Carta Release Notes - Product Updates
3 years ago6/27/2023
Automate ASC 718 stock-based compensation reporting for profits interests
What's new?
You can now pull automated expense and disclosure reports for profits interests with vesting schedules that include time-based conditions and event-based performance conditions.
What's important or valuable about this change?
ASC 718 reporting involves expensing each equity grant on your company’s income statements, which are subject to audits. With Carta, you can now simplify expense reporting for profits interests:
- Eliminate errors and save time with automated expense reporting based on your up-to-date cap table in Carta
- Define reporting parameters and pull customized reports with a few clicks whenever you need them
- Confidently enter audits with accurate, transparent, and defensible expense reports every single time
What do I need to do?
ASC 718 financial reporting is available as an add-on to your current Carta subscription. Please reach out to your CSM to learn more and request a demo.
If you currently have ASC 718 financial reporting enabled on your Carta account, navigate to the Financial reporting tab to generate your reports.
Manage any exclusions (to control which interests are included in financial reports) and provide the ASC 718 fair value for each interest. Once you define these reporting parameters, they're saved so you can pull consistent reports every time.
Input the report start and end dates to run the report.
Download the expense and disclosure reports.
How do I learn more or get help?
If you need help with your Carta-generated financial reports, contact our dedicated ASC 718 support team.
If you’re interested in automating ASC 718 financial reporting with Carta, please reach out to your CSM to learn more and request a demo.
Zeba Naqvi
3 years ago6/27/2023
Gain visibility into preferred returns
What's new?
We’ve made updates to the Interest Summary to provide Admins and interest holders more visibility into preferred returns.
What's important or valuable about this change?
You can now easily see the total accrued value for each interest based on the compounding period and accrual rate. The new preferred returns section provides visibility into the:
- Accrued Value
- Compounding Period
- Accrual Period
- Accrual Rate
- Accrual Start Date
- Principal Amount
- Day Count Convention
What do I need to do?
Navigate to the Interest Details page for an interest and find the Preferred Return section at the bottom of the Interest Summary tab. Note that the interest type must be enabled with “preferred returns” for this section to appear in the interest details summary. Contact your CSM for more information.
How do I learn more or get help?
For more information, visit our support site.
Zeba Naqvi
3 years ago6/23/2023
Tax Jurisdiction Model: Local Jurisdiction Withholding Improvements
What’s new?
Legal Administrators can now group multiple cities under a single local jurisdiction for tax withholding purposes.
Why is this an improvement?
Issuers now have greater flexibility in capturing jurisdictions where their participants pay taxes, particularly for county-level taxes or jurisdictions that are not specific to countries, states/provinces, or cities.
How does it work?
Navigate to Carta’s Tax jurisdiction and rates table by following Compliance & Tax -Tax Rules-Tax jurisdictions and rates.
Add a jurisdiction below the state or province level and select Multi-Regional Tax Jurisdiction. Enter all of the cities that belong to that jurisdiction.
The jurisdiction is then displayed as Multi-Regional. Any tax rate or rule set for the jurisdiction will apply to all stakeholders with tax addresses containing any of its included cities and will be used to calculate tax withholding for applicable transactions.
Bryan Wells
3 years ago6/21/2023
Real-time Carta portco share price updates
What's new?
Get real-time updates when your portfolio companies on Carta raise a new round.
What's important or valuable about this change?
Now, all Fund Administration clients get automatic notifications when their investments on Carta add a new share class to the cap table with filed Articles of Incorporation. We'll also include the original issue price of the new share class – helping you maintain the latest information on your investments.
What do I need to do?
You will receive an email when your portco adds a new share class with a new price-per-share from the original issue price on the Articles of Incorporation. A task will also appear in your Activity tab. There, you can view the new price-per-share, its impact on your fund metrics like IRR and gross multiple, and update your SOI in a few steps.
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How do I learn more or get help?
Visit this support article for a detailed FAQ. Have more questions? Your Fund Admin team is here to help.
Alex Legault
3 years ago6/21/2023
Separate reports for Fair Market Value (FMV) and Financial Reporting Value (FRV)
What's new?
Beginning on June 21, customers with both Carta 409A and Financial Reporting in their subscription will begin receiving two separate, audit-defensible reports: one with the Fair Market Value (FMV) used for tax purposes, and one with the Financial Reporting Value (FRV) used for accounting purposes.
Delivering these reports separately will more closely align with a changing regulatory environment in which tax guidelines under 409A and accounting standards under ASC 718 diverge.
Historically, Carta has only delivered a single report that values our customers' common stock under section 409A of the tax code. This singular report would double as a valuation used for both tax and accounting purposes, which introduced challenges for customers going through audits - companies are incentivized to keep their FMV low to keep options attractive for employees, while auditors may push companies to increase the Fair Value of stock when calculating stock-based compensation expense.
Disambiguating these two concepts allows our customers to work more flexibly with their auditors while still keeping options and other equity awards attractive as incentives for hiring and retaining talent.
What do I need to do?
If you're a customer with both Carta 409A and Financial Reporting in your subscription, you'll receive two reports the next time you request a 409A valuation from Carta: one with the Fair Market Value (FMV), and one with the Financial Reporting Value (FRV).
The FMV can be used as normal: pricing options, helping employees estimate their tax burden when exercising, Form 3921 filings, etc. The FRV can be used in Carta's Financial Reporting product to calculate the expense associated with stock-based compensation. Customers can work with their auditors to either directly use the provided FRV or adjust it from within Carta's Financial Reporting product as necessary.
For customers with access to both Carta 409A and Financial Reporting in your subscription, you’ll see an additional card for FRV at the top of the Valuations homepage in Carta (Compliance & Tax > 409A Valuations) once you receive and accept a new valuation report from Carta:
You'll also see an extra column in the table at the bottom of the Valuations homepage which shows historical FRVs side-by-side with historical FMVs:
And in Financial Reporting, you'll also see text changes when configuring a scenario:
How do I learn more or get help?
We've created a few help articles with detailed information about FRV and how this value differs from FMV and appears in Carta:
- Separate Reports for Fair Market Value and Financial Reporting Value
- 409A and ASC 718 Compliance: Carta’s Financial Reporting Value (FRV)
- Financial Reporting (V3): Carta’s Financial Reporting Value (FRV)
If you've received your FRV report and have further questions, feel free to reach out to val-operations@carta.com - we'd be happy to help.
Stephanie Wittrock
3 years ago6/14/2023
Book a Tax Advisory Session on the Carta iOS app
What’s New
Employees who have access to Carta Tax Advisory through their employer can now book 1-1 sessions with a Carta Equity Tax Advisor directly on the Carta iOS mobile app.
This release allows employees to select a session, book a time, and join their session all directly in the Carta app.
What do I need to do?
Employees with access to Tax Advisory will see this feature on the home screen of their portfolio in the iOS app. To download the Carta visit the Apple App Store.
Have questions? Contact product@carta.com.
Jordan Agnew
3 years ago6/5/2023
Carta Total Compensation downloadable reports
What’s new?
Customers can now download reports directly from the company Scorecard page to gain additional insights into their compensation programs. There are 3 reports available to download:
- Cost vs. Market report: A comprehensive list of all employees, their total compensation, and indicates whether their compensation aligns with the latest compensation benchmarks.
- Equity Refresh report: Shows all employees, their last refresh grant date, and a suggestion for the appropriate amount and timing for their next compensation refresh.
- Equity Forecast and Burn report: A projection of your equity pool's reserve based on various factors like your hiring plans, employee tenure, and performance reviews.
What do I need to do?
You can download your Reports from the top of the Scorecard page.
What’s next?
These reports are currently in beta, so we’d love to hear your feedback as we continue to test and improve them.
After you download a report you can provide feedback directly in Carta Total Compensation. Your feedback will help us improve future versions of these and other reports on our roadmap.
We’ll be releasing other reports over the next couple of months. If there are specific reports that you’d like to see in Carta Total Compensation or have any questions, please reach out to your Customer Success Manager.
3 years ago6/2/2023
What's new?
We’ve enhanced the Activity tab in our GP Portal so Carta fund managers can do even more from one place.
What’s important or valuable about this change?
We’ve expanded the requests fund managers can submit in their Activity tab to include the ability to make a new investment, add a subsequent close, and transfer holdings to a new LP.
Once submitted, they can track the status of that request and receive detailed notifications to update them of any status changes.
