The Founders

The Ex-Big Law GCs Who Founded Talairis Law Group

Sam and Matt bring over 25 years of combined legal experience spanning Big Law, billion-dollar acquisitions, public company governance, and General Counsel leadership at unicorn-valued startups across SaaS and consumer tech.

Sam Shaddox
Sam Shaddox Founding Partner
Matt Souza
Matt Souza Founding Partner

Sam and Matt started in the corporate group at Perkins Coie, advising startups and companies like Microsoft, Amazon, and Zillow on over $15 billion in transactions, counseling them through formation, fundraising, and growth. They each spent most of the last decade in-house, serving as legal leaders at cutting-edge technology companies across AI, SaaS, and consumer tech.

Both served as attorneys and general counsels at VC-backed unicorns, building the legal function from the ground up. They’ve each led in-house legal departments for over four years: closing financings, navigating diligence, and making the hard calls that define whether a company stays healthy as it scales.

From their experiences, they’ve both seen the same problem clearly: founders paying too much, waiting too long, and getting legal work that wasn’t built for their stage. They built Talairis Law Group to close that gap: custom attorney-built AI agents configured with genuine company context, paired with the senior judgment that only comes from years of Big Law training and serving as General Counsel through hypergrowth.

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The story behind the name
The Story Of

Our Name

In Greek mythology, Hermes was the fastest of all the gods and the one Zeus trusted when swiftness and judgment mattered most. His secret was the Talaria, winged sandals that gave him unmatched speed.
Our name, Talairis, is born from the Talaria, with AI at its core, because our speed comes from custom AI agents tailored to your business.
The old legal options are painful compromises that keep you grounded.
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Why we built this
The Firm

Why We Built This

Sam and Matt have each been in the room when founders were paying too much, waiting too long, and getting legal work that wasn’t actually calibrated to their company. They’ve also been the ones fielding the call when something went sideways because a founder used a tool that didn’t give them what they needed, or used no legal at all because they couldn’t afford what was available.

The opportunity was clear: there was a genuine gap between Big Law (too slow, too expensive, built around associate teams when AI has changed what one experienced lawyer can do), DIY tools (no accountability, no privilege protection, no attorney behind the work), and a full-time GC (not practical for most startup and growth companies). That gap was where Talairis Law Group belonged.

The AI piece is not an add-on. Our agents aren’t off-the-shelf tools. Sam and Matt built them from scratch, drawing on over 25 years of combined legal experience across the full lifecycle of startup work, including formation, product guidance, fundraising, employment, compliance, IP, governance, and exits. Every agent reflects how they actually practice law, not how a software company thinks lawyers should work. Configured with genuine company context, not generic prompts, and paired with the kind of experienced judgment that only comes from years of Big Law training and in-house work at companies that scaled from startup to public company. That’s what Talairis Law Group is built on.

"The best part of this job is the founders. They’re building something real, moving fast, and they need someone in their corner who actually gets it. That’s us."

— Sam

"I spent years as GC at a fast-growing startup. The only role better is being that partner for multiple great founders at once. Every client, every week, something new."

— Matt

Frontier Forward

We use the best AI available, full stop. We don’t get attached to tools: we get attached to outcomes. As the AI ecosystem evolves, we evolve with it, continuously rebuilding, retooling, and re-engineering the agent suite to stay at the cutting edge. Clients get the benefit of every breakthrough, not just the one that shipped at launch.

Built to Compound

Every engagement makes the next one better. Context deepens over time. Playbooks get reused and refined. Patterns get recognized and encoded. The longer we work together, the more leverage you get, and the cost to serve you goes down as our understanding of your business goes up. This isn’t a vendor relationship. It compounds.

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What we believe
Core Values

What we actually believe

These are not aspirations. They are descriptions of how we work, and what we hold ourselves to on every engagement.

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Work With Us

Bring us a problem. We’ll solve it.

One conversation with Sam or Matt. They’ll tell you directly whether Talairis Law Group is right for your company, and if it is, what getting started actually looks like.

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How We Work