So a quick summary: I founded a company with a friend a little over a year ago, however, I'm now stepping back for various reasons (mental health, financial debt, career progression etc). This initially started as a university project the year before and so I have put a total of 2 years into R&D. Therefore, I've put in a lot of time and brought things such as: the original idea, much of the IP and an equal amount of the work the past year.
When the company was founded, equity started as 63:37 in my favour, but I agreed to tune this back to 55:45 to accommodate the equal amount of work going forward. A founders agreement was put in place so that shares would be vested over 3 years with a cliff period of 1 year. Just over 1 year has passed so via our contract, I should have 18.3% shares vested.
However, I realise it's not ideal for me to drop out at an early stage as there will be a lot of work left to take the company forward. For reference the company is still in RnD and pre-revenue/investment, it's been entirely bootstrapped up until this point with only a few small-ish grants coming through.
My cofounder would prefer me to take a percentage in the single digits range, however, I've said I'd be happy to decrease my amount to a quarter (13.5%) while continuing to lend a hand with things into the future.
What's your opinion on this, should I take any equity, should I negotiate for a higher amount, or should I go for something in the single digits.
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