This is a realistic simulation based on common small-business partnership disputes, demonstrating how Mediator.ai works in practice. The agreement below was generated by the live Mediator.ai engine from the position statements shown.
Background
Two years ago, Maya and Daniel opened a small bakery together as 50/50 partners. Six months in, Daniel ran out of savings and took a part-time delivery job to stay afloat. He kept baking every morning at 5am — but for the last 18 months, Maya ran everything else: staff, suppliers, books, the Instagram that grew from 400 to 11,000 followers.
Now a local investor wants 20% of the bakery for $80,000. He’s told Maya and Daniel he won’t close until the ownership split is clarified in writing. Maya thinks 70/30 is fair. Daniel thinks the original handshake should stand. They can’t agree. The deal is about to fall apart.
Initial Positions
Each party worked with Mediator.ai privately to articulate their position. Neither saw the other’s statement before the engine began.
Maya’s position (summary)
Maya argues equity should reflect what each partner actually contributed over the full two years, not the day-one handshake. She’s put in roughly 4× Daniel’s hours since he went part-time, handling all operational and administrative work. She proposes 70/30 in her favor, possibly with a vesting arrangement so Daniel earns equity back if he returns to full-time.
“I’m not trying to take everything. I want something that acknowledges the asymmetry of the last 18 months but keeps Daniel as a real partner, not an employee.”
Her fear: losing the investor, and resenting a 50/50 split in five years when the business is worth much more.
Daniel’s position (summary)
Daniel argues the original 50/50 handshake should stand. He’s never missed a morning bake in 18 months; the bakery’s core product is his work. He also covered their shared rent — and sometimes Maya’s half — during the lean months out of his delivery-job income, and has left his distributions in the business for over a year.
“If Maya wants to be compensated for the extra administrative work, I’m open to that happening through salary, not equity.”
His fear: that agreeing to less equity now is the first step toward being pushed out entirely, and that his early-morning work is being dismissed because it’s less visible than Instagram followers.
The Mediation Process
Mediator.ai’s engine generated eight candidate agreements in parallel, ranking them pairwise against each party’s stated needs using the Nash Bargaining Solution. Across three iterations of generation and comparison, the engine converged on a draft that scored highest for mutual acceptability — one that neither Maya nor Daniel had proposed.
The Final Agreement
Equity split
- Maya: 60% (pre-investment). Daniel: 40% (pre-investment).
- Equity restoration pathway. Daniel can restore his 10% either by returning to full-time for six consecutive months within 18 months (automatic), or by forgoing $24k in distributions over 24 months (proportional credit per $3k quarterly).
- Daniel may choose either pathway or switch between them with 30 days’ notice.
Compensation and role clarity
- Maya receives a $2,000/month management salary for operational work, ending or splitting if Daniel returns to parity.
- Role minimums: Daniel at 25 hrs/week including all weekday morning bakes. Maya at 40 hrs/week on operations.
- Tiered decision rights: day-to-day under $500 by domain; $500–5,000 requires both partners; above $5,000 requires unanimous agreement.
Past claims
- The parties explicitly waive further claims on the 18-month pre-agreement period. The 60/40 split is deemed to compensate Maya’s extra labor; the restoration pathway is deemed to compensate Daniel’s personal financial subsidies.
Investor transaction
- Post-investment: Maya 48%, Daniel 32%, Investor 20%.
- Of the $80k: Maya receives $30k, Daniel receives $20k (pro-rata to equity sold). $30k stays in the business as growth capital.
Dispute resolution
- A shotgun buy-sell provision: either party may name a price for 100% of the business; the other chooses to buy or sell at that price. Classic anti-deadlock mechanism.
- Right of first refusal on third-party sales.
Why This Solution Worked
The restoration pathway is the hinge
Neither 70/30 nor 50/50 was acceptable to both parties. The engine found a middle position — 60/40 — and, more importantly, made it reversible. That directly addresses Daniel’s fear of being pushed out (he has a path back) and Maya’s fear of future resentment (equity now tracks ongoing contribution, not ancient history).
It separates past from future
Attempting to litigate the past 18 months — Daniel’s subsidized rent vs. Maya’s extra hours — would have been contentious and inconclusive. The agreement explicitly waives those claims, trading precise accounting for a forward-looking structure.
Cash, not equity, for ongoing asymmetry
Maya’s disproportionate hours get paid through salary. That stops the “why should I sell equity for work I’m doing now” dynamic from recurring.
The investor gets what they need
The split is clarified in writing, the deal closes, $30k of the $80k stays as growth capital.
Lessons
- A reversible compromise beats a permanent one when both parties have asymmetric fears.
- Don’t try to re-litigate the past. A mutual waiver, backed by an equity split that implicitly accounts for prior imbalance, is cleaner than per-line accounting.
- Separate instruments for separate problems. Use equity for ownership, salary for labor, distributions for profits, buy-sell for exit.
- An agreement is a system, not a number. The split only works because the restoration pathway, salary, and waiver work together.