Additionally, fund managers can now message their fund admin directly from the Activity tab, consolidating and organizing all Carta communication outside of their inbox.
What do I need to do?
Navigate to the Activity tab.
You can now submit additional requests through the Quick Actions bar. If you do not see a request, please use the General Inquiry button to submit any request to your fund admin.
Once a request is in progress, we’ve added additional email and in-app notifications so you stay up-to-date on the progress of your fund’s tasks. These include missing information and action required so you know exactly what’s needed from you to complete a request.
We will be making further improvements to the Activity tab over the coming weeks including the ability to schedule a call with your fund admin.
How do I learn more or get help?
To learn more about our improved Activity Tab, check out this support article or reach out to your Account Manager for a demo today.
Melissa VanDerHeyden
3 years ago6/1/2023
Introducing Carta's New Navigation Experience for Companies
We’ve made some improvements
Beginning in May 2023, we are launching a new navigation experience - making it easier than ever to navigate your cap table, create and issue new securities, and manage relations with your stakeholders.
We are testing this experience with a select list of companies. Companies in this test will now navigate Carta’s equity management platform from the left-hand side. We are using this test to iterate on any improvements that need to be made and hope to roll out to 100% of new and existing companies by Summer 2023.
The new menu can also be collapsed for an optimized viewing experience by clicking the menu icon to the right of the Filter text box once you’ve landed in the right spot.
Finding what you need just got easier
The new navigation will make it easier for you to find what you’re looking for and complete critical tasks, with menu categories that are more intuitive and organized according to the type of task that needs to be completed within Carta.
| Menu category | What you will find there |
| Filter Menu | Narrow down your menu options to quickly find what you’re looking for |
| Dashboard | View your company data and explore insights |
| Essentials | Most frequently accessed pages, in one click |
| Cap Table | View and understand your cap table |
| Securities | Issue and view securities |
| Stakeholders | Manage stakeholder information |
| Fundraising | Raise money for your company |
| Compliance & Tax | Ensure your cap table is compliant |
| Documents | Manage documents and communications with stakeholders |
| Settings | Configure your company’s settings |
| More | Explore additional Carta cap table products such as Carta Total Compensation and Tax Advisory |
Terminology that just makes sense
We have also updated some of the terminology that appears throughout the Carta platform to clarify specific tasks and workflows. The changes that we’ve made are outlined in the table below.
| New | Old | Where do I find it? |
| Dashboard | Company summary page | Dashboard |
| View cap table | View by share class | Essentials *Note that this page will still be labeled View by share class under the Cap Table menu |
| Manage stakeholders | All stakeholders | Essentials Stakeholders |
| Draft certificates | Certificate | Essentials |
| Draft options grants | Option grant | Essentials |
| Run reports | Reporting | Essentials Cap Table |
| Cap Table | Capitalization | Cap Table |
| Review cap table health | Account health checks | Cap Table |
| Cap table access | Shareholder experience | Cap Table |
| Review exercises | Exercises | Securities |
| Securities templates | Templates | Securities |
| Run scenario models | Scenario modeling | Fundraising |
| Compliance & Tax | Compliance and Tax (separate menu items) | Compliance & Tax |
| Rule 701 Disclosures | Disclosures | Compliance & Tax |
| Tax Rules | Withholding configuration | Compliance & Tax |
| Company documents | Library | Documents |
| Board activity | Board notifications | Documents |
| Company financials | Financials | Documents |
| Settings | Company settings | Settings |
| Total Compensation | Total comp | More |
FAQs
Why is Carta making this change?
Carta offers a wide range of products and services, and users sometimes get lost as they look through menu items in an effort to find the workflow or platform page they need to access. We understand that time is money, and the less time you spend locating the resources you need frees up more time for you to spend growing and managing your company. The new left-side menu enables users to have an immediate comprehensive view of Carta’s functionality with clearer verbiage, menu filtering, and collapsible dropdowns.
Can I revert back to the old navigation experience?
No. Our research has shown that our new navigation menu is not only more intuitive for users, but also faster. Beginning in May 2023, Carta is fully migrating away from the top navigation menu. We plan to be rolled out to 100% of companies by July 2023.
How do I use the new navigation experience to find what I’m looking for?
The new navigation experience includes a filter to assist you in finding what you’re looking for. The menu will responsively pare down as characters are entered in the text box.
Additionally, left-side navigation enables you to expand and collapse multiple dropdowns at the same time, allowing for a more comprehensive overview of Carta’s functionality at a glance.
Did Carta remove any features?
No. While the new menu may look more compact than in our current experience, all of the features that you have come to rely on are included in the new navigation. The goal of this initiative is not to change the functionality of Carta’s cap table, but rather, to make that functionality easier for you to find.
Alana Lindall
3 years ago5/25/2023
May 25, 2023 Benchmarks
What’s new?
- Updated salary, total cash, and equity benchmarks for all job areas and specializations
- Updated US geographic differentials for all metro areas
- New total cash compensation benchmarks for all roles (total cash compensation benchmarks are reflective of employees who receive both base salary and some form of variable compensation)
- 90th percentile data for all roles and elements of compensation. Users can now set their target market position and view 90th percentile data on the Bands page.
Market Trends
Salary and total cash compensation benchmarks have fallen slightly (approximately 1% overall) since last quarter, reflecting a continued down market for startup talent. We’re observing that new hire salaries across many roles are closer to or below our previous benchmarks, causing many salary benchmarks to decrease. On a role-by-role basis, we’re seeing a bit more volatility in this quarter’s data as compared to the last six months. As in previous updates, specialization-level data continues to be more volatile than the broader sample, as sample sizes for these roles are smaller than job area level data.
Equity benchmarks have decreased approximately 9%, less than last quarter’s 15%. Lower benchmarks cut across most roles and levels, though executive equity grants dropped slightly less, and even increased in some cases.
Looking across updated geographic differential data, most metro areas that moved closer to San Francisco pay levels have maintained their differentials compared to last year. This year, we see more cities outside of traditional tech hubs also moving closer to San Francisco pay levels (in particular metro areas across North Carolina and Florida)
What were the largest areas of movement from these benchmarks?
Salary - Sales, Research, and Strategy roles saw the largest increases, approximately 1-5% versus last quarter. Marketing, Administration, and Project Management roles saw the largest decreases ranging from 5-6%. The decreases for Marketing and Administration are driven by corrections that we have made for how certain roles are being categorized within these job areas. Information Technology also saw a larger decrease, largely due to the small sample size for this job area.
Equity - Support, Human Resources, and Strategy roles saw the largest decreases. Decreases in Product, Finance, and Operations were less pronounced than the overall sample
How do I update my plan to use the new benchmarks version?
You can update your compensation plan to use the latest benchmark versions either by:
Visiting the Plan page and clicking on the "Update available" link in the Active Plan window.
Navigating to the Bands page and clicking on the "Update" bubble in the top left.
You will have the opportunity to preview the new plan with the updated benchmarks version and assess their impact on your Scorecard before accepting the new plan.
What’s next?
Carta Total Compensation is developing benchmarks for new specializations.
3 years ago5/5/2023
Stakeholder 1099-B Status Tool
What’s new?
Stakeholders that have sold through Carta Inc.’s tender offer feature or Carta Inc.’s public markets product can now view the delivery status of their 1099-B tax document. This new feature allows sellers to determine that their 1099-B for a particular selling year:
- has already been delivered
- will be delivered
- is not applicable for the year and won’t be delivered
How does this improve the stakeholder’s experience?
1099-B forms capture the capital gains reported to the IRS for sales done on Carta. Sellers use the information on their form 1099-Bs to file their taxes.
Not all sales done on Carta Inc.’s tender offer tool or Carta Inc.’s public markets product are reported on 1099-Bs. Prior to the release of this product, stakeholders have reported challenges in determining why they did not receive a 1099-B for a calendar year. This tool allows stakeholders to determine the status of their 1099-B quickly and clearly.
1099-Bs might not be provided for several reasons:
- The stakeholder is not subject to IRS reporting (is under a W-8BEN)
- All sales done are cashless sales and the issuer is using Carta’s Rev Proc 2002-50 functionality
- The stakeholder did not sell anything for the tax year where they were paid proceeds through Carta Inc.’s tender offer tool or Carta Inc.’s public markets product
- All transactions excluded from filing (a common reason is treating the dispositions as option cancellations rather than cashless sales)
How does it work?
