Leading Blog

JUNE 10, 2024

Here are the nine key aspects of the Venture Mindset , the most important guiding principles: Home Runs Matter, Strikeouts Don’t VCs worry more about errors of omission than they do about errors of commission. The concern is not the chance of failure but the risk of missing out on the possible success. The goal is not to win each time.

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Consensus Venture Capitalist Long-term Due Diligence 344

Harvard Business Review

MAY 10, 2011

Consider Zipcar, whose recent IPO valued the 11-year old company at over $1 billion. If its ambition was to improve on current products in tiny increments, venture capitalists would ignore them. What could happen if these companies embraced the venture capitalist playbook?

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Venture Capitalist Venture Funding Entrepreneur IPO 13

Harvard Business Review

JANUARY 29, 2014

The billion dollar mark gets thrown around by venture capitalists as shorthand for the level of success they’re looking for when they invest, since the typical outcome for start-ups is failure and thus VC firms bank on a few mega-hits to generate returns. That is well short of the median of 26.5 times sales in 1999.

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Venture Capitalist IPO Comparison Banking 8

Harvard Business Review

JULY 27, 2017

Talented founders know that corporations simply cannot replicate the deep experience private VCs have in starting companies, nor their expertise in assisting startups with complex challenges such as deal making, business modeling, resolving disputes among founders, executing a successful IPO, and so on.

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Venture Capitalist Meyer Innovation Fixed Costs 8

Harvard Business Review

JUNE 9, 2014

The most successful, visionary entrepreneurs dream not of millions of dollars, but of a world where their products change culture. But in technology startups, particularly venture-backed technology startups, the current investment climate does not always support that vision. It is incredibly hard to hold an IPO.

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Entrepreneur Venture Capitalist Mezzanine Short-term 8

Harvard Business Review

OCTOBER 26, 2011

Many venture capitalists are limiting their investments to the "demand-side" — aimed at reducing energy use — rather than investing in startups trying to change the way we produce energy. Even if most of their investments fail, a few spectacular successes can "make the fund" for a VC.

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Energy Finance IPO Biotechnology 12

Harvard Business Review

MARCH 11, 2016

The algorithm isn’t good enough to distinguish Facebook from MySpace, so it won’t help venture capitalists do their work. Set your company up for success. The number of startups that the algorithm scores as quality is high, but the likelihood of a successful IPO or acquisition hasn’t kept up.

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GDP IPO Venture Capitalist Gordon 8

Harvard Business Review

JULY 18, 2012

Many venture capitalists are up in the arms because their returns are down, their funds are drying up, and there appear to be a declining number of entrepreneurs pursuing big ideas. Unfortunately, venture capitalists have mixed up their causality. Most of the big successes followed this pattern. Design thinking.

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Venture Capitalist Software Entrepreneur Engineering 17

Harvard Business Review

JULY 18, 2012

Many venture capitalists are up in the arms because their returns are down, their funds are drying up, and there appear to be a declining number of entrepreneurs pursuing big ideas. Unfortunately, venture capitalists have mixed up their causality. Most of the big successes followed this pattern. Design thinking.

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Venture Capitalist Software Entrepreneur Engineering 17

Harvard Business Review

APRIL 11, 2014

After enterprise tech start-up Box filed to go public last month, revealing founder Aaron Levie’s remaining stake to be just over 4% (plus stock options) , commentators seemed compelled to note just how much control the 28-year-old founder had given up on the road to an IPO.

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Venture Capitalist Entrepreneur IPO Human Capital 10

Harvard Business Review

OCTOBER 31, 2014

It was basically an open-source enterprise, and seemed to owe most of its remarkable success to that openness. Of course, that “success” didn’t come with a lot of revenue. billion in its 2013 IPO) that investors have plowed into it. billion in less than a year. It’s just a company, trying to make some money.

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Marketing IPO Venture Capitalist Fashion 10

Harvard Business Review

MARCH 4, 2016

They may try to rationalize their micromanagement by arguing that every aspect of their venture’s success hinges upon their own exacting review. Set your company up for success. But those who hold on to control too tightly become bottlenecks to organizational action, as all decisions have to pass through them. .”

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Venture Capitalist Sample IPO Long-term 8

Harvard Business Review

FEBRUARY 17, 2011

Venture capitalists are increasingly interested in emerging markets, and in working with local funds based in those markets (despite the fact that reverse innovation in venture capital seems counterintuitive). Editor's Note: This post was written with Justin Chakma, an undergraduate student at the University of Toronto (Canada).

