Imagine you're the founder of a SaaS startup preparing to sign its first enterprise customer. You need to draft your company's standard services agreement, and decide to use a popular AI tool to draft the agreement. The AI produces a professional looking agreement, covering payment terms, termi...
Blog
Helpful news & articles from Thomas McKeever, a Business-Focused Legal Partner for Technology Companies from Emerging to Large-Scale Enterprise.
The Legal Risks of Training AI Models: Understanding the Impact of California’s AI Training Data Law
Over the last year, a California startup has built an AI customer-support platform. Engineers have fed hundreds of thousands of real customer-support conversations into their model in order to train to better answer user questions. The model has produced exactly the results the company was antici...
Why Startups Should Consult a Contract Lawyer Before Signing an AI Vendor Agreement
Imagine your startup plans to integrate a new tool from an AI vendor into its product. Your organization signs a deal with the vendor, assuming it works like any other standard SaaS contract. However, sometime after signing the contract, you discover that the vendor's service relies on models f...
The Essential AI Compliance Framework for Startups
If your startup is using AI technologies, compliance needs to be embedded into your workflow from day one. The problem is that AI adoption is moving faster than regulators can develop a comprehensive set of legal requirements. That leaves startups to navigate a patchwork of existing laws and em...
How a Data Privacy Lawyer Helps Protect Startups from Legal Risks
The cornerstone of many modern tech startups is data. From names and email addresses to IP addresses and GPS locations, if your company collects users personal information, you assume an important legal responsibility for how that information is handled and protected. Founders are understandably...
How Investors and Startups Benefit from Working With a Venture Capital Lawyer
Startups seek outside funding to provide the resources they need to accelerate growth. Meanwhile, investors seek promising companies that can deliver them long-term returns. Before entering negotiations, each side can benefit from a venture capital lawyer who can help represent them throughout ...
The Rise of Fractional General Counsel: Meeting the Legal Needs of Silicon Valley Startups
Life at a startup moves fast. What begins as an idea quickly turns into building a minimum viable product, hiring talent, attracting customers, and eventually raising capital. From product development and hiring to fundraising and expansion, every phase of a startup's lifecycle has legal consid...
What to Expect from a Venture Capital Lawyer During Funding Rounds
Raising outside capital is one of a startup's biggest milestones, but there's more than just a company's immediate financial future at stake. Investors don't just give away money. Every financing round creates long-term consequences for the company. The decisions made during fundraising can aff...
How Fractional General Counsel Services for Startups Accelerate Growth and Manage Risk
In a perfect world, your startup would have an in-house legal department from day one. However, the reality is that most early-stage businesses simply lack the budget to hire a full-time legal team. Yet life moves fast in the startup world, and founders still need guidance on everything from co...
How Venture Capital Lawyers Help With Term Sheet Negotiations
Receiving a venture capital term sheet is one of the biggest milestones in a young company's lifecycle. It's also one of the riskiest periods for your organization's future. Get it right, and you can potentially set your company up for years of growth and success. Get it wrong, and you risk di...
How a Venture Capital Attorney Protects Founders in Venture Capital Finance Deals
In the world of fast-paced Silicon Valley startups, a great idea is only part of what it takes to form a successful company. Sooner or later you'll need cold, hard cash—and plenty of it. That‘s when venture capital becomes critical to growth. The right investment can unlock boundless new opportu...
The Benefits of Hiring an Outside General Counsel for Your Business
Building a business from scratch in Silicon Valley is hard work. Between product development, marketing, sales, and administration, it's easy to overlook legal and regulatory requirements. No matter how much you plan, sooner or later every business needs legal counsel. And with legal work, an oun...
Legal Considerations and Strategies for Venture Capital Transactions
Startup founders and early-stage companies looking to take the next step turn to venture capital (VC) transactions to provide the funding they need to reach their goals. VC funding can change the entire trajectory of a company, but that funding comes with the expectation of significant returns. ...
Data Privacy in Healthcare: Challenges and Solutions
Healthcare organizations are among the most targeted institutions for cybercrimes. And it's not hard to see why. Patient data naturally includes extremely valuable information about a person's identity that can easily be exploited by cybercriminals. At the same time, the move towards digital sy...
Thomas E. McKeever Selected to the 2026 Northern California Super Lawyers List
We're proud to share that SVTech Law's founder, Thomas E. McKeever, has been selected to the 2026 Northern California Super Lawyers list.Only 5% of attorneys in California receive this distinction each year, and we're honored to celebrate this recognition with our network.SVTech Law supports emer...
How Cybersecurity Tabletop Exercises Help Prepare Organizations for the Unexpected
Remember the annual fire drill back in grade school? Early in the school year, teachers would present the class with an evacuation plan in case of a fire emergency. Then, at an unexpected moment, the alarm would sound and your class would have to respond. The goal wasn't to achieve perfection, ...
Legal Risks In Artificial Intelligence Contracts: Key Clauses to Include In AI Agreements
Artificial intelligence is not only reshaping the way the world works, but also how business is done. Companies that plan to integrate AI products and services or license their own AI-powered services to others must fully understand the potential legal risks in artificial intelligence contracts...
The Cost (and Value) of Hiring a Business Lawyer
Operating a business in the fast-paced, high-stakes world of Bay Area tech has no shortage of legal challenges. Whether it's business formation, securing intellectual property, or growing your team, there are significant legal obligations that you must meet for your business to run efficiently. ...
How Law Firms Can Help Manage the Top 10 Legal Cyber Challenges
As the world grows increasingly reliant on technology, a flood of new challenges make legal cybersecurity compliance an essential part of any business. Data breaches, ransomware attacks, and privacy violations have all become frequent, with a growing sophistication in the skill of attackers. Th...
The Advantages of Outside General Counsel for Startups
Startups in the Bay Area face a constant stream of demanding priorities. Whether it's product development, finding the right hires to grow your team, or raising the next round of funding, there is always something that demands your attention. But amidst this relentless drive to build your busin...
Business Formation Attorney vs LegalZoom and other Online Platforms: 7 Reasons to Choose an Actual Business Formation Lawyer
Starting a business is an exciting prospect, particularly in the high-risk, high-reward technology space in Silicon Valley or similar technology hubs. But starting a business and starting a business the right way are two different things. For many prospective founders, the temptation to use a c...
Hiring Contract Lawyers: Everything You Need to Know
Whether you are just starting your business, or have been operating for years, you will inevitably need a contract to govern your relationship with partners, vendors, and clients. Every contract presents significant opportunity, as well as significant risk. In the high-stakes world of technolog...
The Intersection of AI and Intellectual Property Laws: Opportunities and Challenges
The rise of artificial intelligence (AI) has been rapid. Seemingly overnight, AI has made its way into our everyday lives as well as reshaped how businesses operate. But as more and more companies look to adopt AI into their workflows and business models, it's imperative that we are fully aware...
Top 6 Categories of Contracts For Startups and Growing Businesses
For generations, “doing business on a handshake” signified trust and integrity between involved parties. But in the fast-paced, high stakes world of modern business, contracts for startups and other businesses are essential. One misunderstanding can cost you investors, customers, reputation, or...
The Essential Role of Business Lawyers in Mergers and Acquisitions
Mergers, acquisitions and other strategic transactions like spin-outs represent a pivotal turning point in the life cycle of a company, capable of redefining not only a company itself, but entire markets and often the future lifestyle of founders and owners. Whether you are a fast-growing start...