The stakeholder navigates to account:tax documents where all 1099-B documents are stored, and clicks on the “Missing a Form 1099-B” link:
From here, the participant can select the tax year and check the status on that year’s 1099-B:
The tool will indicate that either the 1099-B has already been distributed, or will give the reason that the stakeholder has not received a 1099-B for that year.
Bryan Wells
3 years ago5/4/2023
What's new?
Carta now supports automated preferred return waterfalls.
What’s valuable about this change?
If you have a preferred return hurdle, your Fund Admin team will automate and review waterfalls directly in the Carta app. These improvements enable us to process more complex calculations in real-time, resulting in faster book closures, more secure data entry and the ability to view fund metrics in the app as they happen.
What do I need to do?
No action is needed. Your teams will start to calculate this performance hurdle online immediately.
How do I learn more or get help?
Reach out to your account manager or talk to one of our representatives today.
3 years ago5/2/2023
LP Wire Instruction Confirmation
What's new?
You can now send a confirmation request to your LPs directly from Carta, allowing them to easily add or confirm their wire instructions prior to a distribution.
What’s important about this change?
We’ve made it easier to confirm the accuracy of LPs' wire instructions.
Prior to a distribution, you can now send a request to an individual LP, a group of LPs, or all LPs in the distribution to update or confirm their wire instructions.
Once the request is sent, your LP will receive an email from Carta prompting them to update or confirm their wire instructions in their LP Portal.
Once updated or confirmed, you will see a new status of Confirmed next to the LP’s name in the Wire Instructions Status column in your Partners tab as well as a complete Audit Trail of who added and confirmed the LPs wire instructions.
What do I need to do?
After submitting a distribution request in Carta, click Request Wire Instructions. You can also initiate this request at any time by using the Request Wire Instructions button on the Partners page.
Select the individual investors or group of investors you’d like to send a request to. Set a deadline and optionally customize the email message your LPs will receive. Review the contacts that will receive the notification and then click Send.
Your investors will receive an email asking them to add or confirm their wire instructions are current. After clicking Review wire instructions, they’ll be directed to their LP Portal where they can easily add or update in a few clicks.
You’ll now see an updated status in your Partners tab of Confirmed or Pending (awaiting confirmation from your LP) with the date of confirmation or the date the request was sent. Giving you increased visibility into how current your LPs wire instructions are.
How do I learn more?
For more information on the GP side of this feature, please check out our step-by-step guide. For LPs, click here.
To learn more about how Carta ensures the accuracy of your investors' wire instructions, check out our Audit Trail feature or reach out to your Carta representative to learn more today.
Spencer Holton
3 years ago5/1/2023
Faster ACH Processing Times for Money Moved on Carta
Starting today, we are launching a new feature that will reduce the ACH transaction processing time for money movements on Carta by 33%. Previously, most ACH transfers took 6-7 business days to complete. We have made a few infrastructure changes to reduce transfer times by up to 2 business days.
Who is this for?
This change will impact all private and public corporations who move money directly on Carta, as well as holders of securities from these firms. LLCs will not be impacted by this change.
How long will my transfers take?
There is a slight variation in how long ACH transfers will take depending on what type of transaction the company or holder is making. The estimated processing times for the following transactions are below:
- SAFE Financings transactions: 4-5 business days (previously 6-7 business days)
- Private company exercises: 4-5 business days (previously 6-7 business days)
- Private company ACH repurchases: 3-4 business days (previously 5-6 business days)
- Public market trade settlements: 1 business day (previously 2 business days)
- Public markets options exercise: 4-5 business days (previously 6-7 business days)
- CINC tender offers: 1 business day (previously 2 business days)
I am a company administrator. How do I approve exercise requests in Carta?
Company administrators with the Option exercise approver role are able to individually review the submitted online option exercise requests and historical option exercises from the Transactions > Exercises page on Carta. For detailed instructions, you can check out this support article.
I am a company administrator. How do I track early exercise requests and 83(b) elections?
Use the Filter function to select Yes for Early exercise to track 83(b) elections from the option holders. The ledger will display a filing status that depends on when the option holder originally submitted the early exercise request and whether or not the option holder explicitly chose to file an 83(b) election. Learn more about the 83(b) election.
I hold options in a company that uses Carta to manage its equity. How do I exercise options on Carta via ACH?
Exercising options into shares on Carta via ACH is available to US-based option holders of US private companies exercising ISOs, NSOs, or ISO/NSO split option grants. You can review detailed instructions in this support article.
Alana Lindall
3 years ago5/1/2023
Cap Table Access Settings to Set Rule-Based Permissions For All Stakeholders
We are making it easier for companies to keep employees, investors, and other stakeholders informed about their holdings and company changes.
What are we launching?
With our new Cap Table Access page, company administrators can designate what type of information they want to share with their different stakeholders and set rules based on these preferences. By setting permissions by rules instead of a stakeholder-by-stakeholder process, we make it easier for company administrators to get the right stakeholders the appropriate information and reflect their information-sharing philosophy.
Who is this available for?
We are making this available to all companies on Carta as of April 2023.
Why are we launching this?
Companies have historically been able to grant viewing permissions to their stakeholders via our Cap Table Sharing page and features. This experience, however, was burdensome for many company administrators who found themselves having to change sharing settings as new stakeholders were added to their cap table or existing stakeholders changed their relationship to the company, such as an employee leaving the company or an investor exiting their position.
Where do I find my Cap Table Access Settings?
To update your Cap Table Access settings, navigate to Stakeholders > Cap Table Acce ss.
How does it work?
Companies can choose to enable a group of stakeholders with a specific level of access based on their relationship with the company. For example, companies can choose what information founders, investors, employees, former employees, and other stakeholders access on Carta. We’ve renamed, updated, and simplified our access levels to Restricted, Basic, Advanced, and Full Details. We include a “Recommended” level for different relationships (e.g. Investors = Advanced) to help guide founders and other company administrators on setting up their Cap Table Access settings based on user feedback.
We’ve also added a new rule where former stakeholders--those who no longer have an active investment or holding in the company--will be downgraded to Restricted automatically. This means that as stakeholders enter and exit the cap table, their respective levels of cap table access will update automatically.
New Cap Table Access page: Group levels
We know that sometimes it’s important for company administrators to create experiences specific to a single stakeholder or user. The new Cap Table Access feature allows companies to set overrides for specific stakeholders in the “Individual levels” tab. We also provide information on that stakeholder’s relationship and holdings information.
New Cap Table Access page: Individual levels
Edit an Individual's Cap Table Access Settings
To help ensure company administrators set access levels that best fit the needs of their stakeholders, our access level guide is clickable from either the Group Level or Individual Level views of the new Cap Table Access page.
View the Access level guide
We appreciate our users’ feedback on how to make this page clearer and easier to use. We hope these improvements save company administrators valuable time and help them mirror their company information-sharing philosophy in our software.
Alana Lindall
3 years ago5/1/2023
Videos recommended by your Carta Equity Tax Advisor
What’s new?
Employees will now see videos from our 'Learn' library in their Session recap. The videos shown are recommended by their Carta Equity Tax Advisor, based on the conversation in their 1-1 session.
What do I need to do?
You can access the new feature by navigating to your Session recap either through email or directly on the 'Tax Advice' page in your portfolio.
Have questions? Contact product@carta.com.
Jordan Agnew
3 years ago4/28/2023
Terminating Multiple Stakeholders on Carta
Starting today, we are launching a new feature to make it easier for companies to manage their stakeholders on Carta. Companies with an HRIS integration can terminate up to 25 stakeholders at a time. We are also making the process for performing terminations simpler by removing steps needed to complete this action. This feature is rolling out to select companies today and will be available to all company admins that have set up an HRIS integration on Carta by May 11, 2023.
Who is this for?
Companies on Carta that have an HRIS integration. If your company does not currently have an HRIS integration set up, you can do so by navigating to your Settings -> Integrations.
How does it work?
Companies should take the following steps to terminate 1-25 stakeholders at once:
- Navigate to Stakeholders -> Stakeholder Changes
- Navigate to the Terminations tab (2nd from the left)
- Select between 1 and 25 employees using the checkbox on the right
- Click Bulk Terminate Stakeholders. If the admin has terminated at least one employee, this button will take them to the Terminate Stakeholder page.
- Check to make sure all data for each employee is correct before selecting Terminate Stakeholder at the bottom.
How is this different from the current experience?
