Ownership disclosure law creates burdens for startups
José Padilla has an established track record of providing efficient, low-cost legal services. With LegalMente AI, he’s able to provide that same quality of work to those in need, including early-stage startups. We sat down with him to talk about what policymakers need to know about the uses of AI, how to keep the U.S. innovation ecosystem the most competitive globally, and his motivation to provide the most efficient work possible.
After overcoming childhood shyness in the warmth of his local Caribbean-owned barbershop, Royon Jeffrey knows the power of the beauty industry firsthand. He set out to create ListedB, an online marketplace for beauty industry professionals. We spoke to him about the financial opportunity within the industry, navigating capital access and investors, and his desire to empower small businesses owners.
Foreign nations are saddling U.S. companies — including startups — with discriminatory burdens.
MegaMinds was created out of a need to make learning more creative, fun, and hands-on for students. In our conversation with Co-Founder and CEO Eric Tao, we learned about the growing popularity of immersive learning, the tricky regulatory landscape for a product like MegaMinds, and what it’s like for many first-time entrepreneurs to build businesses.
When policymakers think about changing the rules for how companies host and moderate user content, they focus on three or four large Internet companies. But we know from talking to startups across the country every day that all kinds of companies host user content online. They may not be the companies that are top of mind when policymakers write rules, but they’re the companies least equipped to deal with compliance and litigation costs designed with the large industry players in mind.
The startup ecosystem is incredibly broad and diverse, with startup founders launching small businesses with different business models, in different industries, and in cities and towns across the country. But one thing that startup founders from across the spectrum share the knowledge of how difficult it is to run a startup. Founders are often faced with hard choices about how to invest their already limited time and resources against a policy backdrop—which impacts business decisions, investment opportunities, compliance requirements, and more—that can change on a dime and is often written without startups in mind.
The startup ecosystem is not a monolith. Startup founders, investors, and support organizations all have different missions, priorities, and business models, and none of them have the time or resources to spend following policymakers’ every move. But when startups join together to speak with one voice, policymakers listen. As Engine turns 10, we’re celebrating a decade of work to #StandWithStartups and how we’ve raised the startup perspective for policymakers in D.C. Here are the 10 biggest ways that startups have influenced policy conversations in the last 10 years.
The tech ecosystem looks a lot different than it did when Engine launched 10 years ago. There has been an explosion of innovation, entrepreneurship, and startup growth across the country. Throughout 2022, we’ll be celebrating the milestone of our 10th anniversary by highlighting the biggest wins we achieved with the startup ecosystem and inviting our network to support our efforts through our Engine@10 initiative.
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