We will create a legal platform for conducting business on the Internet
Have you come up with an information technology project and decided to launch a start-up? Our lawyers will help to implement it in Belarus. We specialize in IT support and have extensive experience in supporting foreign IT companies and start-ups in Belarus
1. Opening a legal entity for a start-up. First, a legal entity should be registered. Only in the format of an officially operating company will your project look serious in the eyes of the investor. Before registration it is important to clearly distribute the competence among the founders and to reflect it in the Articles of Association. It is also necessary to take care of the conditions of profit distribution, which will allow to avoid conflicts in the future. The company’s Articles of Association should reflect the procedure for termination of partnership relations. If disagreements cannot be avoided in the course of cooperation, the first document to be opened will be exactly the Articles of Association.
2. Registration of employment relations with the start-up team. Secondly, it is necessary to ensure that the employment relationship with the start-up team is properly documented. Staff members will be dedicated to all business processes. In order to avoid information leakage, it is necessary to draw up competent employment contracts, introduce a trade secret mode in the company and sign a non-disclosure agreement with all employees. Some of the employees will become direct generators of intellectual property objects, whether it would be a trademark, invention, industrial samples, computer programs. In this area, it is important to re-register the intellectual property objects that existed before the creation of the start-up to the company and set up the work in such a way that the intellectual property objects created within the start-up were registered exactly to the company, not to a specific employee.
3. Start-up trademark registration. Thirdly, to register the trademark of the company itself, or in another way – the brand. Many people do not consider this stage worth the time and money. What is the danger of working without a registered trademark? Someone may have time to register your name as a brand earlier and then make a demand to a start-up about your illegal use of a trademark. Such actions can be used to earn on your start-up’s reputation or to destroy it.
4. Registration of investments in a start-up. And another important stage is the registration of investments in the start-up. This procedure can be done in several ways. The most common method is for an investor to join the list of participants and make an additional contribution to the authorized capital. Such procedure is performed either by a simple share purchase agreement or by a share purchase agreement with deferred payment.
Another legal way to finance the start-up is to enter into a loan agreement with interest payable on the loan. This is usually the way to arrange for venture financing.
It is also allowed to enter into a strategic partnership agreement with an investor. Strategic cooperation is expressed in uniting the resources of the start-up company and the investor, resulting in mutual benefit and responsibility for the work on their use. The partnership is formed in the form of a contract, which regulates the functions, rights and obligations of the participants, the procedure for reimbursement of general expenses, distribution of profits and other benefits, terms of effect, terms and conditions of dissolution.
5. Development of contracts in the IT sphere. It is important not only to develop a software product, but also to build a legally correct contractual work with investors, start-up customers, product users, etc.
6. Protection of personal data and intellectual property. As of today, IT start-ups that have not been concerned about the protection of personal data of product users, as well as the protection of intellectual property objects, risk paying very large sums of money.
Legal support of start-up projects is expressed in the form of consulting on all nuances of start-up implementation in Belarus and preparation of a full package of documents for its launch. In particular, our lawyers are competent in the following areas:
Will give you advice
The Leshchinsky Smolsky Legal Office is recommended by the international legal directory IFLR1000 as the leading law practice in Belarus in the field of financial transactions
Danila Smolski and Pavel Leshchynski act as legal advisers to the World Bank Group as part of the preparation of a global report on doing business in the world Doing Business
Legal Office "Leshchynski Smolski" provides legal support to the Embassy of Germany in the Republic of Belarus regarding registration of relations with national companies
LSL is listed in the International Directory of IP law firms and individual patent and trademark attorneys from the country of Belarus
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