Customer Reviews

Confessions of a Venture Capitalist: Inside the High-Stakes World of Start-Up Financing

5 star:		(12)
4 star:		(9)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(8)
1 star:		(12)

 

 

If you are craving an inside look on the operations of the VC world, you are in for a disappointment. If you are looking for enjoyable stories and case studies, you will be left wondering where the other reviewers found the word "fun".

Venture Capitalists are secretive guys. Everyone knows that, and every rare piece of literature on the subject is valuable. What Ms Quindlan says should be consirered a manual on what VCs expect from a good, obedient entrepreneur, but in no way would it prepare him for the encounter with real-life VCs, who are portrayed as true angels...

It is ironic that her friend Jerry Kaplan is used often as an example of a successful buseness man. The man has achieved consirerable personal wealth, but his pen-computing moves proved a failure, and his other company, OnSale was squashed by the likes of eBay.

To get a taste of "high-stakes world of start-up finacing" from both the VC and entrepreneurial perspective, you have to read "Burn Rate" by Michael Wolff and "eBoys" by Randal Stross. Considerably more frank, informative, and enjoyable.

As an entrepreneur who is on his 6th company batting .500 I've had truck with a lot of VCs over the years (including ones I like) and this book barely scratches the surface. For someone with as much experience as Ms. Quindlen, this is a shallow glance at an industry that is rich in detailed stories of this success or that failure where both VCs and founders have been stretched and tested in various ways. She begins by saying that she will be discussing mistakes, but this seems to be only a litany of faulty or weak founders/entrepreneurs. Also, the author presents only a one-way view of this industry. For example she recommends to founders that "you can never be too paranoid", but that this rule should only be applied to competition and never to your VCs. VCs are the good guys, there is no investigation of the VCs whatsoever. In other words, you founders should work extra-hard, be totally committed, tell us (VCs) everything, trust us implicitly and be willing to take less because it will be in your best interest anyway. There, you've just read the book in that single sentence. If you want to see what a winning founder thinks of VCs you're better off buying the biography of Jim Clark, "The New, New Thing" (and the writing is better). How unfortunate for us that the experienced Ms. Quindlen makes the same mistakes as a new author that she regrets making as a starting VC: timidity, ultra-conservatism and risk-avoidance.

This book is poorly written and offensive. Ms. Quinlan was dead wrong about the future of internet stocks. She claimed that profitability is not important in this environment but that this is a new paradigm and that the only important thing is to get large quickly. Clearly time has discredited this absured notion. Also she is dismissive and patronizing to entrepreneurs. She castigates some engineers with a solid business plan for not having the courage to quit their day jobs before funding comes in from the venture community. It must be nice to live in an environment where you do not have to worry about tuition, feeding your children, making the mortgage payment etc. so you can cavalierly expect others to quit their day jobs while they wait for the venture caitalist to smile on them. Also, although she would ask entepreneurs to quit ther day jobs, she is clear that if she loses interst in a deal she usually will not have time to make a courtesy call to say that her firm is passing on a deal. This is rich. Quit your day job and by the way, if I choose to pass on your deal you are not worthy of a phone call. Her advice is to just figure the VC is not interested when they quit returning your calls. Ms. Quinlan is a prima donna.She was dead wrong about the internet stocks. She appears unable to show common courtesy to the dedicated and hard working enrepreneurs who may have a deal that is not a good fit for her firm. She admits to a herd mentality among her colleagues that cause them to rush en mass to fund bad ideas because the might be "the next big thing". Overall, she show arrogance, grandiosity, bad judgement and manages to this all with a group of short, poorly connected, poorly written vingettes.

The elevator pitch: This book is a generic pump-and-dump info-glut to cash-in on VC's as source of genius and increase deal-flow to the firm.

For the customer, this book is like the business model of a news-content website running out-of-time: stale, tepid and you can't understand how it got funded, but there it is.

Having said that, you are probably reading this book because: a) you want to raise money, or b) you want to invest money. You will achieve neither with this book.

This book might save you some money. For example: It will save you the $795 Garage.com fee, the 2% the guy writing the business plan wants, the 10% commission the guy raising money wants, the $5000 Industry Standard conference fee, the $4,000 a day consultant, the 3% the law firm wants.

If after reading this book, you feel confused, stupid and disempowered -- it's not you, it's the book.

i can only assume that ms. quindlen had too much time on her hands and wanted to see her name on a book jacket. i wish i had the option to give this book zero stars.

the substance of this book could have been presented in ten pages .... the rest is filler which will be of no value to the reader. example: ms quindlen apparently was told to give her chapters catchy titles - after the title would then be a story of some company she did or did not fund, concluding "see, that proves my point, manhattan was bought for a bunch of beads" when the connection between the meaningless story and the conclusion is zero. ms. quindlen, assume that your reader has some intelligence and will not just follow your tortured logic and conclude "oh yes, the company did not have distribution channels in place, that certainly proves manhattan was bought for a bunch of beads".

ms quindlen, please stick with what you know - venture investing - and don't abuse readers with something you don't know -- how to write.

