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Daniel I. DeWolf

Member / Chair, Technology Practice; Co-chair, Venture Capital & Emerging Companies Practice

[email protected]

+1.212.692.6223

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Daniel is a leading authority on growth companies and venture capital law — and has worked on pioneering online capital-raising methods since the Internet’s beginning. He is immersed in the national and international ecosystem of emerging companies and investors focused on start-ups. He has also been a member of NYU Law School’s faculty since 2003, where he teaches venture capital law. Earlier, he co-founded and served as managing director of an early stage venture capital firm based in New York City.

Daniel is Chair of Mintz's Technology Practice Group and Co-chair of the firm’s Venture Capital & Emerging Companies Practice Group. In addition to his active legal practice, he is an adjunct professor of law at the NYU Law School. Daniel is also Editor of MintzEdge, an online resource for entrepreneurs that includes useful tools and information for starting and growing a company.

Before joining Mintz, Daniel was head of venture capital funds and a managing director of SoundView Technology Group, Inc. (formerly Wit Capital), a technology-focused investment bank. Prior to joining SoundView, he was head of the corporate and new media and e-law practice groups at one of the leading New York firms representing early stage and technology companies.

Daniel has more than 35 years of corporate transactional experience, both as a lawyer and as a businessman, and has been an advisor to many emerging and developmental stage companies. He is a board member of several technology companies and was a co-founder and Managing Director of Dawntreader Ventures, an early stage venture capital firm.

Additionally, Daniel is an author of a leading treatise on venture capital called Venture Capital: Forms and Analysis (Law Journal Press, 2007).

viewpoints

Historically, most startup companies were funded either by the offering of equity or by loans in the form of convertible promissory notes. Recently, however, there have been some hybrid instruments created to fund startups.
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Kinnos Inc. is a New York-based company that is raising the standard of infectious disease decontamination to protect healthcare workers, patients, and the general public. Their first product, Highlight®, is an additive for disinfectants that eliminates human error and allows even untrained end-users, such as healthcare workers, housekeeping staff, and biosafety personnel, to immediately use disinfectants effectively.

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The current edition of MintzTech Connect includes an article relating to investing in hot secondary securities and an article on some of the pitfalls in our “gig economy” under New York law when hiring independent contractors. We also highlight a very cool young company called Kinnos, which is raising the standard of infectious disease decontamination to protect healthcare workers, patients, and the general public.

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U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission member Michael Piwowar on Tuesday urged investors to be wary of the pitfalls of so-called SAFE investments — a sophisticated financing instrument for startup companies — that are increasingly being marketed to the broader retail investing public.

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Seniority Matters

June 15, 2017 | Article | By Daniel DeWolf

There is little doubt that activity in the trading of secondary shares of private companies remains robust. Private companies are staying private longer and there seems to be an unlimited demand to buy into the newest “Unicorn” anointed each week. As the market for secondary shares stays strong, valuations seem not to matter much to most buyers.
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This issue includes two articles that challenge conventional thinking. The first, called “Software is Still Patent Eligible,” makes the case that software patents can still be obtained. IP generally accretes in value over time and is critically important to the value proposition of many enterprises. While some commentators believe that software patents are no longer worth trying to obtain, we disagree. The second article is about a novel way to construct a more balanced approach to the share ownership of founders and investors. People often forget that the NVCA (National Venture Capital Association) forms are created by counsel to the venture capital industry and as such are generally biased in favor of the investor. Our article proposes a novel solution to mitigate this bias and the solution is both simple and equitable.

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Recognizing that physical therapy will always be in demand, Dr. Stephen Fealy MD, a leading orthopedic surgeon at the Hospital for Special Surgery (HSS), and Greg Peters, a leading health and fitness expert, joined forces to make the overall physical therapy industry and experience more effective and efficient, thus BetterPT was conceived.

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Founded in 2012 and headquartered in New York City, T-REX’s secure, enterprise SaaS-based analytics, risk, and portfolio management platform standardizes and provides transparency to the complex structured products evaluation process, increasing liquidity and creating significant investment opportunities for the hundreds of billions of dollars of capital across various esoteric, non-commoditized asset classes.

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Our client, Benji Cohen, was running an Energy Markets Division at Macquarie when he had a lightbulb moment. Everywhere he looked valuation models were being put together in the most laborious way imaginable, with Excel tables containing hundreds of columns and thousands of rows. Benji saw a real point of pain in the marketplace and acted on it. Thus, in 2012, Benji created T-REX as a subscription-based, SaaS, FinTech platform that could compress the time for the valuation process to make the process 50 times faster and more accurate as well. And, the focus would be in a growing niche — the renewable energy sector. Benji was able to see the size of the opportunity, the point of pain in the marketplace, and the solution. With much hard work and great execution, T-REX is now a leader in this part of the FinTech space. In this edition of TechConnect, we highlight T-REX in our Innovator Profile.
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If there is one common theme that entrepreneurs tend to have, it is fire – meaning, many entrepreneurs are passionate about an exciting idea that they seek to turn into a business. However, entrepreneurs often quickly realize that, in order to make their fire glow high and bright for the world to see, they need fuel – meaning, capital.
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News & Press

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A Mintz team led by Corporate Members Jim McKnight and Joe Ronca advised Altamira Technologies Corporation on its acquisition of Virginia Systems & Technology, Inc. This strategic acquisition expanded Altamira’s capabilities and national security customer portfolio, while winning “Deal of the Year” in the “Under $50 Million” category at ACG National Capital’s 22nd Annual Corporate Growth Awards.