The current experience allowed for single employee terminations only. Each termination required the company admin to access multiple pages and take multiple steps.
I do not have an HRIS integration. How do I get access to this feature?
The best way to access this feature is to add an HRIS integration to your account. Carta supports over 100 HRIS providers. Connecting Carta to your HRIS will help you reduce time spent manually inputting data and ensure data accuracy as your stakeholder information changes over time. You can read more about how to connect your HRIS here.
I did a bulk termination incorrectly and I need to undo it. Can I reverse these terminations in bulk?
Not at this time. You will need to reverse each termination individually. You can review the instructions in detail in this support article.
Where do I go to learn more?
You can review detailed instructions in this support article or reach out to Carta support to learn more.
Alana Lindall
3 years ago4/27/2023
New specializations for Design, Product, and Marketing
What’s new?
We’re excited to announce the release of three new specializations:
- Art & Graphic Design (within the Design job area)
- Product Management (within the Product job area)
- Social Media (within the Marketing job area)
Note: Our sample size for new specializations can be smaller than job area benchmarks, which could result in data volatility as we continue to update the data and grow our overall sample size.
No other benchmarks have changed in this update.
How do I see benchmarks for the additional specializations?
You can view benchmarks for the new specializations by:
- Visiting the Bands page and selecting “Design”, “Product”, or “Marketing” under Area. Once the job area is selected, you can select either the Art & Graphic Design, Product Management, or the Social Media specialization by selecting the Specialization dropdown.
This will allow you to view salary/equity bands for levels 1 - 8 for Art & Graphic Design or Product Management. For Social Media, data are available for levels 1-6.
The above process can be followed for each of the new specializations.
How do benchmarks for the additional specializations affect the Employee Scorecard?
The compa-ratio is a quick way to compare an employee's compensation to your plan's target rate for a given job area, level, and location. The compa-ratios for an employee assigned to the Art & Graphic Design, Product Management, and Social Media specializations will now be calculated using the target compensation for the specialization, not the job area.
How do I update my benchmark version to use new specializations?
You can update your compensation plan to use the latest benchmark versions either by:
Visiting the Plan page and clicking on the "Update available" link in the Active Plan window.
Navigating to the Bands page and clicking on the "Update" bubble in the top left.
What’s next?
The Carta Total Compensation team is working on our Q2 benchmark refresh for all job areas and specializations
3 years ago4/25/2023
Bulk download documents from the Documents Library
What's new?
You can now bulk download a large volume of documents from the Documents Library.
What's important or valuable about this change?
Admin users can download as many documents as they need to in one go from the Documents Library. This helps speed up tasks around tax season, such as downloading all the Form K-1s.
What do I need to do?
Select the documents you need to download, and click Actions → Download documents.
The zip file will be available for you to download in the Downloads section at the top right.
How do I learn more or get help?
For more information about the Documents Library and distributing K-1s, visit our support site.
Des Duggan
3 years ago4/25/2023
New fast-fill feature for transactions
What's new?
A new fast-fill feature is available when processing a large volume of terminations.
What's important or valuable about this change?
When making changes to a large volume of interests, the fast-fill feature lets you make them to multiple interests altogether instead of one by one.
This helps you get through cap table update tasks, such as bulk termination of interests, more efficiently.
What do I need to do?
The fast-fill feature is available in the interest termination workflow today and will be available for more workflows soon. Click the lightning bolt button to the top left of the interests you’re terminating to fast-fill the termination reason and date.
When you click on Fill column, you can choose to fill empty fields only or all fields, which provides you the flexibility to customize the termination reason and date for certain interests first and then fill in the rest with the same reason and date.
How do I learn more or get help?
For more information about terminating interests, visit our support site.
Des Duggan
3 years ago4/25/2023
Convert notes and SAFEs in Carta
What's new?
Admins can now convert notes and SAFEs into other types of interests in Carta.
What's important or valuable about this change?
Convertibles like notes and SAFEs are used by companies to raise money when they’re starting out. You can keep track of convertibles in Carta and when certain thresholds are met, convert them into actual equity.
With our latest features, you can convert notes and SAFEs into other types of interests, issue these interests to investors, and automatically update your cap table.
What do I need to do?
To get started, select the notes and SAFEs you want to convert from the interest ledger, click Actions, and Convert Interests.
You’ll need to have the following information available:
- Effective date of the conversion event
- Conversion price and destination interest type
- Unit quantity for each converted interest
- Conversion documents (optional)
- Acceptance documents for new interests (optional)
- Additional data for new interests
In a few steps, you’ll provide the conversion event details, the quantities to convert, and confirmation of the conversion.
How do I learn more or get help?
For more information, visit our support site.
Des Duggan
3 years ago4/25/2023
Set up one-off vesting plans for interests
What's new?
You can now create a custom vesting plan for a particular interest.
What's important or valuable about this change?
Instead of creating a new vesting template, you can now create a custom vesting plan for an interest to accommodate a bespoke vesting schedule with time and performance conditions specific to the holder’s interest agreement.
What do I need to do?
Navigate to the Interest Details of the interest you want to customize the vesting plan for and then click on the Vesting tab. Click the Correct vesting plan button in the top right.
You can customize the vesting plan for this particular interest granted to this interest holder.
How do I learn more or get help?
For more information on vesting schedules, visit our support site.
Zeba Naqvi
3 years ago4/24/2023
What’s new?
International salary and equity targets are now on both the company and employee Scorecards. This now enables users to easily compare non-US employee compensation to the market, similar to how comparisons are currently shown for US employees. International bands data continues to be available on the Bands page.
On the Company Scorecard, users can see a complete view of all employees. Users can toggle between local currency and USD by clicking the checkbox at the top.
View an Employee-level Scorecard by clicking into any employee for additional information on their salary and equity. By default, employee cash compensation and market targets will be shown in the employee’s local currency. Users can toggle between local currency and USD using the checkboxes at the top of the employee scorecards.
As Carta Total Compensation only supports equity granted in USD, net equity values on all scorecards will only be shown in USD.
How do I update my scorecards to show international salary and equity targets?
No action is needed. The scorecards will update automatically with the appropriate data.
What’s next?
Carta Total Compensation is developing benchmarks for new specializations.
3 years ago4/19/2023
Learn page available to Employees with Tax Advisory
What’s new?
Employees who have access to Carta Tax Advisory through their employer now have access to new, personalized educational content in their Carta portfolio. The release contains a few features for employees:
1. New Learn page with personalized education chapters.
The Learn page will have videos organized in personalized chapters, based on your equity and employment status. Chapters include:
- Getting started
- Purchasing options
- Selling Equity
- Leaving your company
- Previously recorded webinars for your company
2. Video player page with remaining videos in the chapter
3. 'Recommended for you' videos on the portfolio page
4. Schedule a session button on the portfolio home page
You can now easily schedule a 1-1 session with your Carta Tax Advisor, directly from your portfolio.
5. Coming soon: Recommendations will be driven by your 1-1 conversation with a Carta Tax Advisor!
What do I need to do?
You can access the new feature directly from your portfolio, or navigate to the ‘Learn’ page in the navigation bar.
Have questions? Contact product@carta.com.
Jordan Agnew
3 years ago4/6/2023
Design Improvements to the RSU Modal
Today we’re making design improvements to the RSU Modal to make it easier for holders to understand the value of their equity.
What is changing?
RSU holders now can see a summary view of their securities in the details tab, including an overview table with units breakdown. Also, double trigger RSUs are no longer stuck in a zeroed state, they can now see a breakdown of vesting information, including time-vested amounts.
Changes to the Details tab of the RSU Modal
RSU holders will see the following information on the RSU details page:
- Original quantity / Issued: Total amount of RSUs granted on the issue date
- Released for settlement: The number of vested units that have been part of a settlement event
- Delivered: The number of shares ultimately delivered to the holder as a result of converting the RSU, after any shares withheld by the issuer as payment for the holder's tax obligation
- Withheld at settlement: The number of shares that have been withheld to cover taxes at settlement
- Partially-vested amount: eligible for settlement when performance is hit, or the the total number of shares time vested, and available for settlement
- Remainder: Resulting number of shares from original quantity, after subtracting settled and withhold amounts
The bottom of the details tab will now include an employee education modal, which will be used to surface important education about their RSUs.
Changes to the Vesting Schedules tab of the RSU Modal
Now, holders can see the cumulative values for all vesting conditions applicable to their RSUs, which can be time or milestone based, with or without additional performance conditions.
