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DLA Piper launches Accelerate to drive company formation, growth and expansion

New website addresses business and legal issues, streamlines formation, connects companies to capital, and showcases client successes.

DLA Piper has launched Accelerate, a website devoted to founders, entrepreneurs, startups, emerging growth companies and the investor community. Accelerate offers technology-enabled tools and services for the initial phases of a company's development, as well as guidance and best practices on how to position new companies for growth and success.

"Through the offerings of Accelerate – which include simple explanations to business and legal issues that every business owner should know and foundational materials that each sophisticated investor expects – early stage and emerging growth companies can operate with greater flexibility and autonomy," said Louis Lehot, co-chair of DLA Piper's US Emerging Growth and Venture Capital practice. "As part of DLA Piper's ongoing pursuit of delivering quality and value to clients in new and practical ways, Accelerate provides a platform for entrepreneurs and investors to learn about opportunities, to showcase their achievements and tell compelling stories about their growth trajectories."

Among the leading tools and services built into Accelerate are:

• Venture Pipeline: Cultivating relationships between high-quality companies that match the funding criteria of more than 450 leading VCs around the world, and then target and raise smart capital.
• NEST Program: Leveraging the best in emerging growth legal services from DLA Piper, including advice on formation, equity structuring and IP protection.
• Documents: Accessing a free document starter kit, where basic agreements for a typical startup are generated, as well as other commonly used documents on a self-service basis.

"Accelerate helps facilitate client and counsel collaboration and minimize distractions and impediments," said Jeff Lehrer, co-chair of DLA Piper's US Emerging Growth and Venture Capital practice. "This, in turn, enables our team to continue focusing on driving value to clients' businesses, whether it's developing a well-conceived game plan for raising capital or speeding and scaling overall growth."

Accelerate also features high-quality content to educate founders about issues commonly faced at formation; strategies for protecting a company's IP crown jewels; essentials of good corporate housekeeping; employment and equity compensation considerations; and key issues around fundraising and liquidity.

Additionally, DLA Piper's work to help clients raise funds and achieve liquidity is illustrated through case studies with leading companies such as Centric Software, EverFi, doc.ai and Pluto VR, among others. The firm's work to help corporate investors accelerate innovation and investment is illustrated through case studies with HP Tech Ventures and Juniper Networks.

"Setting the foundation for a successful startup can be among the most challenging and rewarding business endeavors, and Accelerate is meant to ease the process with early and efficient counsel and 'Garage to Global' services," said Victoria Lee, global co-chair of DLA Piper's Technology sector. "Our global platform is unique, and this new resource showcases our ability to support global expansion, even for companies in the earliest stages and most competitive markets."

With more than 20 US and more than 90 global offices, including locations in the most important worldwide markets for emerging growth, technology and life sciences, DLA Piper is positioned to support its early stage clients' domestic and global growth objectives. Last year, according to Mergermarket's league tables for legal advisors, DLA Piper again earned the top ranking globally for overall deal volume and ranked first for technology M&A in the US. DLA Piper was highly ranked in other notable league tables for 2016, including placing in the top five of each M&A, venture capital and private equity category recognized by PitchBook – the only law firm to do so.