Law and Justice

Posts Tagged ‘Plan’

Most companies that are worthy of raising venture capital have proprietary Intellectual Property (IP). In fact, the quality of the IP and the management team are often the two most important aspects of a venture capitalist’s investment decision. The challenge that many ventures face, however, is that most investors will not sign non-disclosure agreements (NDAs), and NDAs are critical to maintaining the proprietary nature of the IP. This article details the appropriate strategy for addressing proprietary IP in your business plan in order to attract investor attention while retaining the confidentiality of your inventions.

Focus on the Benefits of and Applications of the IP: The business plan should not discuss the confidential aspects of the IP. Rather, the plan should discuss the benefits of the IP. Remember that even the most amazing of technologies will not excite investors unless it has tangible benefits to customers.

The business plan first needs to discuss the products and services into which the IP will be integrated. It then must detail the benefits that these products and services have to customers and differentiate them from competitive products. When applicable, it is helpful to include non-confidential drawings and backup materials of the products and services in the Appendix.

Focus on Customer Needs and the Relevant Market Size: The business plan must also discuss how the benefits of the IP fulfill a large customer need. To accomplish this, the plan needs to detail customer wants and needs and prove that the company’s offerings specifically meet these needs.

Secondly, the plan needs to discuss the marketplace in which the IP is offered and the size of this marketplace. Critical to this analysis is determining the relevant market size. The relevant market size equals a company’s sales if it were to capture 100% of its specific niche of the market. For example, a medical device’s market size would not be the trillion dollar healthcare market, but rather the sales of all competing medical devices.

Focus on Competition and Competitive Differentiation: Your business plan must also prove that your IP is better than competitive inventions. In identifying competitors, note that listing no or few competitors has a negative connotation. It implies that there may not be a large enough customers need to support the company’s products and/or services. On the other hand, should there be too many competitors, and then the market may be too saturated to support the profitability of a new entrant. The answer — any company that also serves the customer needs that you serve should be considered a competitor.

The business plan should detail both the positive and negative aspects of competitors’ IP and products/services and validate that your offerings are either superior in general, or are superior in serving a specific customer niche.

Prove that you can execute on the Opportunity: As importantly as proving the quality of the IP and that a vast market exists for its applications, the business plan most prove that the company can successfully execute on the opportunity.

The plan should detail the company’s past accomplishments, including descriptions and dates when prior funding rounds were received, products and services were launched, revenue milestones were reached, key partnerships were executed, etc.

When a company is a complete start-up, and no milestones have been accomplished, the plan should focus on past accomplishments of the management team as an indicator of the company’s ability to execute successfully.

Results: Getting Investors to Sign the NDA: If you are able to convince the prospective investor that the IP is integrated into a product/service which yields real customer benefits in a large market, then the investor will take the quality of the invention for granted when reviewing the plan. Later, during the due diligence process, the investor will review the actual technology. At this point, a discussion regarding signing an NDA would be appropriate.

Creating a law firm marketing plan is critical to the long-term financial success of your practice. One of secrets of highly successful attorneys is that they make time to plan for the future. We recommend meeting at least twice a year to evaluate achievements, set new goals and work on your law firm marketing plan.

I was recently coaching a partner in a small west coast law firm about their plans for this year when he said, I’m not sure I see a point in setting goals because everything seems to quickly conspire against us and we easily get so caught up in the day to day operations of the firm that we don’t have time to focus on our goals. Then by the next time we meet, the priorities have all shifted.”

Perhaps you can relate. It’s easy to set goals; the hard part is staying focused on them long enough to accomplish them.

Here’s the first three power tips for lawyers to stay focused and achieve your law firm’s marketing and business development goals.

Here are the first three power tips.

Tip 1. Have a Written Plan. If a goal is important enough to have, then it’s important enough to write down. Carve out 2 hours, get out of your office, turn off your cell phone, and go somewhere creative and relaxing. Here are some of the areas to consider:

o Financial goals for your business. Do to just focus on the money, focus on how you will get there. If your average trademark client spends $5,000 with you, how many new clients will you need to break $500,000 this year (answer: 100)? That works out to about 2 new clients per week. Unless you want a volume law practice, you will need to develop a way to up sell clients into higher end services.

o Practice Area specific goals How many new estate plans do you want to do in the next 6 months? How many new trials are you willing to take on this year?

o Marketing Goals All the top law firms in the country recognize the importance of marketing and business development. You need to set measurable marketing goals. I will meet with 4 new referral sources every month. How are you going to meet them? Who is going to set those meetings up? Who will do the follow up?

o Strategic Business Goals This is where you start to think big about your practice. Challenge yourself, how can you come up with another $100,000 this year? How can you go from your current 5 referral sources to 30 in the next 6 months?

o Personal Goals Perhaps you need to schedule a vacation for yourself every quarter. Maybe you have an idea for a new business venture. What place does your family, friends, and significant other hold in your life?

