Law firms are typically organised through lots of different departments, with lawyers in each department specialising in one area of law, such as corporate law, finance law, employment law, intellectual property law, etc. When clients need legal support from a law firm, they will contact the law firm and be referred to someone from the relevant department depending on what they need at that time. They will then need to confirm fees and engagement terms with the new department. Lawyers from each department working on a job will record their time on a project, and the client will receive a bill at the end of the matter from the law firm's finance team.

An in-house lawyer is someone who works within a company, who is expected to work across multiple areas of law and complete legal work independently. If a question or project has anything 'legal' related, then it will come to the in-house lawyer's desk. They have a broad legal skillset which is purpose-developed for the specific company they are working for. They might have particular specialist expertise in an area they worked at within a law firm previously, but must also have skills to work across multiple legal areas. They are the single point of contact for all legal work and are a direct and core part of the team. Sometimes they will outsource specialist legal work to a specialist department in a law firm, using industry knowledge to choose the right law firm and at the right price. They are typically an employed member of staff. For this reason, typically only larger / more advanced businesses have in-house lawyers.

A flexible in-house lawyer with Accelerate Law is someone who works as an in-house lawyer within your team as your single legal point of contact, without being hired as an employed member of staff. Accelerate Law in-house lawyers are specialised in the legal work which startups and startup investors require, for fundraising, building and incentivising teams, startup legal compliance and trading. You can have all the benefits of an in-house lawyer, working with them as and when you need with no minimum commitment, and with a pre-agreed fee model for when needs arise so that you have certainty. Whereas typically in-house lawyers are reserved only for larger businesses, startups and investors of any size can have their own flexible in-house lawyer with Accelerate Law. Fees are typically around 50% of what equivalent law firms charge.

Having access to an Accelerate Law in-house lawyer enables you to do a few important and valuable things. You can expect to:

1. complete legal work in-house with a highly experienced lawyer trained to work with businesses like yours,

2. consider him/her/them as an integral part of your team,

3. work with someone will get to know you and your business well, and build trusted relationships with you,

4. have him/her/them available throughout your startup life-cycle, from idea to exit,

5. always receive fast responses and pragmatic solutions that fit your size and stage,

6. effectively manage all aspects of your legal work in a cost-effective, secure way, and

7. be surprised at the transformational impact working with an Accelerate Law in-house lawyer can have on the way you do business.

We aim to exceed expectations with every client we work with. All of our lawyers enjoy working within the startup ecosystem and as your personal advisors. They have all the skills, qualifications and credentials to work at big City law firms, but have chosen to work on with Accelerate Law, offering a direct service to founders, startups, investors and other organisations seeking to have a huge impact on the world around us.

The good news is, you can have all the benefits of an Accelerate Law in-house lawyer without actually hiring one. There is no minimum cost.

You can reach out to us any time, either for a specific legal query or project, or just to line up legal support for when you do need it.

At that point, we'll have a free 30 minute call to get to know each other, and if we're the right fit together, then we'll agree our terms for working together.

Any fees or we agree will be based around your specific needs, stage and budgets.

We specialise in everything 'startup'. That's our focus, and we work with startups and investors to create, innovate, expand and exit.

By working with founders, startup teams and investors every day, we develop a deep understanding of startup mindsets - whether that's around the way founders read emails, or take on advice, or how contracts or drafted, or the speed that they need.

Therefore, rather than specialising in one particular legal area, we specialise in the clients we work with, every day, and the things they need from us to succeed.

Check out our services and industry pages for more detail.

Yes. One of our Accelerate Law specialisms is supporting investment rounds, advising both founders/startups, with angel, VC and hybrid rounds, and VC investors directly.

Our sweet spot is pre-seed, seed and Series A.

An experienced lawyer can support in many ways across your business. For example:

• advising on the best ways to close an objective, like secure funding, hire a team, launch a product, etc,

• drafting contracts,

• negotiating those contracts, to help you close deals,

• advising you strategically in difficult situations and on tough decisions,

• preparing tricky communications for you, such as emails, letters, for example as part of a tough negotiation or you are in a dispute,

• explaining things to you to help clarify and de-stress,

• join calls and meetings as your in-house lawyer,

• be the direct, trusted single point of contact for everything 'legal' that comes up.

To get started, email one or both of our co-founders:

Simon Davies - simon@acceleratelaw.co.uk

Silvia Dal Cin - silvia.dalcin@acceleratelaw.co.uk