"Confessions..." is clearly mis-named as there is nothing confessional about this book. Ms Quindlen turns in a tepid collection of disjointed ideas and topics (most chapters are 2-4 pps.) which barely skim the surface of an otherwise intriging subject. Those hoping for a real meat and potatoes serving of the "high-stakes world of venture financing" will come away disappointed. There are far better books out there for that. "Confessions..." reads like something written by someone still deeply involved in the bubble of VC life and donning T-shirt and cap---hence, unwilling to take prisoners, take sides, or make possible enemies in her mission to explore her industry, warts and all. Punches are pulled, kid gloves are kept on, and names are changed to protect the innocent (or guilty and unscrupulous, depending.) At its best, "Confessions..." is a quick read; you can easily polish this off on your next trip aboard the 'Nerd Bird,-- those notorious Boston-SF flights packed with VCs (so watch what you say!)Like fast food, "Confessions..." might hit the spot in a pinch but will leave you undernourished and unsatisfied. At its worst, "Confessions..." is a thinly veiled rah-rah marketing brochure for the VC industry. There are simply too many references to 'VC as Robin Hood figure', rescuing incompetent founders from themselves. In her book all VCs wear white hats and work tirelessly to help founders succeed. There is not one reference to VCs firing founders, taking back unvested shares, or other hardball tactics which are a daily occurence in the Valley. In the end, Quindlen fails victim to not taking her own advice: She cautions entrepreneurs throughout the book to 'Underpromise and overdeliver." However, Quindlen herself overpromises by choosing a great, eye-catching title for a book which falls well short of its potential.

`Confessions' discusses the author's personal experience and stories over 18 years as an analyst and recent venture capitalist at IVP.

Anecdotal easy-reading unreferenced chapters span:

* Life in the bubble- background on Sand Hill venture capitalists, the Internet and Silicon-Valley startups.

* People- desirable startup success characteristics including passion & drive, decisiveness, determination, true motivations of founders and leadership/focus/clarity [don't try stretch in too many new areas e.g. market, technology and team].

* Markets- desirable characteristics including large growth market size, needs rather than wants, simple elevator offering description, hype, and fads [e.g. must be technically feasible, proof of paying customers, listen to customer feedback else is fad].

* Business models- desirable characteristics as per standard models, plus focus on NOT licensing, flexibility of model, "faster, better, cheaper" versus "brave new world", costs, distribution models, manage expectations, and keep eye on (cash) burn rate.

* Venture capitalists- description of stages (e.g. initial pitch, follow-up meeting, due diligence, partner meeting pitch, deal negotiation & close), VCs are partners, listen to VC feedback.

* Entrepreneurs- common mistakes (e.g. hire wrong, think small, tell VC what think want to hear, underestimate competition, focus on money), determination, board meetings, hype, avoid family businesses, and be paranoid.

* Fine Line Between Bizarre & Brilliant- interesting ideas including one described as unintelligible (Digital Datawac) which seemed straightforward (should this reviewer be worried?).

* And short ending chapters on: The Dumbest Decision I Ever Made; Valuation and More; A View from the Trenches; Five Short Years to a Revolution; and an Appendix primer on financing and valuation.

Despite being an easy-read & addressing an interesting subject with basic structuring of IVP material, `Confessions' ultimately lacks content. Useful for industry newcomers or startups as background material.

I agree with the above reader that this book is a shameless advertisement for IVP. The content of the book did not seem to have supported the title "Confession". To me this book is just a VC's view of the VC's work and life. It is just a book for very basic knowledge and not to be taken seriously. I read it like a bedtime story just to help me sleep.

Well, another reveiwer here wrote exactly what I felt reading this book. But this book is so bad I wanted to write a review myself. First of all, the stuff mentioned here is hadly any confessions, they are confused jargon written by a confused person wanting to make some money by cashing on the buzz created by the tech boom and VC world. Second, the book shows us nothing about the high-stakes world of start-up financing, you wont understand how VCs value companies or how they try and build companies. IVP is an old firm and a respected one, reading that the author is from that firm you might get carried away into believing that she knows a lot about the VC world. Nothing! a much better choice to spend your hard earned money would be "Done Deals" or "E-Boys". those books give a better account of the VC worlds.

You can read this book in 30 minutes and you end up learning nothing. Neither from the perspective of the VC (investor) or from the perspective of an entrepreneur. There is one hilarious chapter in the book where the author has to enquire about one of her portfolio companies progress. the only intelligent question she could come up with is "is there any momemtum is sales?" thats all. nothing more, so you dont get to understand what VC look in entrepreneurs, you dont get to understnad how VCs add value to startups, you dont get to understand how companies are valued, you dont get to understand how VC do their exits, basically, you just dont get to understand anything that the books claims to impart you. Nothing, dont spend a cent on this book.

Only a little useful information here. If you really want to understand the world of venture capital, look elsewhere.