We’ve updated the Vesting Schedules tab to account for the following scenarios (screenshots of each below):
- Double trigger RSU (Based on time and an additional condition)
- Double Trigger RSU (Based on milestones and an additional condition)
- Single Trigger RSU (Based on time)
- Single Trigger RSU (Based on milestones)
- RSU has been terminated or expired
Double trigger RSU (Based on time and an additional condition)
Double Trigger (Based on milestones and an additional condition)
Single trigger (Based on time)
Single trigger (Based on milestones)
RSU has been terminated or expired
Visit the resource center for more details
Have additional questions? Check out support.carta.com to learn more.
Alana Lindall
3 years ago4/6/2023
What's new?
Take control of your investor communications with proactive scheduling.
What’s valuable about this change?
Specify the date you want notices to be shared with your investors for capital calls or distributions, and your Fund Admin team will proactively schedule the notification.
What do I need to do?
When you request a capital call or distribution in-app, you can choose an Issue date. This will be the date notices are sent to your LPs.
How do I learn more or get help?
Reach out to your account manager or talk to one of our representatives today.
3 years ago4/4/2023
What's new?
GPs now have full visibility into the accuracy and completeness of LP wire instructions.
What’s important about this change?
Send distributions confidently.
With Carta’s LP Wire Audit Trail, GPs can confirm the accuracy of their investors' wire instructions prior to sending a distribution. You can now view:
- Who entered the wire instructions and when they were entered
- When they were last confirmed as accurate and who confirmed them
- Which entities they’re allocated towards
- The bank account to which the wire transfer will be executed
What do I need to do?
Select the entity and navigate to the Partners tab. Click the three dots next to the investor's name that you want to view the details of instructions for.
View information like confirmation date, confirmation person, and bank details. You can also view which LPs have not yet provided their wire instructions, noted by the status of Missing, in the Wire Info Status column.
Coming soon: We’ll be releasing an even easier way for you to request LPs confirm the accuracy of their wire instructions in Carta.
Spencer Holton
3 years ago4/4/2023
Capital Call Wire Instructions
What's new?
Make critical updates to your capital calls when it matters most.
What’s valuable about this change?
Now, you can revise wire instructions on an active capital call, and new notices will be created for your partners on Carta.
What do I need to do?
Get in touch with your Fund Admin and they will edit the wire instructions for you.
How do I learn more or get help?
Reach out to your account manager or talk to one of our representatives today.
3 years ago4/4/2023
Audit Confirmations Reports for LPs
What's new?
Access time-sensitive LP audit confirms, on demand.
What’s valuable about this change?
If your LP is a fund of funds or they are audited, they will likely ask you to complete an audit confirmation for them. This report details information such as their commitment amount and amounts contributed.
What do I need to do?
If your LP's audit team sends you a request to verify the LP's commitments in your fund, reach out to your Fund Admin team and they can quickly pull together the information you need.
How do I learn more or get help?
Get in touch with your Account Manager or talk to one of our representatives today.
EJ Jacoby
3 years ago4/3/2023
Improved LP Tax Document Center
What's new?
LPs can now easily filter, find, and download tax documents.
What’s important about this change?
A smoother tax season for investors.
We’ve improved the Documents tab in our LP Portal so investors can easily:
- Filter documents: By document type and tax year
- View statuses: Including which entities have shared K-1s and which haven’t
- Bulk download: Download all tax documents in a single click
What do I need to do?
Navigate to the Documents tab of your LP Portal and select the tax year you’d like to access tax documents for.
See which documents you’ve already viewed and which entities have shared their K-1s versus which are still pending.
Download documents individually by clicking View or bulk download documents by clicking Download all.
How do I learn more or get help?
Have additional questions about how Carta can support you and your LPs during tax season? Reach out to your account manager or talk to one of our representatives today.
Spencer Holton
3 years ago4/3/2023
Session recap for Tax Advisory 1-1s
What’s New
Employees attending 1-1 sessions with Carta Tax Advisors will now receive a post-session recap in their Carta portfolio.
Sample session recap:
The session recap will contain:
- Notes from your Carta Tax Advisor about the conversation you had during the 1-1
- A link to schedule a follow-up session with your Carta Tax Advisor
- A snapshot of your equity as of the time of your 1-1 session
What do I need to do?
You can access the session recap directly from the Tax Advice page in your portfolio or from the email sent to you after your 1-1 session is completed.
Have questions? Contact product@carta.com.
Jordan Agnew
3 years ago4/3/2023
iOS Reminders for 1-1 sessions with Carta Tax Advisors
What’s New
Employees with Carta's iOS application and notifications enabled will now receive reminder notifications, 15 minutes ahead of their Carta Tax Advisory session. If you have the Zoom application on your phone, the notification will open the Zoom meeting directly and enable you to join the session on your phone.
What do I need to do?
To receive the notification:
- If you have not already done so, download the Carta iOS application,
- Enable push notifications in the settings of the iOS app.
- Schedule a 1-1 session from your Carta portfolio.
Have questions? Contact product@carta.com.
Jordan Agnew
3 years ago3/23/2023
New specializations for Design and Operations
What’s new?
We’re excited to announce the release of two new specializations:
- UX Design (within the Design job area)
- Logistics and Supply Chain (within the Operations job area)
No other benchmarks have changed in this update.
How do I see benchmarks for the additional specializations?
You can view benchmarks for the new specializations by:
- Visiting the Bands page and selecting “Design” or “Operations” under Area. Once the job area is selected, you can select either the UX Design or the Logistics and Supply Chain specialization by selecting the Specialization dropdown.
This will allow you to view salary/equity bands for levels 1 - 8 for either specialization.
The above process can be followed for each of the new specializations.
How do benchmarks for the additional specializations affect the Employee Scorecard?
The compa-ratio is a quick way to compare an employee's compensation to your plan's target rate for a given job area, level, and location. The compa-ratios for an employee assigned to the UX Design and Logistics and Supply Chain specializations will now be calculated using the target compensation for the specialization, not the job area.
How do I update my benchmark version to use new specializations?
You can update your compensation plan to use the latest benchmark versions either by:
Visiting the Plan page and clicking on the "Update available" link in the Active Plan window.
Navigating to the Bands page and clicking on the "Update" bubble in the top left.
3 years ago3/16/2023
New Vesting Strategy Option for Stock Splits
What's new?
Companies now can decide how they want their shares to be reallocated within the vesting schedules when stock splits are performed. Two vesting strategies can be selected now:
Option 1: Reapply templates
When companies choose the reapply templates option, Carta will automatically reapply the template for all securities with template vesting schedules upon performing the split. This means that Carta will re-calculate the vesting schedules attached to securities, considering the new total quantity. This can change how the vesting is distributed among the tranches since it will be an entirely new vesting schedule.
For example, a 10 shares grant that time vests with tranches of 2 and 3 shares will, after a 1:10 split, have tranches of 25 shares each if the company chooses this option.
Option 2: Apply stock split ratio to all tranches
When companies choose to apply the stock split ratio to all tranches, Carta will multiply the stock split ratio by each tranche. In case the shares remaining in a tranche are fractional, the platform will then round down to the nearest integer. This results in fewer differences in the schedule from the pre-split to the post-split security. If a security is tied to a template vesting schedule, Carta will need to update it to a custom schedule to make this change. Custom vesting schedules cannot be reapplied later, as they are not part of any templates.
If companies choose this option, a 10 shares grant that time vests with tranches of 2 and 3 shares, after a 1:10 split, will have tranches of 20 and 30 shares each if this option is chosen.
Why is this important?
Different companies need their post-split vesting schedules to be represented differently. With this change, Carta becomes more flexible to adjust to different vesting scenarios. Having more vesting accommodation strategies also means less time dedicated to manual adjustments after a stock split is performed.
How can I learn more about this?
You can find a detailed explanation of the new vesting strategies with vesting schedule examples in this support article.
Eduardo Bacil Monteiro Dias
3 years ago3/14/2023
Private Dilution Report in Financial Reporting
What’s new?
Private companies on Carta can now run Dilution reports. The Dilution report will include:
- Incremental Shares
- Weighted Average Shares Outstanding
- Average Trading Prices
All 3 of these values will help customers calculate Diluted Earnings Per Share for their income statement.
What’s important or valuable about this change?
