Venture Capital: A “Contraindication of Success”?

By Paul Kedrosky · September 23, 2007 · ·

Entertainingly contradictory musings from billionaire (and new VC) Randal Kirk on the venture capital business:

If you like something, you should want more of it, and if you don’t
like it, you should get rid of it. [His company] never traded equity for VC
dollars, nor would Kirk have let it. The presence of a venture
capitalist behind a startup is, he says, “a contraindication of success.

[via Forbes]

Related posts:

  1. Venture Capital Compensation
  2. Quartile Spreads in Venture Capital
  3. The Venture Capital Trap
  4. Summary of Recent Venture Capital Research
  5. Geography-Free Venture Capital

Comments

  1. Rohit says:
    September 23, 2007 at 11:06 am

    I have worked for several VC-backed startups, including those backed by some of the big ones: two Kleiners and a Sequoia. As far as I can see, there is no relation between the VC firm and company success. The VC board members don’t really do anything to help you out anyway. Of the four, the only one that made any money for the employees was backed by smaller firms. Any time I hear someone tell me “well, it’s backed by Sequoia” I have to laugh and think that this person must be new to the startup game.

  2. Brent Buckner says:
    September 23, 2007 at 11:15 am

    Hmmmm.
    Well, in the context of the universe of VC funds having earned average pre-fee risk-adjusted returns below cost-of-capital (over a reasonably long time horizon), there may be an empirical case available. Just not sure that the universe of “start-ups” has on average done better….

  3. Stealth Mode says:
    September 26, 2007 at 11:14 am

    Would looking like your VC help? I am referring to this advice: http://smartstartup.typepad.com/my_weblog/2007/09/secrets-of-rais.html
    Is this hot on the east coast too?