
Pitch idea to current company or go elsewhere - mediocrist
In a bit of dilemma - looking to crowdsource some wisdom:<p>I&#x27;m currently working at a medium sized company that itself is looking to pivot.   I think i&#x27;ve come up with a pretty strong idea that could either fit for this company, a few others in this space, or even start my own company.<p>What is the best play here?<p>So far I got:<p>1) I pitch this to my current employer.  They have the resources to build it, are already in a similar space, and are exploring ways to pivot the business.   However best case seems to be they say, &quot;Great, build it&quot; and I get to do something else than my usual day to day. Though most likely I&#x27;d just get an additional job. Might get a promotion&#x2F;bonus but not a substantial increase in equity&#x2F;ownership.<p>2) I pitch this to another company in the space who might be interested.<p>3) I build this out myself.  I have the technical skills to at least put together a decent MVP in 1-2 months.<p>Some other analysis:<p>1) Legally, if my current employer wanted to fight me for ownership they&#x27;d have a decent case.  My contract says they own what I invent and the idea is sufficiently close to the current lines of business that I don&#x27;t think CA moonlighting law(2870) would help me too much.  That said, the idea is a combination of concepts and I&#x27;m not sure <i>all</i> parts of it could be considered related.  I imagine it&#x27;d depend on the caselaw and the scope of &#x27;relates&#x27;.<p>2) I could build out a MVP on the side and then present it the current company as an independent project - asking, innocently, if they might be interested in acquiring it.  Not crazy about this plan as it&#x27;s actually one i&#x27;ve sort of done before with limited success.  Still, seems like it might work.  If they say no I could take it elsewhere and I could see them wanting it if only to prevent that and could offer at minimum whatever the costs&#x2F;headaches of legal action might be.<p>Thoughts? Asking on a throw away for obvious reasons.
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csallen
I don't think it's a good idea to basically extort money from your company (or
motivate them to sue you) by building a derivative product and threatening to
take it to a competitor. So I would cross that off the list.

It sounds like you're an ambitious guy. Why not build something on your own
outside of work? It's challenging, fulfilling, educational, and rewarding: you
keep 100% of the value you create. I think more devs will be moving in this
direction as time goes on and there are increasing resources to "guide the
way". (Meta: I'm both doing this and helping others via
[https://IndieHackers.com.](https://IndieHackers.com.))

If I were you, I'd give the company the idea, then brainstorm new and
unrleated ideas of my own, then get written/legal permission to work on them
at home and own them.

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mediocrist
Not sure 'extort' is fair here. I'd be building something they'd never build
on their own while providing a promising direction to a company that could use
one. I just want to end up with some ownership over my own idea.

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brudgers
My advice, talk to a lawyer. The attractiveness of paying for legal advice is
a filter over options 2 and 3.

Good luck.

