01 / 06

Every share issuance traces to a signed document and a board resolution.

Verbal promises and email confirmations are not sufficient. Every grant - founder shares, advisor equity, employee options - should be traceable to a specific board resolution and a signed document that sets out the terms clearly. If you cannot produce that paperwork today, assume an investor's legal team will notice.

02 / 06

Founder vesting is formalised, consistent, and cliff dates are confirmed.

The standard structure is a four-year vest with a one-year cliff. Variations are fine, but they need to be explicit and consistent across the founding team. A co-founder who leaves at month six should not walk away with the same stake as one who is still there at Series A. If vesting was never formalised, or was formalised differently across founders, resolve it before the raise - not during it.

03 / 06

Advisor equity has a signed agreement, not just an email.

Advisors who received equity informally - in a conversation, over email, without a signed agreement - create ambiguity about what rights they actually hold. A simple advisor agreement covering equity amount, vesting schedule, and exit treatment takes an afternoon to put in place and removes a category of risk entirely.

04 / 06

Your option pool is formally authorised and reconciled against actual grants.

Investors will want to know the size of your option pool, how much has been granted, and what the fully diluted cap table looks like post-round. If your option pool was never formally authorised by the board, or if grants have been made informally, clean this up now - with accurate numbers.

05 / 06

Early investor rights have been reviewed in the context of your next round.

Pro-rata rights, anti-dilution provisions, information rights, drag-along provisions - the terms your seed investors agreed to were negotiated in a different context than your Series A. Before you go into a raise, understand exactly what those rights say and how they interact with the terms you are about to negotiate. Surprises here are expensive.

06 / 06

Your fully diluted cap table is accurate today — not approximately accurate.

Founders frequently discover discrepancies between their records and reality when they prepare for due diligence - options granted but not logged, shares issued under different terms than recorded, former employees still appearing as holders. A full reconciliation before you start the raise process is not optional. It is the baseline.

DON'T BUILD ON MAYBES.

BUILD ON AETHER.

ANY QUESTION MARKS?

If any of these items have a question mark next to them, talk to us before the raise starts. That is

exactly what Aether is built for.