May 19, 2023: Need a lawyer?

Reliable legal counsel at your finger tips, hopper makes a hop into the carbon capture game, plus more events and jobs to check out

Author

Alex at TechTO
May 19, 2023

Profile: Grant Lahring and Goodlawyer

What is Goodlawyer?

Goodlawyer is a platform for fast-growing companies that need reliable legal counsel at a better price.

Using our platform allows you to work directly with top Canadian lawyers, cutting out big firm overhead and saving ~50% on everything from sales contracts to Series A rounds.

What was the insight/inspiration that led you to launch it?

My co-founder, Brett Colvin, was a corporate lawyer at Canada's biggest law firm. Despite billing out for $500+/hr (and doing all the work), he was taking home less than 25% of it. The rest went to firm overhead. That, combined with the truly horrifying stories I heard from both clients and lawyers helped me realize there was a big problem worth solving.

How has it been received by the market? Why do you think it has been so well received?

In the last three years, we've helped more than 4,000 growing Canadian companies and completed roughly $5m worth of services. Behind those numbers is a lot of great feedback and an NPS score of 88 (more than 3x the average for legal services).

We're not perfect and we've got a long way to go, but these early signals suggest we're on the right path.

How did you know you were ready to found a company?

I honestly don't know why I chose to get into the startup world, but I've been in it for most of my career. I studied marketing and entrepreneurship in my undergrad and MBA, and I saw what success looked like during my time at Uber and other startup companies. It made me want to take a serious crack at building something HUGE.

How did you meet your founders/know they were the right people to start a company with?

It was pretty random.

I met them at the Harvest Ventures launch event and they told me what they were working on. I told them how I'd build the marketing and sales side. I liked their ambition and felt like I was the missing piece, what they needed for the rubber to hit the road.

What has been the hardest thing on your journey so far?

The largest law firms in Canada have been operating for more than 200 years. The way they do business has become the status quo and Goodlawyer shatters that standard. While most Canadians understand the issues with that system, there is a strongly entrenched "old guard" that opposes any kind of change in the industry, which presents issues and roadblocks seemingly at random.

What has been the most pleasant surprise?

Referrals!

More than half of our new customers come straight from referrals. It is amazing to have such a supportive user base!

What is your super strength?

I can see both the forest and the trees, switching between very detail-oriented problem-solving and strategic planning easily. This has been crucial to our journey so far.

Who is the unsung hero on the team? Why?

Parker, our CTO, for sure. We've had a heck of a time recruiting good developers and he has operated either solo or with a skeleton team for years. He's solving problems, shipping code, and making sure bugs get squashed ASAP.

What are you trying to achieve over the next 12 months?

Profitability, believe it or not.

We are on the line toward this milestone and I can't wait to hit it, because that's when we'll start throwing gas on the fire again.

What advice do you wish you had been given prior to launching?

"Move fast and break things" is often the worst thing you can do. Fixing things takes time and costs more than money.

In my opinion, a better saying is "Slow is smooth, and smooth is fast"

Who are the Canadian startups you like in your market?

Placeholder - flexible warehouse space to rent on your terms

Clutch - car buying and selling made easy

Helcim - easy and affordable payment solutions with a human touch

SideFX - leaders in Procedural Software

Learn more about Grant and Goodlawyer here

Quick Takes: Hopping into the carbon capture game

What is the news?

Fred Lalonde, co-founder of Hopper, has raised $10 million in funding for Deep Sky Corp, a Quebec-based carbon removal and sequestration company.

What is Deep Sky?

Deep Sky utilizes technology from various companies to capture CO2 from the air and plans to generate revenue by selling carbon credits. The team at Deep Sky includes Hopper co-founder and CTO Joost Ouwerkerk, as well as Laurence Tosi, an investor and director at Hopper. The company is backed financially by Brightspark Ventures and the Quebec government, both of whom invested in Hopper. However, the $10 million funding is not sufficient for Deep Sky's capital-intensive business, as they aim to raise $50 million to establish a site and build their first project in the coming year.

What else should we know?

While it is not uncommon for founders to focus on their successful ventures, investors often support them in their new startup endeavors if the founders have left their previous company or if the new venture is a side project. In this case, Fred remains dedicated to Hopper while his co-founder concentrates on Deep Sky.

Investors are motivated to back founders again due to their track record of generating returns. Additionally, Hopper is supporting Uber's flight section in the UK, which could provide distribution opportunities for Hopper if Uber succeeds in becoming a super app.

What are the final takeaways?

The key takeaway is that a successful founding team tends to attract more success, making it easier to secure funding and talent. Deep Sky's approach emphasizes making existing technology accessible and developing a viable business model in the field of carbon capture, which can be costly given the hardware and climate considerations involved.

The newest episode of Quick Takes will drop next week!

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