Users want to know how difficult it is to amend the certificate of incorporation to increase authorized shares in Delaware, and if it requires legal assistance or can be handled by founders themselves.
Hey everyone, I had a question about share structure and wanted to understand how difficult the fix is. We’re a Delaware C-Corp using Carta, with 10M authorized shares. I set everything up myself since we’re bootstrapped. Over time I issued shares to a few early team members and advisors. The plan was that I would hold a bit over 75% of the company. What I realized recently is that while allocating shares to everyone else, I never actually issued shares to myself. Because of that, while there are still unissued shares remaining, there aren’t enough left to match the ownership structure we originally planned. Some additional context: • No investors yet • No one has purchased equity • Just early team/advisor allocations • Everyone involved would be fine approving whatever is needed to fix it From what I understand, the solution would likely be amending the certificate of incorporation to increase the authorized shares, but I wanted to ask: • How difficult is this process in Delaware? • Is it mostly paperwork, or does it usually require lawyers? • Is this something founders typically handle themselves at this stage? Just trying to understand how big of a process this is. Thank you in advance.