In the past four months, the North American IPO market has shown
some signs of a resurgence, at least in relation to the two
years that came before. Given this potential rebound, this
edition and the next couple of editions focus on the IPO legal
process, together with certain legal aspects related to running
a company after its shares are listed on a stock exchange. And
while the focus will be on entrepreneurial businesses, much of
this commentary applies equally to any type of business looking
to go public. But before delving into legalities, first some
thoughts on the all-important decision by the controlling
shareholder(s): "Do you even want your company to go public?"
Why Go Public?  When a company "goes public" through an "initial
public offering" (or IPO), it essentially sells some of its
shares to retail and institutional investors, and those shares
are then invariably listed on a public stock exchange, where the
price for the shares floats up or down depending on a range of
factors related both to t