Venture Capital, Royalty-based funds, Venture Lending, Private Equity, Fund-of-Funds, Deal Flow Funds, Technology Performance Financing

Keeping Entrepreneurship Alive

New Series, beginning soon, ‘Keeping Entrepreneurship Alive.’ The idea for this series came from a post to Brad Field’s blog Startup Revolution»Communities by Namek Zu’bi from Jordan, titled ‘Young Startup Communities:  Beware of the Excitment Bubble.’

Read More

Insider View, Twists & Turns in International Venture Capital

In January I delivered a lecture to MBA students, Ross School of Business at the University of Michigan. David Brophy, Director of the Office for the Study of Private Equity Finance & Associate Professor of Finance invited me to speak at his private equity class about my experiences in doing VC since 1986, with what he calls “Tom is 3 feet deep into VC, with mud on his boots.” If you don’t know David you should, as he was the…

Read More

The Valley of Death. Market Failure? Or Rational Behavior of Investors to Risk?

Governments, development banks and investors poured billions of dollars to finance entrepreneurs in the ‘Valley of Death.’ Add in the millions of hours of human energy and thought devoted to creating solutions too, and the investment is truly staggering. Yet the Valley of Death still exists. Conventional thought defines the ‘Valley of Death’ as a market failure. But is it? Or is the Valley simply the rational behavior of investors to risk? If the Valley is a reaction to risk,…

Read More