[aspir]

I'm a contracted business plan and grant writer on the side as I work at a startup. I've also entered and placed in / won a few national biz plan competitions in multiple industries (biotech, pharma, semicon, ren. energy, B2C software, B2B software) so I feel like I may be able to gauge this.

Odds are strong that your plan, if in the consumer space, is already outdated. Unless you have real, long-lasting IP (not just 'patent pending', but literally a process that is revolutionary and incredibly hard to reverse engineer, typical with university tech) the market has likely shifted away from your assumptions. Unless this is true, the business plan is only worth the paper and ink it's printed on.

That said, if you have been able to secure the first partnership, funding, or start carrying out the actual plan, you have something much more valuable than 30 bound pages and a spreadsheet. That deserves equity, and a lot of it.

Also, and I apologize if this sounds rude, 2 years of writing a biz plan is about 15-18 months too long. I can bang out a complete draft sans graphics in ~4 weekends. Any more time that that, and I get into the "law of diminishing returns" space. Whatever you do, don't rewrite it -- you've already sunk enough time into it. Fundraise full time, line up partners, presell the product with your next time period, but another day tweaking that plan is another day lost.

For the record -- I'm not a fan of writing business plans at all, but it pays the bills, and organizations are happy to write me big checks so they don't have to write them either. Some big industries require them (bio, semicon, green energy), but those same players also want ironclad IP, so its a completely different world than the modern web space.

[aspir]

After reviewing the edits in your post, I'd say that your best actions are to just split equity evenly 3 ways, unless someone writes a large check/maxes out their credit card for whatever reason, and leave the business plan alone for 6-8months while everyone works.

Biz plans are often a double edged sword -- when you need to adjust or move quickly, they become anchors to the past plans. They aren't worthless though; to paraphrase Eisenhower, "Plans are nothing, planning is everything."

Your CEO has done everything right to earn the title, powers, and prestige of CEO, but not extra equity.

EDIT -- wrote this before I saw your reply below :)

[nickh]

Thanks for your insight, aspir. Much appreciated.

Despite the CEO having worked on the business plan for the last 2 years, it's actually not out of date. This is because it's been updated as time has gone on, and a direct, funded competitor just launched, which validates the idea and one of the planned revenue streams.

Since I and others have joined the startup:

* we've just barely begun looking for our first round of funding.

* the CEO's been successful in obtaining a few beta testers to generate our initial content.

* we've built 70% of the MVP.

[aspir]

Factoring all of that in, I'd still say that if there were equity for the plan, it would be small. A lot of this planning work is within the CEO's job description by default. It takes the bruden off the technical team so that they can do their best work. In my opinion, if you can convert the beta testers to paying customers (even if they are for tiny amounts of cash) your valuation is significantly higher, with or without a plan (with is always better, though).

[nickh]

That's a very good point: this planning is part of the role of the CEO.