Research Project: Can SAFE Contracts be Smart?

Y Combinator's Simple Agreements for Future Equity (SAFE) agreements are a type of contract used in startup seed financing. Rather than receiving shares directly for their investment, the seed investor receives a contract that is intended to be converted into preferred shares at the time of a future equity round. This circumvents the problem of placing a valuation on a very immature enterprise, and defers the complex negotiations on the terms of the preferred shares to a time when the company is ready to take on a larger investment.

This project is investigating the potential for SAFE contracts to be implemented as smart contracts on a blockchain platform. Since smart contract code is necessarily more precise and formal than legal text, the work encompasses financial analysis, legal formalisation, software engineering and computer security analysis.

Staff:

Prof. Ron van der Meyden (CSE), Prof. Michael Maher (ADFA and Reasoning Research Institute), William Coulter (CSE Honours Student)

Outcomes: