About Richard Prangell
Richard Prangell is the founder of Viridian Lawyers, a boutique Sydney law firm dedicated to supporting high-growth businesses and ambitious founders.
Richard has spent over 15 years advising startups, scale-ups, and their investors — from the earliest pre-seed conversations through to Series B fundraises, trade sales, and acquisitions. He’s helped Australian companies raise more than $100 million in venture capital, designed and implemented employee share schemes for dozens of startups, and registered more than 50 trade marks across Australia and internationally.
He has served as corporate counsel in-house and is recognised for a practical, business-focused approach — the kind of legal advice that helps founders make decisions and move forward, rather than creating more complexity.
Teaching & Research
Richard teaches Corporate Innovation & Regulation and International Transactions at the University of Sydney Law School, sharing practical experience with the next generation of commercial lawyers. His teaching reflects the same philosophy as his practice: law in service of business, not the other way around.
Areas of Expertise
- Venture capital & fundraising — term sheets, SAFEs, convertible notes, preference shares, shareholders’ agreements across every stage from pre-seed to Series B
- ESOPs & employee share schemes — plan design, startup concession structuring, vesting schedules, and plan rules under Division 83A
- Business setup & structuring — company formation, founder agreements, cap table management, and corporate governance
- Intellectual property — trade mark registration and strategy, IP assignment, copyright, licensing, and open-source compliance
- Employment law — employment contracts, contractor arrangements, restraint of trade, termination, and workplace policies
- Mergers & acquisitions — share and asset sales, due diligence, deal structuring, and post-completion integration
- Fintech & regulation — AFSL requirements, AML/CTF compliance, digital assets, open banking, and payment systems
- Privacy & data security — Privacy Act compliance, data breach response, privacy by design, and vendor due diligence
The Viridian approach
Viridian is deliberately boutique. That means Richard works directly on every matter — not a partner who hands off to a junior once you’ve signed the engagement letter. It also means pricing that reflects value, not hourly clock-watching: most matters are handled on a fixed-fee or capped-fee basis.
The firm works flexibly inside the tools founders already use — Slack, Teams, Notion, Google Meet, Zoom — so legal doesn’t feel like a separate silo that slows everything down.
If you’d like to talk about how Viridian can help your business, get in touch.