Seed Investing: Understanding the Landscape - Part I
- 1.13.2016
Starting a company has never been easier. Technology solutions for payroll, , cloud computing and payment systems have made it much cheaper to take care of the back end.
But founders may start seeing more when they hit the fundraising process, some of which come from legal fees. Fortunately for entrepreneurs, several lawyers and investors have tried to cut down these by providing standard documents for seed-stage investing. Unfortunately for entrepreneurs, as more and more new types of instruments and investment documents are introduced, it becomes difficult to distinguish between them or even understand which one is the best .
In this three-part blog series, we will explain the different types of seed instruments: , Series Seed and SAFE.
Seed-stage investments are often structured as convertible loans. Investors loan money to the company and, in , receive convertible promissory notes. The notes then convert at a specified milestone, usually when the company sells in its next financing, into shares of that same series of . Occasionally, the notes automatically convert at the at a pre-determined price.
Discounts and caps
The notes typically convert at a discount (generally between 10% to 20%), so the seed investors would receive their shares of at a better price in recognition of the fact that they took an earlier and bigger risk on the company as compared to the new investors in the financing.
Over the last few years, as the size of seed and downstream Series A have increased, investors have introduced a cap on convertible notes. For example, if the notes have a cap of $4 million and the company raises a Series A at a pre-money valuation of $8 million (assuming the conversion is based on pre-money valuation), the noteholders will convert the principal amount and the interest at an effective price of $4 million, i.e., 50 cents for each dollar given by the Series A investors.
The company and investors often negotiate whether or not a cap is appropriate, if so what the cap should be and whether the note investors should share the resulting from an new pool created as part of the Series A round.
From the company’s perspective, it is better not to have a valuation cap, because although it the investor down-side protection, it has no benefit to the company and can be highly dilutive to the founders. From an investor’s perspective, receiving a note without a cap means taking the risk that the next round is at an unexpectedly high valuation—reducing the relative benefit of the discount.
When notes include both a discount and a cap, they usually convert at the lower of either the price per share based on the discount to the Series A or the price per share determined by dividing the cap by the pre- or post-money valuation of the Series A (usually the pre-money). It is always worth clarifying this up front so that founders understand the in subsequent .
At the end of the day, the convertible note is a loan and has a , i.e., the date on which the principal amount and the interest become due and payable to the investor, if the loan has not yet converted. The varies between 12 and 24 months from when the loan is granted, with 18 months being the most common.
Other features of the “notes” aspect of convertible notes include interest rate (generally between 1% to 4%) and repayment terms.
Pros of Convertible Notes
- Efficiency
and cost. A financing requires fewer and less complicated
documents, so a company can complete it more quickly and cheaply than a preferred
financing. This is particularly important in a seed round, when the company
might not raise a significant amount.
However, since the investment community has widely begun to accept other standard documents, this may not remain an advantage exclusive to convertible notes. - No current
valuation. Selling requires a company and its investors to
agree upon the current value of the company. This task can prove difficult for
early-stage companies, especially if investors lack experience or if founders
feel that the company is not mature enough for investors to value it fairly.
With , the company and investors generally do not need to agree
upon the company’s current valuation. Instead, they defer the valuation
decision until the time of the next financing. That said, a cap
on the notes is effectively a valuation for the noteholders; the no current
valuation only holds true in an uncapped note.
- No
investor board seat or control provisions. Noteholders rarely if ever get
board seats or veto or control rights. This allows founders to retain control
of the company without assigning board seats to someone that may end up owning
a relatively small percentage of the company.
Although this is a definite advantage of convertible notes over other forms of seed investing, founders should remember that board and control provisions are usually negotiable even in priced seed . - Fundraising
flexibility. Founders often use notes with different caps to raise funds
over an extended period of time. Since a cap is not a valuation for tax
purposes, founders can effectively leave the note round open for a longer
period and close it on a rolling . Sometimes, it also eliminates the need
to have a lead investor in the round.
On the flip side, fundraising can be a very time-consuming process, and founders may want to close the round and move back to focusing on the product and company. Also, even in a seed-priced round, a founder could negotiate to leave some room for friendly investors to join the round in the near future, usually between three to six months, at the same valuation. - No impact on . Selling for fundraising purposes has the effect of fixing the current fair market value of the company’s . As a result, a company can no longer issue equity incentives to potential employees (in the form of to purchase shares of ) at a price below the sold for fundraising purposes without creating negative tax and issues. Issuing without a cap does not create those same concerns for the value of the .
Cons of Convertible Notes
- Additional
. A note with caps means an investor pays a fraction of the full
price for shares issued in the equity financing. Let’s use the example of notes
with a $4 million cap and a subsequent Series A with $8 million pre-money
valuation. The convertible noteholder received a share worth a dollar but only
paid 50 cents, so the resulting from the was twice
that resulting from the new money invested in the financing round.
- The
hidden windfall. This is where most founders are caught off guard.
While they are prepared to negotiate a 1X non-participating
preference common in a Series A or subsequent funding round, they do not
realize that the cap on the notes gives the noteholders a multiple
preference.
In our example above, if noteholders invested $100,000, they would get 200,000 shares (assuming price of a dollar per share in Series A). Even if the founders negotiate the terms of Series A financing to be a 1X non-participating preference, the noteholders will still get a 2X preference on their investment, i.e., $200,000 (200,000 shares times $1). This doesn’t even account for the interest.
Some investors reason that this return is only fair, considering the risk that they took in investing at an early stage. - Maturity
date as the ticking clock. As mentioned above, the convertible note comes
with a . If the company has not raised its Series A by that time,
the noteholders can potentially call for the notes to be repaid, which would pass
the back to the investors.
In most cases, however, the investors will amend the notes and extend the . Calling the note in could potentially bankrupt the company, while extending the deadline gives the noteholder an opportunity to participate in the upside by giving the company more time to reach its milestones.
Fixing the Windfall
- Price the
round. One of the main advantages of notes is not having to value the
company. Since caps effectively do set the valuation, founders may want to consider
moving to a priced seed round without giving up board or voting control.
- Convert
the discount to . In some cases, founders can negotiate for convertible
notes to convert to the in the next round of financing so that
the preference matches the dollars invested, and the balance of the
shares convert to . This keeps the clean, but it also
means that the founders now have other holders with the same voting
rights.
- Convert
notes to shadow . More commonly, companies have started to
create a shadow preferred series, e.g., Series A-1, Series A-2, etc., so that
the notes convert into their own class with a 1X preference to
match the dollars invested. The other rights of investors in these shadow
preferred series are the same as the holders; they even vote as
a single class.
Some founders shy away from this solution because of the complexity that it adds to the , but it also has advantages: (i) it can protect the founders from entering a situation in which the noteholders have a multiple preference, and (ii) seasoned investors do understand how , even complicated ones, work.
A potential risk to this method is that the shadow will have a separate class vote under Delaware law for actions that disproportionately and adversely affect that series, potentially giving the former noteholders the ability to block certain actions that the company wants to take.
The only times that creating shadow may not make sense is if the difference between the cap and the valuation in the subsequent priced round is not very big, and the company chooses to ignore the excess preference. This is why, usually, the creation of the shadow is left to the of the founders.
Stay tuned for part two of this three-part blog post—we’ll take a look at series seed funding. And for more about convertible notes, check out this video.