Private company Financial Reporting administrators will be able to run a Dilution Report that will provide them with major inputs into the Diluted Earnings Per Share formula.
In this release, the following will be available:
Shares outstanding
Simple average
- Weighted average
Trading prices
Simple average
- Weighted average
Incremental Shares
Supporting tabs to help auditors tie out values
What do I need to do?
Log in to Carta and go to Compliance > Financial Reporting. Run a new report (must be 1 year or less reporting period). In the drop down menu to download other reports, such as SBC Expense and Min Disclosure, there will be an option for Dilution.
Have questions? Contact 718@carta.com
Samantha Widman
3 years ago3/8/2023
What’s new?
Soon, you will be able to access 8 new reporting templates under Capitalization > Reporting, which provide you with access to critical data points about your equity pool, company, securities, and stakeholders. You will be able to see exactly how your key option pool values are derived, view equity awards joined with Grant Reason and Employee ID, and even export a detailed list of stakeholders and their properties.
Why is this important?
We’ve been listening to every piece of feedback from you, and have heard the challenges that you face. The new reports address these challenges, providing visibility into how key pool values are derived, and giving you reporting access to over 60 key fields that were spread across multiple places, and in some cases, previously un-reportable.
Those 8 template reports are:
- Equity pool transaction ledger: A detailed view of shares available to issue from your equity pool. This new report includes a double-entry activity log for every transaction so you can see, line-by-line, exactly how available shares and other plan values were derived.
- Common securities ledger: A ledger of all Common shares in Carta.
- Equity awards outstanding: A detailed view of all outstanding equity awards across all plans on Carta.
- Equity plan granted: A ledger of all securities granted from the equity plan.
- Options outstanding: A detailed view of all outstanding options across all plans on Carta.
- Securities ledger: A ledger of all securities tracked on Carta.
- Share registry: Used by companies in many countries to create a share/equity register or register of holders.
- Stakeholder details: Full list of stakeholders and their properties.
What do I need to do?
You should be on the lookout for an email from your CSM letting you know that these reports are now available for you. Once you get that email, you can go to Capitalization > Reporting, and you will see the following view, where the newly added reports will have a ‘New’ bubble next to them:
From there, you just need to export the report as usual!
Where can I learn more?
For more information on exporting reports, visit our support site. We will be adding additional information to the support site as reports are updated and improved.
Will WD
3 years ago3/7/2023
What's new?
GPs can now click on a specific investor's name within their Capital Activity Notice PDF to quickly view the details of that investor's notice.
What’s valuable about this change?
Get the information you need, faster.
Save time by no longer having to scroll through pages of notices until you find the right LP. Easily search and select the LP to be automatically directed to that LPs notice.
What do I need to do?
- Log into your Carta account and navigate to the Activity tab
- Click into the details of an active capital call in your task list
- Scroll down to Notification to Investors and select the Document Outline icon
- Then, select the LP to review their capital call notice
3 years ago3/7/2023
Request Distributions in Carta
What's new?
GPs can now easily request distributions in Carta.
What’s valuable about this change?
Distributions made smoother. Request, view, and approve your distributions in the same place you manage your fund.
What do I need to do?
- Login to your Carta account, select the entity, and navigate to the Capital activity tab
- Click “Request distribution” and enter the amount of capital to be distributed
- Enter distribution details including distribution notice, money transfer dates, and source of proceeds
- Select “Continue”, review the distribution details, and Submit
Note: For same day processing, the request must be made before 3:00pm EST.
How do I learn more or get help?
Visit this support article for a more detailed view into distributions.
3 years ago2/28/2023
What’s new?
With Carta's new Deal pro forma tool you can generate an accurate deal-ready pro forma model with iterative calculations in just a few minutes. Users will be able to create a deal-ready pro forma that takes into account all the nuances of the model and handles the complicated conversion math for SAFEs and Notes.
What's important or valuable about this?
Carta automates the process of building a pro forma so that it can be completed on the Carta platform within minutes. Carta Deal Proforma eliminates unnecessary iterative and redundant work. With the new tool you can increase the capacity for companies to be more versatile with their modeling as it’s easy to make incremental changes instead of starting from scratch. Starting today you can:
- Build a deal pro forma in a few minutes instead of hours and view results instantly
- Share or view on Carta or exported as an excel file.
- Use your latest cap table information for real-time changes to your pro forma.
What do I need to do?
Carta Deal Pro Forma will be available to all Carta customers in their Scenario Modeling tab.
How does it work?
Under Fundraising > Scenario Modeling > Pro forma tab, you can see create a pro forma and generate a full view of your next round and export a deal-ready pro forma cap table.
You can:
- Add new round terms
- Add new money investors for this round, including consideration for investors with pro rate.
- Add convertibles converting in this new round or uncheck convertibles to be excluded from this pro forma.
- Define the share classes for the financing
- Include Investor Pro Rata Rights, including investors with convertible Pro Rata Rights
- Add advanced terms such as conversion methods, anticipated option pool increase, specification of authorized shares and common stock buffers
- View and share in app or export to excel
Have a question or feedback? Visit our support site.
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Shubhi Nigam
3 years ago2/27/2023
What's new?
A new column in the Document Library shows you if a document has been shared or not and who it has been shared with.
What's important or valuable about this change?
These enhancements will help you streamline document sharing workflows, such as sharing a large volume of Form K-1s with interest holders ahead of tax season. Easily keep track of which documents have been shared with interest holders and which ones have not. You can also filter the Document Library by sharing status which can help you quickly see which documents still need to be shared.
What do I need to do?
See the new ‘Shared with’ column in the Documents Library. You can filter down to ‘Shared documents’ or ‘Not shared documents’ by clicking on the filtering menu in the Documents Library search bar.
How do I learn more or get help?
For more information on the Documents Library and distributing Form K-1s, visit our support site.
Des Duggan
3 years ago2/27/2023
Enhanced visibility into transferred interests
What's new?
When you transfer an interest in Carta, you can now see all the information related to the transaction in the event details.
What's important or valuable about this change?
Gain complete visibility into every transfer transaction and see clearly in the event details if an interest was issued from a transfer as opposed to a new issuance on the cap table.
Track changes to the interest during the transaction and the issuance details, including where the interest was transferred from, to who, quantity, price, and total amount paid for the transfer.
What do I need to do?
You can see the details of each transfer transaction in the event details:
How do I learn more or get help?
For more information on transferring interests, visit our support site.
Des Duggan
3 years ago2/27/2023
View interest holder details and track employee IDs
What's new?
You can now get a comprehensive view of interest holders, including demographic information, interests issued to them, and documents shared with them. Additionally, you can now track employee IDs in Carta.
What's important or valuable about this change?
Enhancements to the interest holder details provide a single source of truth in Carta for who each interest holder is, what interests they hold, and which documents have been shared with them.
When you record an Employee ID with each interest holder in Carta, you can use it as a unique identifier to streamline reporting across Carta and other systems such as payroll.
What do I need to do?
To get a comprehensive view of an interest holder you can click on any row of the interest holder ledger. This will open a page with various tabs to view the holder details, view all interests that have been issued to them, and view all documents that have been shared with them.
To track and report on employee IDs, edit an interest holder to add their employee ID. Shortly, these employee IDs will also be pulled into our excel based reporting.
View the interest holder demographics in the Summary tab of interest holder details.
View the interests issued to this holder in the Holdings tab.
View the documents associated with these interests and shared with this holder in the Documents tab.
How do I learn more or get help?
For more information, visit our support site.
Des Duggan
3 years ago2/27/2023
New time series graphs show changes in Outstanding Value estimates
What's new?
For each Outstanding Value estimate, a new time series graph shows how the value of the interest has changed over time.
What's important or valuable about this change?
Interest holders now have a visual that represents the change in Outstanding Value and can help them understand the value of their equity and future potential.
What do I need to do?
Admin users can enable Estimated Values, including Outstanding Value, when creating a new interest type or editing an existing one.
Once enabled, the Outstanding Value estimate details will include a time series graph to show the change in value.
How do I learn more or get help?
For more information on Estimated Values, see our support articles for Admins and Interest Holders.
Des Duggan
3 years ago2/27/2023
What's new?
When inviting a new Admin user to your Carta account, you can now capture their job title and company name. The Team & Security page allows you to add new users, edit or remove existing ones, and keep track of who has access.
What's important or valuable about this change?
