion when somebody decides to sue you and this case goes to court, even then you do not always need a…

I know posters below are ripping your 'in Europe' phrasing, because truly, there's no 'Europe' when it comes to legal systems and judgements. But after stints in Malaga, Amsterdam, London, and Marseilles, I believe you. The legal systems there in Europe, in aggregate, do seem fairer and more logical than what the USA has. Especially with respect to small business. Maybe " Ever. " was overstating the case. But I do th…

More litigation = more justice in the USA.

Re: What Start-ups Should Know About Hiring a Lawyer

#40

Post by oregonspanish »

veidr wrote: post #34
meriksson wrote: post #28

TL;DR: Since dealing with high-end lawyers is often tough, contract someone to do it for you. At my company we went through a handful of lawyers, mostly from big firms. We were extremely unhappy with the experience, especially since we did not seem to get reasonable value for our money, ours being a very small account for any established law firm. Eventually we found a solution that was perfect for us. We now work wi…

This is such awesome advice. Find and hire one good lawyer, who the deals with all your other lawyers. It might not apply if your investors have their own legal muscle that they can introduce. But, if you are insanely expensive (manpower-wise) to deal with finding, retaining, and managing decent legal counsel (to say nothing of replacing them due to a sudden conflict of interest, when you unexpectedly find yourself f…

Do you think that other startups would be interested in this type of in-house counsel-as-a-service?

This would give teams the benefit of having single source that knows all your issues and goals, but could also negotiate effective rates with specialists.

Post reply on HN