Handbook of Corporate Finance Empirical Corporate Finance Volume 1

Chapter 9

VENTURE CAPITAL*

PAUL GOMPERS
Graduate School of Business, Harvard University, Morgan 483, Soldiers Field, Boston, MA 02163, USA
e-mail:[email protected]

Contents

Abstract 482
Keywords 482

1. Introduction 483


2. The development of the venture capital industry 484


3. The venture capital investment process 490
   3.1. Exiting venture capital investments 499


4. Venture investing and innovation 503


5. What we don’t know about venture capital 505
   5.1. Understanding risk and return 505
   5.2. The internationalization of venture capital 506
   References 507

*This chapter is based in part onGompers and Lerner (1999b, 2001). All errors are our own.

Handbook of Corporate Finance, Volume 1
Edited by B. Espen Eckbo
Copyright©2007 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved
DOI: 10.1016/S1873-1503(06)01009-9