Founders and finance teams
You are raising, hiring and granting equity, often all in the same quarter. We make sure the tax works before the documents are signed, and stays defensible long after.
What we do for companiesStartup tax advisory · Singapore
Your light through startup tax.
Corporate tax, fundraising structures and share plans for venture-backed startups. Plain-English advice for the employees who hold their equity.
- Around 40 venture-backed startups advised
- CA (Singapore) · Accredited Tax Advisor (Income Tax), SCTP
- Eight years in Big Four practice before Lantern
Who we work with
Two sides of the same cap table.
Startup tax is rarely just the company's problem or just the employee's. We work with both, so the plan that gets adopted is one that works for everyone on it.
Employees with equity
You have been granted options or shares and want to know what you will actually owe, and when. We work it out with you, show every assumption, and explain it in plain English.
What we do for employeesServices
Focused on the tax questions startups actually have.
For companies
From the first ECI filing to the round that changes the cap table.
Corporate tax
ECI and Form C-S / C filings, start-up tax exemptions, IRAS queries, and the year-round questions that do not fit neatly into a filing deadline.
Fundraising structures
SAFEs, convertible notes and priced rounds. Holding structures and redomiciliation. What the term sheet means for your tax position, worked out before you sign it.
Share plan design
ESOP and ESOW plans built with tax input from the start. Plan rules and grant documents that say what you intend, and produce outcomes you can explain to your team.
Employer reporting
Appendix 8B reporting of share gains, tax clearance for departing foreign employees, and how the deemed exercise rule affects what you report and when.
For employees
Your grant, your timing, your tax return. Worked through with you, not around you.
Understanding your grant
Options, ESOW shares or RSUs: what you hold, when it becomes taxable, and what value IRAS will look at. Read from your actual grant documents, not a summary of them.
Timing of exercise
Modelled scenarios that compare exercising now, later or at exit, with every input on the page so you can see what changes the answer.
IRAS reporting
What your employer reports on your behalf, what you need to declare yourself, and how to check that the two agree before you file.
Leaving Singapore
If you are not a Singapore citizen and you are leaving your job or the country, the deemed exercise rule can tax your unexercised options and unvested shares before you go. We explain what is taxed, how it appears in your tax clearance, and what you can do if the actual gain later turns out lower.
How we work
Advice that comes with its workings.
A tax number you cannot explain is a liability waiting for a question. Everything we produce is built to be understood, checked and defended.
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Plain English first
Every piece of advice explains the outcome and the reason for it, so you can act on it without a translator.
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Assumptions in the open
Every number comes with its inputs. If we have assumed a valuation, a date or a residency status, you will see it on the page.
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Defensible by design
A clear trail from your documents to our calculations, so the answer holds up with IRAS, an investor's due diligence, or a future you.
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Tax before signatures
The cheapest time to fix a share plan is before it is adopted. Talk to us while it is still a draft.
Before we meet
Bring the documents, not the screenshot.
A cap table screenshot tells us what you hold. The grant documents tell us how it is taxed. The more of the list below you can find, the further we get in the first conversation.
If you are an employee
- Grant letter or award agreement
- Plan rules
- Vesting schedule, including any acceleration terms
- Exercise price, and the share value at grant if you have it
- Exercise notices or sale records, if any
- Appendix 8B from your employer, if you have received one
- Your residency status and any plans to leave Singapore
If you are a founder
- Current cap table
- Share plan rules, whether draft or adopted
- Term sheet or financing documents for the current round
- Latest financial statements
- ECI and Form C-S / C filing status
- Any correspondence with IRAS
Missing something? Come anyway. Knowing what is missing is often the first useful finding.
Marcus Koh
Partner
- CA (Singapore)
- Accredited Tax Advisor (Income Tax), SCTP
About
Startup tax, from both sides of the table.
Marcus leads Lantern Taxes' work with the startup ecosystem. He advises around 40 venture-backed startups on corporate tax, fundraising structures and share plan design, and works directly with startup employees on the tax treatment of their ESOP, ESOW and option grants: when to exercise, what to report to IRAS, and how the deemed exercise rule applies when a foreign employee leaves Singapore.
Before Lantern, Marcus spent eight years at a Big Four firm. He moved to boutique practice for the pace and variety of startup work, and for the chance to give advice that founders and employees can actually use.
He believes tax advice should come with its workings: clear audit trails, defensible calculations and no hidden assumptions. If a client-facing document needs rewriting before a founder can understand it, it was not finished.
Contact
Start with a conversation.
Tell us where you are: a term sheet on the table, a grant you do not understand, or a plan you are about to adopt. We will tell you where to start.
- Partner
- Marcus Koh, Accredited Tax Advisor
- marcuskoh@lantern.tax
- Mobile
- +65 8115 2581
- Entity
- Lantern Taxes · UEN 202117064E
- Based in
- Singapore