Cozen O’Connor’s nationally known Emerging Business & Venture Capital team has been deeply involved with this dynamic field for decades. We don’t dabble in the venture space — we live in it.
The firm counsels startup, early-stage, growth, and late-stage venture-backed companies through every stage of the corporate lifecycle, from formation and financing to maturation and exit. Complementing our company-side practice, the firm also represents venture capital funds, private equity funds, family offices, corporate venture capital funds, angels, and other high net worth investors.
WHAT WE DO
Founding and Groundwork
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Pre-formation consideration, entity selection, and formation
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Founder shares, equity division, and vesting
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Ownership structure and cap table management
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Equity compensation and options (e.g., ISOs, NQSOs, profit interests, RSUs)
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Employee hiring and retention
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Proof-of-concept (POC), pilot, and full-service customer contract negotiations
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Joint ventures, strategic alliances, and outsourcing
Financing and Exit
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Friends and family, angel, pre-seed, seed, and series preferred financings
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Convertible notes, SAFEs, priced series seed/preferred rounds, bridge loans, and recapitalizations
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Venture debt
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Crowdfunding
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Accelerator, incubator, and venture studio deals
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M&A, divestitures, spin-offs, and other forms of venture-backed company exits
Strategic Value
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Introductions to an extensive network of venture capital funds, private equity funds, family offices, corporate venture capital funds, angels, and other high net worth investors
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Business model design
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Market positioning
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Pitchdeck development and pitch coaching
WHY OUR FIRM
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Venture-backed enterprises move at breakneck pace; Cozen O’Connor provides timely, pragmatic, business-savvy advice that keeps clients moving forward.
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We bring deep experience in key industry verticals: health and medical tech, digital health, telemedicine, cannabis, ed tech, insurtech, proptech, fintech/finserv, adtech, fashiontech, blockchain, NFTs, metaverse, drones, robotics and AI, data storage and cloud computing, digital entertainment, social networking, tech-adjacent consumer products, and others.
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Cozen O’Connor’s COpilot program offers sophisticated information and resources to nascent startups as well as deferral opportunities for qualifying enterprises.
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Our lead attorneys are investors, entrepreneurs, and startup veterans themselves, so they know first-hand what it takes to build successful venture-backed companies.