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Ask HN: Starting a startup in Europe while employed

4 points by photonios ↗ HN
I am currently employed as a software engineer by a small company in a European country (member of the EU). The company itself is part of a group of companies that operate worldwide. This group owns the company works for. The group itself operates from the UK.

I've been working on this idea in my spare time and I am thinking to turn it into a business. It's not in the space my employer operates in. Absolutely not. I am also not using company resources at all. I am very well aware of the legal trouble and the claims my employer could make if I were to do that.

I know that in the US, even this could be problematic. Your employer could make a claim for any side work you do, even if it isn't on company time or using company resources.

How does this work in Europe? Is there someone who started a business while still employed? Did you notify your employer before launching?

7 comments

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1ba9115454
Never tell your employer about your side projects.

Even if you launch it does not guarantee any level of success so telling them first could turn out to be pointless.

romanovcode
> How does this work in Europe? Is there someone who started a business while still employed?

It works exactly the same way. The default EU contract for jobs have the clause of your work being an IP of a company you work for, even on your spare time.

That being said I always do not accept this clause and ask my employer to remove/change this clause to allow me engage in my own businesses as long as it does not benefit competitors of my employer.

> Did you notify your employer before launching?

No, since you are not legally obliged, what's the point?

photonios
I just checked my contract, it has no such clause, which means that it depends on what the law says. So I guess that's good.

Wouldn't it be wise to notify/inform your employer and make sure you're both on the same page to avoid any problems in the future?

agitator
A verbal "go ahead" won't help you. If they wanted to litigate in the future, they would either way. Bringing it up to your employer would only impact your career prospects and not benefit you in any way. They would just treat you as potentially leaving, or disengaged and you will be less likely to earn promotions etc. Its best just to keep it to yourself. If you are worried, keep records of working on it on your own time, in case it becomes an issue. If your side project takes off, you tell your company you are leaving to do your own thing, and generally most companies don't care. It's only if they discover that you are doing something that directly competes, then they will look into it.
mattmanser
Really depends on your contract + country. There is no "default contract" in the EU as another commentator says[1].

You need to read your contract. They're generally fairly readable. You're looking for clauses about working for other companies and intellectual property. As the pdf I linked shows, in some countries some of these clauses end up being unenforceable, they're simply there to scare/intimidate/restrict you.

In a few of the places I worked there were prohibitions in my contract against owning or working for another company without an ok from the board/CEO/something like that. It sounds scary and unobtainable, it's definitely not.

At the first company, my friend was running a side business and asked and it was ok. At another business I already had a company when I was offered the job, I asked to keep the company as it generated a little cash each month, I was given the ok.

Generally speaking though, you're not going to have any problems. Just don't do anything using their equipment and watch out for poaching clauses in contracts if you hire people from work, they're much more likely to enforce them. The contracts I've had that actually had them were generally a year or 18 months though.

[1] Here is an example of non-compete enforcability which lists every EU company's different laws, as you can see, they're all different:

https://www.fcblegal.com/xms/files/Meritas_Guide_to_Employee...

photonios
Thanks for the in-depth answer, that helps. The PDF you linked is very helpful. That sums it up nicely. Unfortunately it does not list the EU country I live in. On the bright side, it does list the country I incorporated in (my home country).

I guess I don't have much to worry about. Although it might be wise to consult a lawyer.

maephisto
Probably best thing to do would be to talk about it with your employer and ask for a written agreement. If it's not conflicting in any way most employers will accept.