Done Deals: Venture Capitalists Tell Their Stories [Hardcover]

Udayan Gupta (Editor)

Book Description

Series: Harvard Business School Press | Publication Date: September 2000

This work provides a revealing history of the venture capital industry as told through first-person accounts. It chronicles the industry's beginnings and highlights the differences between America's West and East coast firms. More than thirty leading venture capitalists - from early pioneers such as Eugene Kleiner and Arthur Rock to current top players like Geoff Yang and John Dorrer - reveal insights gleaned from their personal experiences in successful deal-making.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

"Until a few years ago," notes journalist-consultant Udayan Gupta, "venture capitalists were hardly on anyone's radar screen." That's not the case these days, as financiers who used to work behind the scenes now regularly set markets afire with their public support of high-profile technology and Internet stocks. In Done Deals, Gupta allows 35 of the brightest stars in what has become a $30-billion-a-year business to tell their own stories in their own words. We get to see exactly what they were thinking when they backed such endeavors as Intel, eBay, Excite, Genentech, and 3Com. Gupta's intention is to demonstrate how the industry has changed over the past half-century and how it differs today among its various forms. He achieves this beautifully by dividing the first-person accounts into thematically attuned sections that focus on dealmakers of the future (such as Mitch Kapor of Accel Partners), early pioneers (including the late Benno Schmidt of J.H. Whitney & Co.), West Coast veterans (such as Don Valentine of Sequoia Capital), past and present East Coast practitioners (like Charles Waite of Greylock Management), and visionaries (including John Doerr of Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers). Some of the stories are more detailed than others, but taken together, they provide a well-rounded view that will interest anyone who must deal with this often intertwined yet still individual world. --Howard Rothman

From Publishers Weekly

With the growth of the Internet and the exploding number of startups, venture capital has become far more significant not only to the companies that benefit from the money but to investors curious about venture capitalists' analyses of the market. Gupta, a former Wall Street Journal staffer, has interviewed 35 of the most prominent figures in the venture capital world from across the country, including such key players as Mitch Kapor of Accel, Michelangelo Volpi of Cisco, Lionel Pincus of Warburg Pincus, and Steve Lazarus of ARCH Venture Partners. In their own words, these financial wizards discuss how they pick companies and what tools they use to evaluate new investments. For example, Arthur Rock, a patriarch of today's venture capitalists who invested in Apple and Intel, says, "I think you have to be a technologist today, because there are so many different technologies converging that you have to understand where everything is coming from. When I started doing these deals, there was no competition. You could make some mistakes, and still not get very far behind. Today, if you make any mistakes, you're dead." Readers looking for insights into the success of technology companies will certainly find some here. Although it would have enhanced the book for general readers if the editor had supplied more connective material between the interviewsAsupplementing the strong introductionAthis title will undoubtedly attract attention in Silicon Valley or any tech industry hot spot where the names of the contributors are well known. (Oct.)
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 448 pages
• Publisher: Harvard Business Review Press; First Printing edition (September 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0875849385
• ISBN-13: 978-0875849386
• Product Dimensions: 9.4 x 6.3 x 1.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.8 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (16 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #354,064 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

26 of 27 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Perspectives Otherwise Unavailable in a Single Source, October 26, 2000

By 

Robert Morris (Dallas, Texas) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Done Deals: Venture Capitalists Tell Their Stories (Hardcover)

I really enjoyed reading this book. Others may be critical of the quality of writing but no one can be critical of the quantity and quality of information provided. (But if you're looking for "insider information", look elsewhere.) These VCs probably did write what is attributed to them. Brilliantly organized (and probably edited somewhat) by Gupta, the 31 individual commentaries address two themes: "the sharp contrast between the practitioners of early venture capital and those practicing today, and the coastal divide -- the difference in venture capital and practice between the West Coast and the East Coast." Gupta includes first-person perspectives on "the newest incarnation of venture capital"; how several VC's got their start and their impressions "of the industry's more recent success and notoriety"; "contrasts [on the West Coast] between the first forty-five years and the past five"; commentaries on "the early days in Silicon Valley" and those circumstances "that enhanced its entrepreneurial process"; and other commentaries which focus on the future and "where the industry is headed in the next fifty years." I know of no other single source which provides the number and quality of commentaries which are assembled in this volume. By reading them, you will gain a much better understanding of one of the most widely-discussed and least-understood components within our nation's economic history during the past 50 years.

19 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Highly recommended reading, October 5, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: Done Deals: Venture Capitalists Tell Their Stories (Hardcover)

Best articulation of the evolution of the VC industry dating back to the 1950s. Learned more about the VC industry in this one book than other previous books collectively. Unravels various and competing schools of thought among the great VC minds, of past and present. Very candid and insightful, and makes one appreciate its history. Have fun reading this book ... a definite page-turner.

13 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Not Impressed, December 30, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: Done Deals: Venture Capitalists Tell Their Stories (Hardcover)

Where are the great stories that are promised? I read the whole book and am still scratching my head! Most of the stories surround how the VC's got started in the business, what it was like being a VC in the 60's & 70's, how much money investors made on different investments, etc...not why deals were funded. I was hoping to get a better sense of what decision making criteria were used to justify various investments and left severely disappointed.

Where is the industry going? Again, no real insights here...

As someone stated earlier, if I wanted a historical perspective on the VC industry or a who's who in the industry, there are many, many sources on the internet for this information.

Try Ruth Ann Quindlan's book for better insights into the decision making that goes into dealmaking.