HN user
Founder @ copy.ai
Hey! I’ve used both. They’re actually not competitors (Compound integrates with Carta). The difference? Compound sells to shareholders (Carta sells to companies). Compound provides holistic financial management services (in helping me manage my entire financial stack), including startup equity. The biggest benefit is they personalize everything to my situation (it’s a holistic experience). Would recommend trying it out!
Hmm I'll ask the founders if they have a solution for that! They allow bulk upload of profiles, but may require emails currently.
Circle.so (https://circle.so/)
With a rapidly growing creator economy, the tooling around building custom communities is very far behind. The cutting edge is a Facebook group, Slack channel, or a Discord server.
Huge fan of modular construction! I hope down the line, more modular construction means you can upgrade buildings much more easily.
This is awesome! I've always thought someone should make Magic Links as easy as Facebook or Google Auth flows!
Flowdash has really improved our workflows at my job! We use to have a very tedious human in the loop process which is now much faster and more transparent for the entire team. The main benefit has been turning excel spreadsheets into a more defined work flow with a better user interface.
I think it comes down to the high cost of lifestyle changes. For example, if I am a consultant and needs to fly a lot to make a living, it would be very hard for me to change that.
I agree we need people to be more conscious of waste and to reduce excessive consumption, but at the same time, we need easy solutions for people to contribute.
I like the dual strategy of Project Wren (https://projectwren.com/) that encourages lifestyle changes and buying carbon offsets at the same time.
My firm helps with number 2!
We help cover the exercise and any associated taxes for a portion of the upside!
Check out Project Wren (https://projectwren.com/), you can offset your carbon footprint for about $20 a month in a few minutes!
They also do a great job of educating users about what they can do to reduce their carbon footprint!
I think you're correct. The younger generations are especially feeling pressure to try to take action to reverse climate change and become carbon neutral!
I hope to see more people change their lifestyles to become carbon neutral! At the very least, I hope people will vote with their money and subscribe to something like https://projectwren.com/!
I think a lot of this comes down to resources and innovation.
As more money is invested and spent on research and development of new ideas, I think some things will eventually start to work providing a solution to these issues.
For more money to flow into the ecosystem, we need people to see value from being carbon neutral personally.
If you'd like to become carbon neutral, I'd suggest you check out https://projectwren.com/
Lifestyle changes can make a large difference, but the changes that make the most difference are also the hardest to implement (driving less, flying less, A/C and heating, etc.)
I try to do whatever lifestyle changes I can, but I also use Project Wren (https://projectwren.com/) to offset the remainder of my carbon footprint!
Money talks, if companies can make billions of dollars from individual $10-20 subscriptions, I don't see why we can't do it for climate change/deforestation!
I personally use Project Wren (https://projectwren.com/) to offset my own footprint and a bit more!
Just got my first report from Project Wren! Loved it so much I copied and pasted it here so I can share it:
https://www.notion.so/chrislu/Project-Wren-August-17th-Updat...
The costs may go up as tree planting is more limited, but the more money in the ecosystem will allow new innovations to be discovered!
We can all do our part! Even though it is hard to actively contribute to fighting climate change every day, by becoming carbon neutral, we can grow a community to make a difference!
The average American has a carbon footprint that can be offset with a $20 per month subscription. We need more money to flow into fighting climate change!
I personally use Project Wren to offset my carbon footprint specifically through a tree planting projects!
We need lots more people like you! :)
Trail of Bits (a security consulting firm) recently subscribed to an offset program that offsets all of the carbon from their employees!
I've been posting about this a lot, but check out Project Wren! (https://projectwren.com/)
It costs me $40 a month to offset my own carbon footprint, but I take a lot more flights than the average person.
Individuals matter too!
Netflix made had $5.8B in revenue from small $10-20 subscription users!
Today, for $20 a month you can offset your own carbon footprint! This matters because the more resources that goes into fighting climate change allows innovation. Even by generating more demand for carbon credits and offsetting, new businesses can thrive and grow by fighting climate change!
I've been super obsessed with https://projectwren.com (YC S19) for these exact reason!
The founders of Project Wren (https://projectwren.com/) went from building HR Software to building software to combat climate change.
We need profitable enterprises focused on this large global problem! I think the tides are starting to shift and would love to see the smartest minds of our generation focused on this issue!
Hi there, at the ESO Fund we can get you liquidity without a full transfer! Feel free to reach out at https://www.esofund.com
Completely agree! There is more and more liquidity these days for later stage startups! Not only are people paying up to get in, but sometimes they're paying a premium to what the last VCs paid.
This is the main dilemma for startup employees across the board! The ideal situation is not leaving the company until after an IPO or M&A after which your options/shares will be liquid. The purpose of the options is to keep you at the company by locking you into "golden handcuffs" and raises the cost of changing companies.
If the company is successful, the money you will make can be life changing. If the company fails, then you lose most if not all of your investment.
However, in the last few years, many solutions have appeared to address this binary situation. I work at the ESO Fund and we try to provide a middle ground. We provide money to exercise and any potential taxes in exchange for a piece of the upside and we do this on a completely non-recourse basis (meaning you don't have to pay us back if the company fails). Our deals are structured to give you the majority of the upside without having to invest your own personal money!
Feel free to reach out if you have any more questions!
If you're not looking to sell everything, the ESO Fund also offers cash advances against shares. Each of these firms have different structures. EquityZen and Sharespost typically require a full transfer with company approval while Forge Global has been known to do forward contracts.
The general process for a full transfer is as follows:
Find a buyer Agree on a Stock Transfer Agreement with the buyer Notify the company about the sale The company has 1-3 months to exercise their Right of First Refusal (the company has the chance to purchase the shares first) (note: some companies don't allow transfers at all) If the company allows the transfer to occur, then you can finally close the deal.
This process takes up to 3-6 months depending on how easy it is to find a buyer, negotiate terms, get the company approval, etc.
A forward contract or a deal with ESO can close extremely quickly, usually within a few weeks or even days!
Disclaimer: I work at the ESO Fund
If the company qualifies for Rule 701, they may be required to give you the Rule 701 disclosure. That document may contain financial information, but not necessarily.
Great article! One last caveat is that the landscape around stock options has changed quite significantly especially in the US. These days many firms are offering Non-qualified stock options which don't expire for 7 years or more.
Additionally there are many new funding options for stock option exercise. A few firms have appeared to help employees buy their stock options and split the future upside.
Disclosure: I work at one of those firms!
On letting the options expire:
There are other options than purchasing the options yourself or just letting them expire.
From a pure finance perspective, you just need to find someone to take on the risk of the exercise. My company, ESO Fund, has a diversified portfolio of startups and as a result can take a $20k bet with much more ease than a single employee making a $20k bet.
If the company is wildly successful, the stock options should be quite valuable! From my vantage point, the stock can be life changing for many employees. These days, you can even get liquidity before the company exits from platforms like ESO Fund, Forge Global, Sharespost, etc.
Disclaimer: I work at the ESO Fund
My girlfriend and I experienced a really weird bug in the past. We would see that Facebook said we were active in the middle of the night when we were definitely asleep. It didn't make too much sense then, but now its possible that those instances might have occurred due to someone else accessing our accounts? Both of our accounts were logged out.
Did anyone else experience anything like that?