In the VC world, I would suspect Bessemer Venture Partners stands on top as being the firm many hope to emulate. Probably one trait everybody should seek to immediately emulate is transparency.
If you haven’t seen the Bessemer “Anti-Portfolio”, you should take a peek.
From the intro page:
“Our reasons for passing on these investments varied. In some cases, we were making a conscious act of generosity to another, younger venture firm, down on their luck, whom we felt could really use a billion dollars in gains.”
The list is pretty funny:
Google
Cowan’s college friend rented her garage to Sergey and Larry for their first year. In 1999 and 2000 she tried to introduce Cowan to “these two really smart Stanford students writing a search engine”. Students? A new search engine? In the most important moment ever for Bessemer’s anti-portfolio, Cowan asked her, “How can I get out of this house without going anywhere near your garage?”
The rest is here.
This one, "Deals Missed", by OVP is pretty cool too: http://www.ovp.com/industry_deals.html
- Steve
Posted by: Steve Lacey | March 21, 2006 at 14:49