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BOSTON – Mintz has earned top rankings in the 2023 edition of Legal 500 United States guide. The firm is recognized in 14 practice categories, and 59 individual attorneys are also recognized in the guide, some in more than one category.

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Through its creative partnership with legal tech provider Clara, Mintz provides founders with a cost-efficient way to start a US business. Utilizing Clara’s platform, Mintz created templates that enable users to form Delaware companies and prepare all necessary documents while additionally helping founders to meet all legal requirements.

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My Startup World covered Mintz's collaboration with legal tech provider Clara and quoted Members Dan DeWolf and Sam Effron.

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Law360 covered Mintz's partnership with legal tech provider Clara. The move allows Clara to enter the U.S. market.

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Chair of the firm’s Technology Practice, and Co-chair of the firm’s Venture Capital & Emerging Companies Practice Daniel DeWolf was interviewed by FinTech Tv's Vince Mollinari about the state of the international venture capital market and potential opportunities for Congress to implement economy driving legislation.

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Mintz has acted as deal counsel to Altamira Technologies Corporation in its acquisition of signals intelligence mission business, Virginia Systems & Technology (VaST).

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Mintz Member Daniel DeWolf co-authored an article featured in The Deal exploring the top five ways to accelerate the growth of emerging companies.

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Antler Innovation U.S. LLC has selected Mintz as its law firm partner of choice to support its portfolio companies in the U.S. as it expands its presence and foothold in America’s emerging growth ecosystem. With more than 500 portfolio companies globally valued at $2 billion, Antler is helping to professionalize early-stage investing by bringing new capital, a large global community of co-founders, and a broad set of industry expertise to support fast-growing companies from the earliest stages. 

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Mintz Member, Chair of the firm’s Technology Practice, and Co-chair of the firm’s Venture Capital & Emerging Companies Practice Daniel I. DeWolf appeared on FINTECH TV’s Digital Asset Report to discuss the impact of COVID-19 on the private marketplaces, digital transformation in the private marketplaces, and venture capital activity and indicators.
Daniel DeWolf, Co-Chair, Venture Capital and Emerging Companies, and Megan Gates, Co-chair of the Securities & Capital Markets Practice Group, authored this VC Experts Blog piece discussing how the world of raising capital has been evolving over the last several years.
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Mintz was recently named the exclusive legal sponsor of AREA, a real estate technology venture accelerator program based in New York City. As a sponsor, the firm will offer in-kind legal services to real estate technology startup companies participating in the intensive three-month program.
Daniel DeWolf, Co-chair of Mintz’s Venture Capital & Emerging Companies and Technology Practices, and Associates Sam Effron and Rachel Gholston, authored this VC Experts Blog piece providing a clear overview of the best practices businesses can implement when using electronic signatures.
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Events & Speaking

Moderator
Moderator
Mar
19
2020

Investing in Energy Transformation [Event to be rescheduled]

Briefing on Power, Technology and Security Strategies

Mintz, 666 Third Ave, New York, NY

Seminar Reference Image
Speaker
Jul
30
2019

TechGC Roundtable

San Francisco, CA

Moderator
Jun
19
2019

Private Tech Investing Success Stories for Family Offices

Mintz, Chrysler Center, 666 Third Avenue, New York

Speaker
Apr
10
2019

TechGC Roundtable

New York, NY

Speaker
Apr
3
2019

The First Most Important Decision for the Entrepreneur: How to Choose the Right Corporate Entity for Your Startup

BioLabs@NYULangone

BioLabs@NYULangone, 180 Varick St., 6th Floor, New York, NY

Speaker
Speaker
Speaker
Mar
15
2018

Legal Clinic

NYC MediaLabs

Co-chair
Oct
27
2017
Speaker
Mar
17
2017

Corporate Formation Workshop

NYC Media Lab

New York, NY

Moderator
Nov
3
2016

The Changing World of Raising Capital

MintzEdge and Columbia Technology Ventures

New York, NY

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Daniel is a leading authority on growth companies and venture capital law — and has worked on pioneering online capital-raising methods since the Internet’s beginning. He is immersed in the national and international ecosystem of emerging companies and investors focused on start-ups. He has also been a member of NYU Law School’s faculty since 2003, where he teaches venture capital law. Earlier, he co-founded and served as managing director of an early stage venture capital firm based in New York City.

Recognition & Awards

  • Recommended by The Legal 500 United States for Venture Capital and Emerging Companies (2015 – 2017; 2021 – 2022, 2024)

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Daniel is a leading authority on growth companies and venture capital law — and has worked on pioneering online capital-raising methods since the Internet’s beginning. He is immersed in the national and international ecosystem of emerging companies and investors focused on start-ups. He has also been a member of NYU Law School’s faculty since 2003, where he teaches venture capital law. Earlier, he co-founded and served as managing director of an early stage venture capital firm based in New York City.

Involvement

  • Adjunct Professor at NYU School of Law
  • Guest Lecturer, High-Growth Corporate Transactions, Cornell Law School at Cornell Tech
  • Judge, Harvard Business School Business Plan Contest
  • Member, Advisory Council to the Public Policy Committee of the Angel Capital Association
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Daniel I. DeWolf

Member / Chair, Technology Practice; Co-chair, Venture Capital & Emerging Companies Practice

New York