Customer Reviews

Raising Venture Capital for the Serious Entrepreneur

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4 star:		(2)
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I did, so I bought five books. I will review them from worst to best.

"Finding an Angel Investor In a Day," by The Planning Shop (2007), told me nothing I didn't know, and I didn't know anything about business plans or angel investors. The title is ludicrous and the advice is obvious, e.g., "Your business plan should be concise, compelling, and irresistible to investors." 1 star.

"The ABC's of Writing Winning Business Plans," by Garrett Sutton (2005), walks you through writing business plans for a lawn mowing business and buying a pizza restaurant. If your business is more complicated, this is not the book for you. 1 star.

"The Ernst & Young Business Plan Guide," by Brian Ford, Jay Boorstein, and Patrick Pruitt (2007), is a good book but hardly inspiring or insightful. If you follow this book your business plan will be competent but won't grab investors. 3 stars.

"Angel Financing for Entrepreneurs," by Susan Preston (2007). This book doesn't explain how to write a business plan, but it explains how to make a 10-minute PowerPoint presentation to investors -- a presentation that will grab investors. For example, one question is "How is your product or technology scalable?" I also learned some of the financials that angel investors look for, such as what IRR is expected. This book helped and inspired me to write an excellent presentation, that became the basis for my business plan. 5 stars.

"Raising Venture Capital for the Serious Entrepreneur," by Dermot Berkery (2008). This is a textbook for a business school course about venture capital. This book is full of insights. Every few pages new ideas would compel me to go to my computer and add stuff or rewrite my business plan, for example, Berkery emphasizes the need for clear milestones. Preston mentioned milestones but didn't make it clear why they are so important. The financials that were briefly presented in Preston's book are thoroughly presented in Berkery's book, for example, what gross margin investors look for (80% or more) and why they need such extremely profitable products or services. Plus you learn the jargon or key phrases of venture capitalists, e.g., "a large but well signaled market," the importance of "market power" and an effective "route to customers." I feel that my business plan now speaks to investors in their language, with the numbers they are looking for. 5 stars.

I've worked in, and been around, VC and angel investor-financed businesses for a long time. So, in some ways the topics in this book are not entirely new to me. However, this book takes all the various buckets of entrepreneurial finance information that are scattered around my brain and puts them into a coherent whole.

More than that, since I am also in the process of fundraising for a startup, this book gives me clear guidance and demystifies the VC evaluation process. Other than investor scale and growth expectations, I think the advice applies equally well to angel investor evaluations.

The book is incredibly clear...I agree it is not a "VC for Dummies" book, yet a a total novice would indeed be able to navigate the content quite easily. The author has a gift for anticipating reader questions and possible confusion points...probably because he also teaches entrepreneurial finance and has seen all the questions before.

My husband saw me avidly reading this book and said "Do you have some racy novel between the covers of that book?" Joke aside, I have found it very compelling reading.

There is one word for this book and its contents - Brilliant.

The book thoroughly covers the forward movement in start up and how to move towards proper funding. It helps entrepreneurs think through the tough decisions that face them - and gives solid advice and ideas by showing working examples and outcomes. By clearly describing the motivations around each party involved in funding situations and seeing how those motivations can change at each stage of the game - this book gives the reader tools that any serious start up needs. I recommend this book 150% - It has been a solid guide in the steps I have taken and are continuing to make in my start-up.

Mr. Berkery deserves a standing ovation for the serious depth and thinking placed into this volume and provided to the entrepreneurial world!

I haven't finished it reading yet, but I learned more about business in the first thirty pages than I've learned in the rest of my entire life.

This book is built to give entrepreneurs the view of people who have money and vice versa. It covers presentations, milestones, business plans, and stock options.

I had never understood what preferred stock meant until I got this book.

It's very readable and not pretentious at all, even though it's talking about people giving you millions and millions of dollars. It's also focused on the point that without venture capital and people starting businesses, the economy just doesn't work.

Excellent book, I'm very happy with my purchase. It's also written very recently and takes into account a lot of other companies' recent experiences.

If you want to start a business that requires some capital and don't know much about business, this is the book you want.

