What is early stage?
Early stage describes the period in a startup’s lifecycle from incorporation through pre-Series-A — characterised by team building, MVP development, product-market-fit search and initial customer traction. Early-stage companies are typically pre-profitability and have limited runway.
Early-stage legal focus is on cap-table cleanliness, founder vesting, IP assignment, customer contracts that scale, employment compliance and clean documentation that will survive due diligence in subsequent rounds.