startup legal advisory in nairobi — from idea to investor-ready

Registering a company in Kenya sounds straightforward until it is not. The wrong company structure can cost you dearly when investors arrive, when you want to add co-founders, or when you try to repatriate profits as a foreign investor. We advise on the right entity: private limited company, LLP, branch office, or foreign-owned entity and handle the entire process: business name search and reservation, preparation of Memorandum and Articles of Association, registration with the Business Registration Service (BRS), KRA PIN and VAT registration, NSSF and NHIF registration, and your first year of company secretarial compliance.

We also advise international founders and diaspora entrepreneurs on the optimal jurisdiction for their holding company structure whether in Kenya, Mauritius, Delaware, or the British Virgin Islands; depending on where their investors are and where their business will operate.

More startups unravel from founder disputes than from bad products. A co-founder agreement that clearly defines roles, vesting schedules, intellectual property ownership, and what happens if someone walks away is not pessimistic. It is what founders do.

We draft founders’ agreements that protect everyone at the table, including you. Every engagement includes IP assignment agreements ensuring that what your team builds belongs to the company, not to an individual who might walk out the door. We pair this with tailored NDAs that protect your proprietary information, trade secrets, and competitive advantage from day one, whether you are sharing your vision with a potential hire, an investor, or a partner.

We also advise on ESOP design for early employees, convertible instruments for angel rounds, and SAFE agreements for pre-seed funding.

Because the best time to get this right is before anything goes wrong.

Raising capital in Kenya is not just about having a great pitch deck. Whether you are approaching angel investors, venture capital firms, development finance institutions, or strategic partners, the legal documentation behind the deal matters just as much as the idea itself. Poorly drafted terms can cost you equity, control, or the deal entirely.

We support founders through every stage of the fundraising process. That means term sheet review and negotiation, shareholder agreements, subscription agreements, convertible note structures, SAFE agreements, due diligence support, and cap table management advice.

We have sat on both sides of the table. We know what investors look for, and we know what they will use to chip away at your valuation if your house is not in order. Our job is to make sure you walk into every room prepared, protected, and negotiating from a position of strength.

Your brand, your technology, your content, and your processes are assets. In Kenya, protecting them requires proactive legal action, not just a registration number.

We handle trademark registration with the Kenya Industrial Property Institute (KIPI), copyright protection for software and creative work, IP assignment agreements to ensure the company owns what it builds rather than leaving ownership tied to an individual founder, and licensing structures that help you commercialise your IP without giving away more than you should.

Because the work your team creates from day one has value. The question is whether you have the legal foundation to prove it, protect it, and profit from it.

If your startup operates in fintech, healthtech, edtech, agritech, or any regulated sector, you need legal guidance before you launch. Not after your first compliance notice arrives.

We advise startups on the full range of regulatory requirements they are likely to face as they grow. That includes CBK licensing for digital credit providers and payment service providers, ODPC data protection registration and compliance, CMA regulatory requirements for fintechs touching securities, sector-specific licensing across Kenya’s broader regulatory framework, and employment law compliance for teams that are scaling.

Regulators in Kenya are paying closer attention than they were three years ago. The founders who treat compliance as a foundation rather than an afterthought are the ones who scale without interruption. We help you become one of them.