This week’s day in the life interview comes with Anthony Drogon, CTO and Cofounder of Seedlegals.
Seedlegals allows founders and investors to create all the legal documents they need to build their company and close their funding round, online, in minutes from any connected device!
1. First can you tell us a bit about your job? What does your company do?
I’m CTO at SeedLegals, the world’s first automated legal service for high growth startups. Our platform generates all the legal agreements needed to do a funding round. We’ve made the whole process painless, up to 90% faster, and at a fraction of the cost it used to take. Founders and investors simply negotiate and close the round online, lawyer free. We also provide cap table, stock split, exit modeling, share certificates… Anything that goes into making an equity investment happen, we make it super easy in our product.
2. What brought you to this area?
One of the investors in my previous company – SmartJog (now Arkena, acquired by TDF) – approached me with the idea. He was a well known VC, and I’d been looking to start a company so it was the perfect fit. Nothing like this existed in the market before, and I knew that if we got the implementation right it would be a big hit. So I quit my job and packed my bags, even though I knew nothing about private equity back then (and my knowledge still scratches the surface today).
3. What time does your day start, and what does your typical work day schedule look like?
My day starts at 10AM (which is late I know!), but then it ends at about 2-3 AM. Sleep deprivation sometimes makes me deviate from the routine, so it varies. The morning is about pushing the developers (including myself) in the right direction for the day. The afternoon is about gathering input and feedback, from customers and other departments. But mostly, it’s about coding. That’s why I value the night-time work, when being alone allows me to think outside the box.
4. What kind of projects are you currently working on?
Migrating to AWS, migrating to Angular 5, migrating to Spring 5. Winter is coming and these swallows need to reach South fast. Business-wise, we’re currently expanding our product offering to include: Convertible notes, EIS Advance Assurance applications, and EMI Option schemes.
5. What do you consider the greatest achievement in your work to date?
Hiring my developers. And keeping them so far. By the way, we are still hiring 🙂
6. What is the one app you could not live without?
Google Authenticator, for security reasons. And Slack, for awesomeness reasons.
7. What’s the best thing about working at your company?
My co-founders (Anthony Rose and Laurent Laffy) have a tremendous experience of the industry, and have founded, invested and exited a huge number of businesses between them. When they share their knowledge, you don’t need to apply for an MBA anymore.
8. Where is the after work hangout?
We’ve just moved offices, and I still try to figure out where lunch is. The after work hangout will have to wait.
9. Who is your professional role model?
Very cliché: Elon Musk. Not the SpaceX guy though, the Tesla one. He really understood design and engineering are two sides of the same coin. I wish I could see myself as Head of Product for more than just Technology, but there’s a long way to go there.
10. What makes London a good city for technology and startups?
Money. The UK has a lot of unicorns compared to the rest of Europe. London being its epicentre, it has attracted a lot of investors, meaning more startups, meaning more investors. It’s a virtuous circle that I hope Brexit won’t break. The recent Uber hiccup could also send mixed signals to future founders, like it’s not Silicon-Valley-compliant anymore. I’ve lived in Stockholm for a few years, and the startup market is really booming in the Nordics following the success of Skype or Spotify. London should really start looking at the rear-view mirror if it intends to keep its leadership.
11. Which tech trends are you most excited about?
Brain-machine interfaces. Moore’s Law is dying too fast, at this pace we won’t reach the Singularity, so I hope they can resolve that. Joking aside, autonomous electric vehicles. They solve so many issues on so many levels they should be a no-brainer to manufacturers, customers, and governments.
12. What are the top 3 qualities you look for in an employee?
1. Expertise
2. Always up-to-date on the latest in their field
3. Not being a pain in the arse
13. And finally, what is the one piece of advice you would give to an entrepreneur starting out?
Find a partner, and the right one, either a field expert or someone who has already survived all this. You’ve been mentored your whole life on tasks that were pretty menial, why would you go alone (or in bad company) on the single hardest experience you will ever encounter? And get the legals right from the get go, and we can help with that 🙂
