Business Law: Your Local Specialists
If you are starting or running a business, it is essential to ensure that your business is legally compliant and protected. Often times, business owners may begin a new venture or partnership without taking the necessary steps to protect themselves from liability and make sure their business assets are properly protected. This is where our business law specialty comes into it’s own.
At Sadeghi & Associates, we focus our business law practice on helping startups, entrepreneurs, small businesses, and large corporations navigate the legal requirements of their fields. With effective business litigation protect their businesses with strong contracts and policies, and manage and protect their intellectual property.
Work With a Skilled, Californian, Business Law Attorney
When you choose to work with the skilled business attorneys at Sadeghi & Associates, we will serve as your legal advocates in every stage of your business to help you choose the best legal entity, draft policies for your business, negotiate contracts with potential partners, merchants, clients, independent contractors, and more, handle employment matters, protect your intellectual property from infringement, and address other legal considerations you may encounter in your business.
Let’s take a closer look at some of these areas:
Some of Our Business Law Firm Services
Business Formation
One of the first choices you must make as a business owner is what type of entity your business will be.
You may choose to operate as a sole proprietor, a limited liability corporation, a C-corporation, an S-corporation, or, in some states (including California), a B-corporation. Each of these options presents its own set of benefits and challenges. You should work closely with your attorney and certified public accountant (CPA) to determining the proper legal entity for your business.
Frequently, small businesses may wish to initially operate as a sole proprietor or LLC.
Sole Proprietor
A sole proprietorship is kind of like a de facto legal business structure. It is created automatically when you begin conducting business in commerce. There is no need to register a sole proprietor in order for it to exist, though there may be registration requirements depending on your state.
The advantage of a sole proprietorship is that it is very easy to create – you simply start doing business and no additional paperwork is generally needed. The disadvantage of this option, however, is that there is no legal separation between you and your business, leaving your personal assets exposed to creditors and lawsuits.
Limited Liability Corporation (LLC)
A limited liability corporation (LLC) is a very popular choice among small businesses because it strikes a balance between the simplicity of a sole proprietorship and the protection from personal liability for debts and judgments against the business afforded by a corporation. While costs of forming an LLC vary from state to state and they require additional formalities and paperwork when compared to a sole proprietor, the process is fairly straightforward.
If you form a single-member LLC, the business will be treated similarly to a sole proprietor for tax purposes and the income of the business will pass through the entity and to the single member’s personal income for taxes. This eliminates the need to file a separate tax return for your business.
Our team of business attorneys would be happy to meet with you and discuss which entity choice is best for organizing your business.
Policies to Protect Your Business
When you are running a business, it is important to have policies that communicate your internal rules and procedures to the public and your employees. With more and more businesses having an online presence, it is important to have a comprehensive privacy policy on your website that communicates what type of personal data you collect, how you collect the data, why you collect it, how you store it, what you do with that data, and whether you share the data with any third parties.
It is wise to work closely with a business attorney when drafting your privacy policy as there are several laws that your policy should comply with, including the EU’s General Data Protection Regulations. Many business owners have not heard of the GDPR or incorrectly believe that because they are not located in the EU or do not do business in the EU, they are not required to implement a GDPR-compliant privacy policy. However, this law is so far reaching that even if you operate a website that collects an IP address of an EU resident or you have an email list or blog subscription form on your website and an EU resident joins, you are required to comply with the GDPR. Enforcement is complaint-based and fines for violating the security of an EU’s data privacy can be as high as 20 million Euros.
Other policies that you will need for your business website include terms and conditions, which may set forth certain rules for website visitors including that they must be over a certain age to access and use the website, terms governing the use of trademarks or copyrighted content on your website, or disclaimers.
Depending on the field and structure of your business, there may be additional internal policies that you require such as a conflicts of interest policy, ethics policy, and various employment related policies like anti-harassment, anti-discrimination, and leave policies.
Contracts
Contracts are legally binding agreements that you enter into with another party. A court will only look past the express terms contained within a contract in extreme circumstances and as long as a contract is otherwise enforceable, a party will generally not be released from their contractual obligations, even if the transaction turned out to be a very bad deal.
It is extremely important that you ensure that the contracts you negotiate and enter into in your business are advantage to you, protect you from liability, and anticipate all the different scenarios that could transpire from the relationship or exchange.
Our team of talented contract lawyers would be happy to assist you in drafting a contract for your business, reviewing a contract you have been presented with, or negotiating a new contract.
Intellectual Property
More than ever, a business’s brand is what sets them apart from their competition. In your business, the trademarks you use and original content you create are valuable business assets and it is important that you protect them from possible infringers by registering your trademarks and copyright.
Intellectual property law is a complicated field and even registering a trademark is a complex process. Our experienced team of intellectual property attorneys have helped countless clients protect their IP rights from infringers. Make sure the reputation and goodwill you have built in your business is protected by registering your IP.
Book a Consultation with a Business Law Attorney
Starting and running a business is no easy task. Along the way, you need the advice and counsel of experts to help you make the best decisions for your business. At Sadeghi & Associates, we help businesses at every stage of their journey, so they can focus on their strengths and have confidence in knowing that their business is legally compliant and protected.
For a consultation with our business lawyers, call (949) 514-8605 to set up a consultation.
Or, contact us via email and we’ll contact you at your convenience.