I have worked on business transactions in varying roles for the last 20 years. Although I already knew a lot about the subject matter, this book organized the subject and explained it in a way that anyone can understand. As soon as I finished the book, I bought a second copy for a friend who is an entrepreneur. I have also recommended it to several lawyers, accountants and economic development professionals, who play supporting roles to local entrepreneurs. If you only buy one book on this topic, this should be the one.

I am a veteran of several Silicon Valley startups, having gone to raise money, and watched money being raised, and invested my own as an angel.

This book is by far the best I've ever gone through, from the point of view of someone very experienced in the field, with the gift of being able to articulate not the theory, but the true practice.

The author goes through the mindsets of the investors and the entrepreneurs in an uncannily accurate manner. His chapters on what makes for a successful business plan is so right on, and everyone should measure their plan against his required attributes. If you don't match up, you really need to consider another idea, or do alot more creative thinking on your existing idea.

This was by far the best $50 I spent as a career startup type. Thanks to the author for keeping it very real and readable.

I have given advice to entrepreneurs looking for equity financing for a business idea. The concentration has been on the plan and cash flow requirements. This book fulfills a need for the entrepreneur to protect his intersts and how to deal with a range of possibilities including subsequent financing when needed.

The book's advice appears to have the potential to ensure a more balanced agreement and protection for the less experienced party. It is surprising to see the basic tools of the VC laid out in such detail. It looks like a useful handbook

In Dermot Berkery's book "Raising Venture Capital for the Serious Entrepreneur" looks back with precise insights into a time when "Limited Partners" would invest millions in a VC fund. Berkery says on page 114 that LP's hopes were of getting at least 2.5 times their investment back over the (typically 10 year) life of that (LP or LLC) Venture Capital Fund.

So, around the turn of this, the 21st Century, LPs invested about $130 Billion in U.S. VC funds that, over 10 years LOST 4.2 percent. Subsequently, in 2009 and 2010 U.S. VC funding totaled about 10 times LESS, (click icon for Rock-A-Bye IP - A Dangerous Bargain for Inventors" complete with details in footnotes at [...]).

Given the 90% fall-off in U.S. VC funding, these days entrepreneurs are searching for background on the "Beacon Method" in such now-pertinent books as:

"Web-Based Venture Money - A Guide to Capital Formation" by John K. Romano and

"Take Your Company Public!: The Entrepreneur's Guide to Alternative Capital Sources" by Drew Field

I bought this book to get a crash course on venture capital and it did not disappoint. The author explains VC in plain language using understandable case studies. Clearly, Dermot Berkery has years of practical experience in equity finance and he has skillfully converted that experience into meaningful lessons and indespensible wisdom. That's what makes this book good. What makes this book great is what the author has omitted: the superfluous filler that you might find in a "For Dummies" type of text. Berkery sticks to the facts and backs up his opinions and suggestions with sound reasoning. In an age when shelves are cluttered with management books filled cover to cover with useless babble from business philosophers and pontificating tomes from celebrity entrepreneurs and CEOs, it's refreshing to to find a volume that gets to the point without any fluff.

I wanted to gain a better understanding of venture capital financing, for purposes of my own professional development, and to expand the services I offer as a CFO consultant. As I searched out different books on the subject, I came across Dermot Berkery's "Raising Venture Capital for the Serious Entrepreneur". This book was exactly what I was looking for.

Mr. Berkery provides his readers a clear and complete understanding of every aspect of venture capital. Some of the areas that were quite helpful included understanding the unique cash flow and risk dynamics of an early stage venture, how much capital to raise and when, creating winning business plans (not what you have read in other books), how to value early-stage ventures, and negotiating all facets of a term sheet.

In addition to his clear writing style, he provides well thought out explanatory exhibits, mini-cases, and exercises - all of which reinforce the concepts, in a meaningful way.

I would highly recommend this book to any entrepreneur, and those that support them, who really wants to, and needs to, understand venture capital as a funding source. And if there are college professors out there teaching venture capital - this book has to be the one you use as a textbook. Mr. Berkery's depth of experience in the venture capital world comes through clearly in his writing - he knows what he is talking about and has a great way of explaining it to those who want to learn more.

William M. Wright II, CPA
Chesapeake, VA USA
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