The new capabilities provide complete visibility into who has access to your Carta account and the type of access they have. This is especially important if you have various internal and external users that need access to your cap table data in Carta, such as law firms or deal teams and back-office admins at Private Equity firms.
What do I need to do?
Visit the Team & Security page to add new users, edit or remove existing ones, and keep track of who has access.
When inviting a new user to your Carta account, select from a pre-set list of job titles or choose Other to input a different job title that is not on the list. You can also add the company name here.
How do I learn more or get help?
For more information, visit our support site.
Des Duggan
3 years ago2/23/2023
Quarterly refresh of salary, total cash, and equity benchmarks
What’s new?
Benchmarks version 2023-23-02
What changes can I expect from these benchmarks?
We have updated salary, total cash, and equity benchmarks for all job areas and specializations.
Salary and total cash compensation benchmark changes in this release reflect a slowing market for talent among startups, falling slightly since last quarter (approximately 1% overall). As in previous updates, specialization level data continues to be more volatile than the broader sample, as sample sizes for these roles are smaller than job area level data. For example, while Web Engineering and Quality Assurance saw large increases last quarter, this quarter’s data shows decreases in those benchmarks.
Equity benchmarks have decreased approximately 15%, consistent with the decreases that began last quarter as a result of the slowing market. Lower benchmarks cut across most roles and levels, though executive equity grants (particularly at early to mid-stage companies) dropped slightly less, and even increased in some cases.
What were the largest areas of movement from these benchmarks?
Salary - Product, Support, and Operations roles saw the largest increases, approximately 1-2% versus last quarter. Sales, Administrative, and Information Technology roles saw the largest decreases ranging from 3-5%.
Equity - Legal, Support, and Human Resources roles saw the largest decreases. Decreases in Engineering, IT, Finance, and Operations were less pronounced than the overall sample
How do I update my plan to use the new benchmarks version?
You can update your compensation plan to use the latest benchmark versions either by:
Visiting the Plan page and clicking on the "Update available" link in the Active Plan window.
Navigating to the Bands page and clicking on the "Update" bubble in the top left.
What’s next?
Carta Total Compensation is working to bring International market targets to the Employee and Company Scorecards, as well as developing benchmarks for new specializations.
3 years ago2/10/2023
What’s new?
This release improves the workflow for matching employees with stakeholders on Carta. Employees with the same name and email as the stakeholder will automatically match, saving their employee ID and thereby linking the stakeholder with the employee record. The improved workflow guides you through reviewing all other employee matches.
How does it work?
For the reviewed matches, you can now ignore, to be reminded next time, or to choose a different stakeholder. These decisions will be saved and will not need to be rematched when running the employee matching workflow. You can now review all matches and update the decisions later.
What do I need to do?
To get started, you will need to connect your external data to Carta either through connecting your HRIS system, uploading a spreadsheet, or pasting the information into Carta directly.
With your external data connected, Carta will attempt to automatically match your employees. From there you review suggested matches, deciding to approve the suggestion, ignore it, remind me later, or manually choosing a different person.
If there are any employees from external data that don’t match at all to Carta stakeholders, you can choose to ignore them or manually choose a person to match.
The workflow is then completed and all matches can be reviewed.
How do I learn more?
For more information on Employee Matching, please read our support article.
3 years ago2/7/2023
Improved Capital Call and Distribution Notices
What's new?
GPs can now include a detailed breakdown of capital in their capital call and distribution notices to maintain transparency with their investors.
What’s important or valuable about this change?
Institutional investors prefer to see a breakdown of capital versus a lump sum for internal reporting purposes. We make it easy to provide inventors that information:
Capital calls: Specify what dollar amount or percentage of the amount called is going towards investments, expenses, management fees, and more.
Distributions: Break down the return by dollar amount or percentage into capital, realized gains, or income.
What do I need to do?
On the Overview tab of your portal, select the entity, then navigate to the Capital Activity tab. Click Request Capital Call and follow the steps. Specify the breakdown of capital in the Notes for your Fund Administrator section.
For distributions, click Request Distribution and complete the steps above.
Once submitted, it will appear on the capital call or distribution notice for your review and approval.
How do I learn more or get help?
Have additional questions about Carta’s capital activity? Reach out to your account manager or request a demo today.
Milena Wall
3 years ago2/7/2023
Download All Audit Docs with One Click
What's new?
A smoother audit season.
Auditors can now bulk download all fund documents from Carta in a single click.
We’ve bundled all fund audit documents in one place so auditors no longer have to spend time downloading multiple documents from multiple places.
What do I need to do?
Navigate to the Reports & Documents tab of your portal, then select Audit. Documents are bundled into two packages per entity:
Package 1: Formation documents, bank statements, investment documents, invoices & calculations, and partner commitment changes and transfers
Package 2: Partner subscription agreements and side letters, capital call notices, and distribution notices
Select the package and click Download.
How do I learn more or get help?
Have additional questions about how Carta can support you during your fund audit? Reach out to your account manager or talk to one of our representatives today.
Kathleen Meil
3 years ago2/7/2023
Improved Investment Valuation Updates
What's new?
GPs can now easily submit valuation updates where positions on an investment have different values or prices per share.
What’s important or valuable about this change?
We’ve improved our in-app valuation updates to be able to handle advanced scenarios, including submitting an update where each asset has a different price per share. This is common for GPs who have invested in the same investment across multiple rounds.
What do I need to do?
Navigate to the Activity tab of your portal and select Valuation Update. Then select the company whose valuation you want to update.
Select Spreadsheet View and enter the date for when the valuation took place. Enter the new value per share to see the gain or loss across all positions.
Then review your valuation update and submit.
How do I learn more or get help?
Have additional questions about Carta’s valuation updates? Reach out to your account manager or talk to one of our representatives today.
Milena Wall
3 years ago2/6/2023
Hire internationally using Carta Offer Letters
What’s new
Total Comp customers can now send Offer Letters in 140 international currencies. Candidates will be able to view their Offer Letter in their local currency.
Get started
How do I send an Offer Letter in a non-USD currency?
- Navigate to the Current Offers page and click “Create Offer.”
- In the “Compensation” section, select the correct currency for the candidate’s Offer Letter. Companies are still able to offer multiple packages for international offers.
3. Enter the Base salary in either the local currency or USD.
4. The Equity value can be entered in USD only. However, you will be able to see this displayed in the local currency selected as well when you preview the Offer Letter before sending it to the candidate.
5. Candidates will be able to view their Offer Letter in the selected local currency. This includes their benefits, Offer Summary, and the Compensation Projection chart.
Learn more
Visit the Carta Offer Letters resource center for more details.
Have additional questions about Carta Offer Letters? Reach out to your Account Manager or contact our Support Team.
3 years ago2/3/2023
Share Class Manager Improvements
What’s new?
The Share Class Manager page will be updated this coming Monday, February 6th to make it easier to navigate, and provide a consistent experience when you are updating AOI terms.
We no longer display a "Link AOI" button at the top of the page. The new flow is designed to be simple and intuitive, with the "Manage Share Class" button giving you access to update existing share classes, add new share classes, and link Articles of Incorporation.
What do I need to do?
Navigate to Capitalization > Manage share classes. Under Manage share classes, there will be three options:
- Create new share class
- Edit existing share classes
- Add historical AOIs
Where can I learn more?
Visit the Share Class Manager support article or contact us via the In-App Help Center.
Will WD
3 years ago2/2/2023
What's new?
We’re introducing a new way for Carta GPs to have greater visibility into their relationship with their fund administrator.
What’s important or valuable about this change?
GPs can now submit, view, and track the progress of their fund admins tasks, like sending capital calls or preparing financials. Fund managers will receive a notification for any outstanding tasks or if there’s an action required.
GPs can use the Activity tab to stay up to date on critical fund events, like reviewing financials or management fees.
What do I need to do?
On the Overview tab of your portal, navigate to the Activity tab.
You can view and complete tasks assigned to you by your fund administrator. Click Details to view additional information about the task like the date it was created, progress, and status.
Scroll down to see what your fund admins are working on. Click Details to view additional information about their task like which fund admin is working on the task and the progress.
Easily request a capital call or submit a valuation update. Once submitted, it will appear in the fund admin section for you to track to completion.
Select Task History to view an archive of all past tasks completed by you and your fund administrator.
This feature currently services capital calls, valuation updates, SPV formations, and reviewing and approving management fees, SOIs, and financials.
