A blockchain-native legal-tech platform: AI document generation, Web3 e-signature, on-chain dispute resolution, with real demand and a price no investor could underwrite. Left alone, it would have raised on a model that fell apart in diligence. We rebuilt the economics before the pitch.

01 The diagnosis

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The brief was pricing. The problem was architecture. Per-seat pricing would underprice heavy enterprise users and overprice light ones; churn at the bottom, margin erosion at the top. Pure usage-based pricing would solve that but produce unpredictable bills that enterprise procurement cannot sign off on. And at $20,000+ annual contracts, anything outside a buyer's procurement template would not be negotiated down; it would be deferred indefinitely

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02 The architecture

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A hybrid: a seat-based floor that gives procurement a predictable minimum, plus a usage-based expansion layer tied to the two metrics that track the value delivered: document volume and AI query consumption. The floor was anchored to the real cost-to-serve; the expansion captured upside without an open-ended ceiling. Three tiers, each built to fit a recognisable procurement template, so no buyer had to invent a new approval category.


The technology was always fundable. The revenue model was not.


03 The buyers

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In parallel, we mapped three buyer profiles: the cross-border law firm, the multi-jurisdiction corporate legal team, the financial-services firm needing smart-contract documentation, to the tier each would convert into, the objections each would raise in procurement, and the ROI narrative most likely to close.

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04 The outcome

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The founders walked into enterprise demos with pricing stress-tested against their cost stack and built to survive procurement at the contract values they were targeting. More importantly, the unit economics were now underwritable, a defensible floor, a calculable expansion rate, and a credible path to net revenue retention above 110%, the metric that separates a SaaS business worth funding from one that merely adds logos.

The alignment between what the product does, what it costs to deliver and what customers will pay is not a pricing exercise. It is the foundation of a raise, built before the first investor conversation.

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