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Marketing Venture Capitalist Biotechnology IPO 15

Harvard Business Review

MARCH 27, 2014

At the time, Apple was a less-than-successful computer company, and Steve – ever the loner – had moved on to create Next, another less-than-successful one. The consummate loner, Harano would likely have stayed off our radar screen, except that one day his unpredictable behavior led to a fantastically successful product.

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Entrepreneur Venture Capitalist Business Incubator IPO 8

Harvard Business Review

OCTOBER 23, 2013

Raising venture capital isn’t the be all and end all of entrepreneurial success. But for an important subset of the business world — firms in pursuit of explosive growth — raising capital from angel investors or venture capitalists is an early step on a long and uncertain road to success.

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IPO Venture Capitalist Entrepreneur Competitive Advantage 9

Harvard Business Review

JANUARY 9, 2015

What successful companies are doing right. Between 1977 and 1984, venture capitalists invested over $400 million in 43 manufacturers of the drives. Some (12) of the firms had an IPO, and collectively enjoyed valuation that at its peak was $5.4 ” Insight Center. Making Money with Digital Business Models.

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Venture Capitalist Business Model IPO Marketing 8

Harvard Business Review

APRIL 13, 2015

With limited exit opportunities via initial public offers ( IPOs ) and acquisitions, smart young people understand that stock options rarely bring a big payday. Once in a while, after a great success, share profits. Thus begins a cycle of frustration in Africa’s tech sector around the ability to hire and retain the right team.

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Venture Capitalist IPO Entrepreneur Banking 8

Harvard Business Review

NOVEMBER 7, 2018

To understand the downsides and why they’re important, though, it helps to understand why staged venture-capital financing has been so successful in the first place. One of the fundamental elements of commercializing new ventures is the high failure rate they face. Begin with a more centralized governance structure (e.g.,

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Cost Decentralization Finance Entrepreneur 8

Harvard Business Review

APRIL 10, 2013

For example, it is nearly impossible for scaling ventures in many countries, including Brazil and Denmark, to count on an IPO for a successful exit. Having startup policies without taking care of access to IPO markets is like having a fast new ramp onto a pot-holed dirt road.

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Entrepreneur IPO Incentives Venture Capitalist 8

Harvard Business Review

AUGUST 6, 2014

And then we found Alibaba — and it found us — and that connection led to the partnership that ultimately proved to be remarkably successful. This success was built on what we learned from our prior efforts, as well as a resolve to take new risks to do what was necessary to succeed. The company subsequently went private in early 2012.

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Chief Financial Officer Operations Learning-by-Doing IPO 10

Harvard Business Review

AUGUST 27, 2018

The number of listed firms can decline because of three developments: 1) bankruptcy, failure, or closure of listed firms, 2) delisting of firms going private or acquired, and 3) decrease in number of initial public offerings (IPOs). Furthermore, doing IPO is not only an expensive proposition, it also consumes managerial time and energy.

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IPO Company First-mover Advantage Intangible Assets 11

Harvard Business Review

JULY 19, 2016

They suggest that’s why female entrepreneurs have trouble securing financing from venture capitalists. My research reveals two practical insights: For female entrepreneurs, it’s important to know that securing financing from an all-male venture capital firm may drastically reduce their probability of a successful exit.

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Venture Capitalist Finance Succession IPO 8

Harvard Business Review

SEPTEMBER 10, 2015

.” Senor and Singer also cite immigration policy and a culture that tolerates risk-taking and failure as contributing to Israel’s startup success. The final reason for Israel’s entrepreneurial dynamism is based on the logic of innovation clusters: Early success breeds continued success. billion in 2013.

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Venture Capitalist Entrepreneur Marketing IPO 8

Harvard Business Review

JULY 20, 2017

A123 Systems promised to be a clean tech success with a soaring IPO in 2009. Startups inject new technical expertise, and venture capitalists offer funding and access to new talent. The company developed lithium ion batteries that helped convince automakers of their value for hybrid vehicles.

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Innovation Productivity Products Venture Capitalist 13

Harvard Business Review

NOVEMBER 6, 2015

This approach is successful for some ventures — mostly for software-related companies with modest initial operating expenses. Many great companies have achieved success after reaching a point of failure in their existing approach and then finding a new market to attack. Successful entrepreneurs know this.

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Venture Capitalist Entrepreneur IPO Wireless 8

Harvard Business Review

FEBRUARY 25, 2015

based venture capitalists about my plans to move my family out to Singapore to oversee Innosight’s nascent investment and incubation arm. Since I had never done venture investing before, I was trying to get advice from as many people as I could. “You are crazy.” “Name a Singapore start-up.

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Entrepreneur Incubator Venture Capitalist Innovation 8