At Accurx, we make sure everyone has a stake in Accurx’s success to forge a sense of collectiveness and recognise hard work and loyalty.
We do this by issuing both new joiners and existing employees, at particular milestones, with share options.
Share options give employees the ability to buy company shares in the future at a discounted price.
We standardise how we make option offers. The value of awards are based on share bands. These have been informed by the most commonly used benchmarks for employee equity among European tech startups.
Employees are awarded a top up of shares at promotion to reflect their new share band.
Employees will be awarded a top up of their shares after every 2 years of tenure. The purpose is to retain employees for the long term by avoiding 4 year vesting cliffs.
Evergreens are awarded based on the default offers and share price at the time of issue (date of your anniversary). They are half of the default offer for the band.
There are several share schemes available to employers to issue shares to employees. Each scheme has different rules regarding who can be issued shares, at what price and what tax is to be paid.
We have chosen unapproved as it provides flexibility and ensures the shares remain affordable to all employees.
These shares vest over a 4 year period with a 1 year cliff. When joining the company you are given a maximum number of shares options,, this is the number of shares options you will have after working at Accurx for 4 years. These options become available to you based on the below schedule:
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Once you buy these options, they become shares in the company.
When leaving Accurx, you are able to hold onto your shares that have vested if you are a “good leaver”.