⚡ How this Start-Up has Turned Legals into a Piece of Cake for Early-Stage Companies

Morning Innovators ⚡ In less than 5 minutes, we’ll cover…

🥳 The best funding opportunities, events and jobs in the Start-Up world this week
📰 This week’s biggest news stories in the Start-Up world
🍰 How this Start-Up has turned legals into a piece of cake
📺 How you can get your dream customers by jumping in on their campaign
🧑‍🤝‍🧑 A tool that enables you to collaborate visually on code

✨ Last weeks most clicked link was this link taking you through to 14Peaks Capital who have just raised a $30m fund to invest in early-stage B2B Start-Ups in Europe and the US.

This is our final issue of the year, it’s been a pleasure sharing Innovators Uncensored with you over the last year. I can’t wait to see what everyone achieves in 2025 🚀 (Please do email back with any feedback or ideas for the newsletter ahead of next year)

Happy hustling,

Rich

🎤 Events/Opportunities

💨 Y-Combinator are accepting applications for their Spring 2025 Cohort, with successful applicants receiving a $500,000 investment. You can apply here.

👷 PiLabs are looking to back early-stage game changers looking to go global with up to £3m in funding, you can apply here.

⛽️ Fuel Ventures are looking to deploy £250k SEIS cheques, make sure to do your Due Diligence! Find out more here.

💼 Start-Up Jobs

🏡 Digital Marketing Manager, MyCrib
✏️ Head of Product, Octanise
🧠 Fullstack Developer, Engage Smarter AI

🛩 Is the dream of electric planes over? Sifted

🪄 Grammarly acquires productivity Start-Up Coda, brings on new CEO. TechCrunch

🧑‍🍳 Access bets that people will be willing to pay thousands of dollars a year for guaranteed restaurant reservations. TechCrunch

📚 Generative AI could increase education inequality, report warns. UKTN

SuLe: Simplifying Legal Solutions for Growing Businesses

The Mission: Legal Support Made Accessible
SuLe is a smart legal platform designed to help businesses scale efficiently and avoid unnecessary legal pitfalls. The platform provides businesses with essential legal documents, such as team agreements and commercial contracts, that would traditionally cost thousands of pounds, at a fraction of the cost.

SuLe also offers a tailored legal roadmap to guide businesses based on their size and needs, ensuring they know what to prioritise as they grow. Backed by a team of expert lawyers, SuLe is like having an entire legal department in your pocket, ready to tackle complex questions and challenges.

Founding Story: From Client to Co-Founder
The partnership behind SuLe was serendipitous. Nilsu, now the co-founder and CPO, first approached SuLe as a client in need of legal assistance. During the process, she impressed Patricia and the team by contributing valuable insights and ideas for the platform.

Recognising her talent, Nilsu was invited to join as a product advisor, where her contributions quickly became indispensable. Within months, it was clear that she was the ideal co-founder, bringing her expertise and collaborative spirit to the forefront of SuLe’s success.

Acquiring the First Customers: From Consultancy to Platform
SuLe began as a legal consultancy, which allowed the team to learn firsthand how Start-Up businesses were underserved by the traditional legal system. Their first customer came through a referral, and subsequent clients were secured through networking, speaking engagements, WhatsApp groups, and word-of-mouth referrals.

This initial phase not only validated the need for SuLe’s services but also provided insights into how to structure the platform to meet businesses’ specific needs.

Scaling Up: Referrals, Partnerships, and Community Building
The transition from consultancy to platform was fuelled by two key growth drivers: referrals and partnerships. Early collaborations with business accelerators opened doors to influential individuals and organisations, helping SuLe establish itself within the industry.

In addition, SuLe leveraged organic LinkedIn content to share legal insights and build a community of engaged followers. This consistent and intentional approach created market awareness, connected the team with clients, and positioned SuLe as a thought leader in the legal-tech space.

The founders credit much of their growth to the support of their network, which introduced them to investors, partners, and advisors who believed in SuLe’s mission from the start.

Lessons Learned: Hiring and Building Smarter

1. Hire Slowly, Invest in Your Team: SuLe’s journey underscored the importance of maximising the skills and potential of existing team members before bringing in new hires.

2. Build Less, Test More: Rather than diving into extensive development, the team focused on testing ideas and validating customer needs before scaling.

3. Pay Yourself: Founders need to recognise their value and avoid the burnout that can come from neglecting personal needs and compensation.

Funding the Vision: From Bootstrap to Investment
SuLe bootstrapped its growth for the first year and a half, reinvesting revenue from its consultancy into platform development.

Last month, the company closed its first funding round, bringing in angel investors and industry professionals from banks and law firms. True to SuLe’s networking-driven ethos, nearly all investors were secured through connections and word of mouth. Thje Founders noticed that people wanted to invest alongside their friends, so would often bring other angels in.

Overcoming Challenges: Lessons in Resilience
From accidentally deleting the company’s Google account to neglecting personal health, the journey hasn’t been without challenges. The founders learned the importance of self-care and work-life balance, implementing boundaries such as not working on Saturdays and prioritising time with friends and family.

This mindset shift has helped ensure that both the business and its founders thrive sustainably.

Looking Back: What Would They Do Differently?
If starting over, SuLe’s founders would prioritise:

1. Finding a co-founder sooner for shared support and collaboration.

2. Planning product development earlier and focusing on a clear roadmap.

3. Paying themselves earlier to foster a sense of belonging and drive.

Carta is a platform that helps people manage equity, build businesses and invest in the companies of tomorrow. Our mission is to unlock the power of equity ownership for more people in more places. Carta is trusted by more than 40,000 companies, over 8,000 investment funds and a million employees for cap table management, venture capital solutions and more. In the UK, we support founders who are raising money through SEIS/EIS, helping with Advance Assurance, round modelling and more. To find out more, take a look at their website, or get in touch with [email protected].

We’ve all heard people tell us to go where our customers are, but Archive have taken that to another level.

Archive help brands track mentions in UGC across ad campaigns, but they wanted to make that interesting. They saw that their dream customers, brands such as Spotify, Swarovski and Coca Cola, were taking out big billboards in Times Square. Whilst they knew they couldn’t afford to do that, they knew that they could jump on their campaigns in a helpful way.

Archive rented a van with an LED screen on the back, parked it in front of their billboards, and showed them exactly how their dashboard would track these exact campaigns. This stunt has gone viral across LinkedIn and X, leading to buckets of customers checking them out and getting in touch.

We’re not saying you have to hire an LED screen on the back of a van, but how can you add to the marketing campaigns of your dream customers?

Each week we highlight our favourite tools - either something we’ve been using in our businesses, or tools that our innovator community have recommended.

Tempo is a Visual Editor for React, which gives PMs, designers, and engineers the ability to collaborate visually on code. It offers the familiar UX of a design tool but functions like an IDE under the hood. Tempo is optimised for Vite and Tailwind.

Next week I’ll be highlighting another awesome Start-Up, as well as sharing all the usuals including funding opportunities, Start-Up news, plus plenty of awesome tips, tricks and tools.

P.S. Connect with me on LinkedIn…