  We theoretically present a design of self-starting operation of microcombs
based on laser-cavity solitons in a system composed of a micro-resonator nested
in and coupled to an amplifying laser cavity. We demonstrate that it is
possible to engineer the modulational-instability gain of the system's zero
state to allow the start-up with a well-defined number of robust solitons. The
approach can be implemented by using the system parameters, such as the cavity
length mismatch and the gain shape, to control the number and repetition rate
of the generated solitons. Because the setting does not require saturation of
the gain, the results offer an alternative to standard techniques that provide
laser mode-locking.