We will be making further improvements to the Activity tab over the coming weeks including the ability to request a wire, submit an expense, and message with your fund admin.
How do I learn more or get help?
Have additional questions about the Activity tab? Reach out to your account manager or request a demo today.
Milena Wall
3 years ago2/2/2023
Private Dilution Report (Beta)
What's new?
Private dilution reports can be run on Carta.
How does it work?
Private company administrators will be able to run a dilution report that will provide them with diluted shares, average trading prices, and supporting tabs to back out the incremental shares tab.
In this initial release, the following inputs will be available:
- Average and weighted average trading prices, including the ability to add Fair Market Values on weekends and holidays
- Diluted shares
- Supporting tabs to help users recalculate their incremental shares tab
In the future, Carta will also support:
- Pre stock split values in dilution reports
- Weighted average shares outstanding (WASO)
What do I need to do to get started?
To participate in the beta and receive early access to this report, please reach out to us at 718@carta.com.
Samantha Widman
3 years ago1/31/2023
International Bands and Total Cash Compensation Data for Customer Success
What’s new?
We have two exciting updates now available in Carta Total Comp. You can now use:
- International salary and equity adjustments on the Plan and Bands pages
- Total cash compensation benchmarks for the Customer Success job area
International adjustments
Users will now be able to view salary and equity benchmarks on the Bands page based on adjustments from our US benchmarks. In this initial release, users will have access to adjustments for 44 countries.
How do I see international adjustments?
You can view international adjustments by:
Visiting the Plan page and scrolling down to International Market Adjustments. This section will show you suggested adjustments for salary and equity across 45 countries. These suggested Adjustments are based on Carta data and our knowledge of local market practices.
You can override these suggested adjustments to better match your company’s comp philosophy. Click into them to edit, and save your new adjustment by clicking the check box.
Visit the Bands page to view the adjusted salary & equity benchmarks. Find any of the 45 countries by selecting it from the Location dropdown.
Total cash compensation benchmarks for Customer Success
Carta will now provide total cash compensation benchmarks for the Customer Success job area. Total cash compensation is defined as base salary plus target variable compensation. 25th, 50th, and 75th percentile data are accessible on the Bands page. No other benchmarks have changed in this update.
How do I see total cash compensation benchmarks for the Customer Success job area?
You can view Total Cash Compensation benchmarks for the Customer Success job area by:
Visiting the Bands page and selecting “Customer Success” under Area.
Select “Total Cash” for compensation type.
This will allow you to view total cash compensation bands for levels 1 - 11 for the Customer Success job area.
How do I update my plan to use the new benchmarks version?
You can update your compensation plan to use the latest benchmark versions either by:
Visiting the Plan page and clicking on the "Update available" link in the Active Plan window.
Navigating to the Bands page and clicking on "Update" in the top left.
Learn more
Have additional questions? Reach out to your Account Manager or contact our Support Team.
What’s next?
Carta Total Comp is working on updated salary and equity benchmarks for all job areas and specializations.
3 years ago1/26/2023
Introducing Agreement Execution for issuing new interests
What's new?
You can now generate fully executed legal agreements when issuing interests with Carta LLC.
What's important or valuable about this change?
With the new Agreement Execution functionality, you can simplify the end-to-end issuance workflow, increase efficiency, and auditability:
- Set up interest agreement templates and automatically populate them with data from Carta, such as each interest holder's information, interest type, number of units, and more
- Send these interest agreements to the holder to collect their signature directly on the PDF
- Save the fully executed agreement in Carta with the interest so you and the interest holder can access it for audits, personal finance, or tax use cases
What do I need to do?
To get started with Agreement Execution, you will need to first work with our team to set up a new interest agreement template. Get started by navigating to Documents > Templates.
Request a new template by clicking on the button on this page.
You need to provide us with the following items to set up a new template:
An interest agreement template document in .docx format
Include a line for where the holder should sign
- Include a pre-populated company signature, if applicable (Carta does not populate any signatures besides that of the holder)
A list of fields for Carta to auto-populate in the document
Today, we can populate any issuance and holder data and certain data relevant to the account and entity
Once your template has been set up, Carta Staff will notify you and you can use it to issue new interests. Watch our demo video to learn more.
How do I learn more or get help?
For more information on interest agreement templates, please read our support article.
Des Duggan
3 years ago1/23/2023
Set up and send your first Offer Letter with a few clicks
What’s new?
We're introducing an easy way for new Carta Total Comp users to send their first offer letter in just a few clicks. With our new guided onboarding experience, you can get the most out of CTC immediately.
The setup guide will be marked as complete for users with Offer Letters already set up.
Get started
You must have "Full Admin" permissions to set up Offer Letters.
Navigate to the Offer Letters page and click “Get started.”
Complete the guided onboarding experience to personalize your Offer Letter for your company.
Once you complete your setup, all Admins, Area Leads, and Recruiters will be able to draft, preview, and send Offer Letters.
Learn more
Visit the Carta Offer Letters resource center for more details.
If you have additional questions about Offer Letters? Please reach out to your Account Manager or contact our Support Team.
3 years ago1/20/2023
Automated Refresh Vesting Schedules
What's new?
We are introducing automated refresh vesting schedules in-app. Now, all private companies have a template ready for refresh vesting, a schedule that mimics Carta's equity strategy of boxcar grants.
How does it work?
On the vesting schedule templates page (Securities > Templates > Vesting Schedules), you can edit the Refresh Vesting to select when grants under this schedule should start vesting. See detailed instructions to manage vesting templates here.
You will have options from 1 to 4 years after the issue date.
You are all set!
Now, you can start adding, modifying or applying the Refresh Vesting when issuing new securities, and we will automatically calculate and input the vesting start date for you, based on the criteria selected on the template.
Where can I learn more?
Visit this support article or contact us via the In-App Help Center.
3 years ago1/20/2023
Share Class Conversions (Beta)
What's new?
Share Class Conversions are now self-serve on Carta.
What’s important about this change?
Skip contacting Support for share class conversions. With our new self-service tool, your law firm will be able to complete this for you in minutes.
Select individual shares, or convert entire share classes when needed. Once the shares classes are converted, Carta handles canceling the existing certificates, issuing new stock certificates, and guiding signatories and security holders through the process of executing signatures.
What do I need to do?
This feature is currently in beta with law firms and we are releasing it to more users on a rolling basis. By April 2023, all company legal admins will have access to in-app share class conversions too.
If you need to perform a share class conversion, reach out to your outside counsel. If you don’t have a law firm, contact Carta Support using the In-App Help Center.
How do I learn more or get help?
Visit this support article to learn more about the step-by-step process.
Vrushali Paunikar
3 years ago1/9/2023
Share Offer Letters via a link
What’s new
CTC customers can now send Offer Letters to candidates with a simple URL link if they are not using Carta’s candidate acceptance flow. This will allow companies to send Offer Letters to candidates via an existing email thread with a candidate or additional signatory tool of their choosing.
Get started
How do I send an offer letter via link?
Navigate to the Offer Letters page
Draft, preview, and save an offer letter by clicking “Create new offer”.
3. Once you have saved your offer letter, click “Copy link”, the URL can be pasted and shared to grant access to the published Offer Letter.
Learn more
Visit the Carta Offer Letters resource center for more details.
3 years ago1/4/2023
Send an Offer Letter directly from the Bands page
What’s new
All CTC customers can now save time by seamlessly previewing and sending Offer Letters straight from the Bands tab.
- Companies who have configured the required settings for Offer Letters send Offer Letters faster with pre-filled job and compensation package details .
- For companies who have not configured Offer Letter settings, a preview of an Offer Letter with a recommended compensation package will be provided. Admins can always quickly configure Offer Letters settings in the Settings tab.
Get started
How do I send an Offer Letter from the Bands page?
Here’s how to get started:
1. Navigate to the Bands page.
2. Click on the Job Breakdown for a particular Role.
3. Click “Create offer” to be shown a preview offer letter with a recommended compensation package based on your company’s Plan information, specific for that Role.
4. Companies who have already configured the required Offer Letter settings will be redirected to the “Create New Offer” page with pre-filled salary and Role information.
Companies who have not configured the required Offer Letter settings will be shown a preview of an Offer Letter for the specific Role. Admins can click “Send your first offer” to be guided on how to configure the required Offer Letter settings before sending your company’s first Carta Offer Letter.
Learn more
Visit the Carta Offer Letters resource center for more details.
Nikhita Gupta