Tip 2. Make Sure You’re Written Goals are S.M.A.R.T. Goals. This is a well known acronym for Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Results-oriented, and Timed. A good goal needs to incorporate all of these criteria. It is not sufficient to say I want to be a millionaire lawyer. That statement may be measurable, but does not include time frames, it does not lay out a specific game plan for how you will accomplish this goal.

An example of a SMART goal is: I want to meet in person with a minimum of 4 different potential referral sources every month for the next 6 months and ask them to send me business.

Tip 3. Ask Someone to Hold You Accountable. Accountability is key when it comes to keeping your marketing commitments. Whether it’s your firm partner, an attorney in a different firm, or a law firm marketing consultant, set up a regular time to meet with someone you trust and who has your best interests at heart and request they keep you accountable. Simply knowing that they will ask you about your progress every week can make a big difference to a lot of people.

Incoming search terms:

Unless you are in a coma, it doesn’t matter where you live in California, in Corona del Mar, San Diego, Orange County, CA, Palm Springs, Palm Desert, Long Beach, Santa Ana, Anaheim, Riverside, Chula Vista, Irvine, San Bernardino, Huntington Beach, Fontana, Moreno Valley, Oceanside, Rancho Cucamonga, Ontario, Garden Grove, Palmdale, Corona, Escondido, Orange, Fullerton, Costa Mesa, Victorville, Carlsbad, Temecula, Murrieta, Mission Viejo, El Cajon, Vista, Westminster, Santa Monica, Santa Barbara, Hesperia, Newport Beach, Buena Park, Indio, Rancho Mirage, Indian Wells or Coachella, you will have somehow heard there is an economic crisis going on, and that Congress passed a whopping $700 billion bailout plan.

What you may not know, is that Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson’s draft proposal for the bailout of financial service firms on Wall Street as it was presented to Congress was an unconstitutional power grab of monumental proportions.

Under Paulson’s plan, no oversight, no review and no challenges would have been allowed by the courts, by Congress or by individuals. Henry Paulson had proposed that he effectively be appointed economic czar.

Under Section 8 of his initial proposal, which for years to come, will undoubtedly form the basis for questions on bar exams for law students, “Decisions by the Secretary pursuant to the authority of this Act, are non-reviewable and committed to agency discretion, and may not be reviewed by any court of law or any administrative agency.”

Under Section 8 of this Act, the Treasury Secretary would arguably have become a more powerful figure than our largely missing-in-action President, more powerful than the head of the Federal Reserve, the SEC and Congress combined, and as such in violation of the Constitution of the United States of America.

The draft proposal was in conflict with the Constitution for the simple reason that our nation’s most important document provides that every member of the executive branch, including the Treasury Secretary, is subject to legislative and executive review. Neither Congress nor the executive may delegate its authority to a cabinet member. It would have been like Congress delegating all its power to Sarah Palin, or to a single congressman, or to Superdog for that matter.

As hard as it is to violate the nondelegation clause in the Constitution, if there has ever been a proposal to come out of the executive branch which does a good job of it, it has been argued that this is probably the one.

The question is, did the President tell Paulson to get a blank check from Congress and to heck with the Constitution or did Paulson come up with this on his own? Did the President and Paulson really believe that if they told Congress they needed this power in 24 hours like the TV show, that Congress, even the Republicans in Congress, would give it to him?

In bad times even more so than in good times, we expect the leaders of this country to protect the Constitution of the United States, not to usurp the powers it conveys on other branches of government. Let us hope that in the coming days and months as this country tries to mend itself from this economic crisis, that Congress remembers what the executive branch seems to have forgotten – the Constitution.  

If you have a constitutional, or first amendment law issue in San Diego, Newport Beach, Irvine, Orange County, La Jolla, in the Inland Empire, Los Angeles, Palm Springs or anywhere in Southern California, we have the knowledge and resources to be your California Constitutional Lawyer and your Palm Springs and San Diego Business Attorney. Be sure to hire a California law firm with business and constitutional law experience who can serve areas such as Los Angeles, Palm Springs, Palm Desert, Anaheim, Irvine, Newport Beach, Carlsbad, Corona del Mar, Laguna Beach, Huntington Beach, Santa Ana, Rancho Cucamonga, Ontario, Fullerton, Del Mar, San Diego, Orange County, San Luis Obispo, Buena Park, La Jolla, Oxnard, Ventura, La Quinta, and Santa Barbara so you are properly represented.

If you have a constitutional, first amendment or business law issue of any kind, call the Law Offices of R. Sebastian Gibson, or visit our website at http://www.sebastiangibsonlaw.com  and learn how we can assist you.