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On the Lifecycle Dynamics of Venture-Capital- and Non-Venture-Capital-Financed Firms

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  • Manju Puri
  • Rebecca Zarutskie

Abstract

We use a new data set that tracks U.S. firms from their birth over two decades to understand the life cycle dynamics and outcomes (both successes and failures) of VC- and non-VC financed firms. We first ask to what market-wide and firm-level characteristics venture capitalists respond in choosing to make their investments and how this differs for firms financed solely by non-VC sources of entrepreneurial capital. We then ask what are the eventual differences in outcomes for firms that receive VC financing relative to non-VC-financed firms. Our findings suggest that VCs follow public market signals similar to other investors and typically invest largely in young firms, with potential for large scale being an important criterion. The main way that VC financed firms differ from matched non-VC financed firms, is they demonstrate remarkably larger scale both for successful and failed firms, at every point of the firms' life cycle. They grow more rapidly, but we see little difference in profitability measures at times of exit. We further examine a number of hypotheses relating to VC-financed firms' failure. We find that VC-financed firms' cumulative failure rates are lower than non-VC-financed firms but the story is nuanced. VC appears initially "patient" in that VC-financed firms are less likely to fail in the first five years but conditional on surviving past this point become more likely to fail relative to non-VC-financed firms. We perform a number of robustness checks and find that VC does not appear to have more stringent survival thresholds nor do VC-financed firm failures appear to be disguised as acquisitions nor do particular kinds of VC firms seem to be driving our results. Overall, our analysis supports the view that VC is "patient" capital relative to other non-VC sources of entrepreneurial capital in the early part of firms' lifecycles and that an important criterion for receiving VC investment is potential for large scale, rather than level of profitability, prior to exit.

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Bibliographic Info

Paper provided by National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc in its series NBER Working Papers with number 14250.

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Date of creation: Aug 2008
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Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:14250

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References

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  1. Zarutskie, Rebecca, 2010. "The role of top management team human capital in venture capital markets: Evidence from first-time funds," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 25(1), pages 155-172, January.
  2. Paul Gompers & Anna Kovner & Josh Lerner & David Scharfstein, 2005. "Venture Capital Investment Cycles: The Impact of Public Markets," NBER Working Papers 11385, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  3. Steven N. Kaplan & Per Stromberg, 2002. "Characteristics, Contracts, and Actions: Evidence from Venture Capitalist Analyses," NBER Working Papers 8764, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  4. Brav, Alon & Gompers, Paul A, 1997. " Myth or Reality? The Long-Run Underperformance of Initial Public Offerings: Evidence from Venture and Nonventure Capital-Backed Companies," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 52(5), pages 1791-1821, December.
  5. Steven N. Kaplan & Per Stromberg, 2003. "Financial Contracting Theory Meets the Real World: An Empirical Analysis of Venture Capital Contracts," Review of Economic Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 70(2), pages 281-315, 04.
  6. Steven N. Kaplan & Antoinette Schoar, 2005. "Private Equity Performance: Returns, Persistence, and Capital Flows," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 60(4), pages 1791-1823, 08.
  7. Bottazzi, L. & Da Rin, M. & Hellmann, T., 2008. "Who are the active investors? Evidence from venture capital," Open Access publications from Tilburg University urn:nbn:nl:ui:12-305977, Tilburg University.
  8. Megginson, William L & Weiss, Kathleen A, 1991. " Venture Capitalist Certification in Initial Public Offerings," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 46(3), pages 879-903, July.
  9. Paul Gompers & Josh Lerner, 2001. "The Venture Capital Revolution," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 15(2), pages 145-168, Spring.
  10. Thomas Hellmann & Manju Puri, 2002. "Venture Capital and the Professionalization of Start-Up Firms: Empirical Evidence," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 57(1), pages 169-197, 02.
  11. Samuel Kortum & Josh Lerner, 2000. "Assessing the Contribution of Venture Capital to Innovation," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 31(4), pages 674-692, Winter.
  12. Gompers, Paul A., 1996. "Grandstanding in the venture capital industry," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 42(1), pages 133-156, September.
  13. Lerner, Josh, 1995. " Venture Capitalists and the Oversight of Private Firms," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 50(1), pages 301-18, March.
  14. Laura Lindsey, 2008. "Blurring Firm Boundaries: The Role of Venture Capital in Strategic Alliances," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 63(3), pages 1137-1168, 06.
  15. Alberto Abadie & Guido W. Imbens, 2006. "Large Sample Properties of Matching Estimators for Average Treatment Effects," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 74(1), pages 235-267, 01.
  16. Ron S Jarmin & Javier Miranda, 2002. "The Longitudinal Business Database," Working Papers 02-17, Center for Economic Studies, U.S. Census Bureau.
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Cited by:
  1. Bengtsson, Ola & Hand, John R.M., 2011. "CEO compensation in venture-backed firms," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 26(4), pages 391-411, July.
  2. Da Rin, M. & Hellmann, T. & Puri, M.L., 2011. "A Survey of Venture Capital Research," Discussion Paper 2011-044, Tilburg University, Tilburg Law and Economic Center.
  3. Inderst, Roman & Mueller, Holger M., 2009. "Early-stage financing and firm growth in new industries," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 93(2), pages 276-291, August.
  4. Fabrizi, Simona & Lippert, Steffen & Norbäck, Peh & Persson, Lars, 2008. "Venture Capitalists, Asymmetric Information, and Ownership in the Innovation Process," Working Paper Series 776, Research Institute of Industrial Economics.
  5. Bengtsson, Ola & Hand, John R. M., 2012. "Employee Compensation in Entrepreneurial Companies," Working Paper Series 922, Research Institute of Industrial Economics.
  6. Bertoni, Fabio & Colombo, Massimo G. & Grilli, Luca, 2011. "Venture capital financing and the growth of high-tech start-ups: Disentangling treatment from selection effects," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 40(7), pages 1028-1043, September.
  7. James B. Ang & Jakob B. Madsen, 2012. "Risk capital, private credit, and innovative production," Canadian Journal of Economics, Canadian Economics Association, vol. 45(4), pages 1608-1639, November.
  8. T. Vanacker, 2009. "A Longitudinal Study on the Impact of Venture Capital Firm Heterogeneity on Portfolio Company Growth," Working Papers of Faculty of Economics and Business Administration, Ghent University, Belgium 09/552, Ghent University, Faculty of Economics and Business Administration.
  9. Carpentier, Cécile & L'Her, Jean-François & Suret, Jean-Marc, 2010. "Stock exchange markets for new ventures," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 25(4), pages 403-422, July.
  10. Nahata, Rajarishi, 2008. "Venture capital reputation and investment performance," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 90(2), pages 127-151, November.
  11. Timo Fischer & Gaétan de Rassenfosse, 2011. "Debt Financing of High-growth Startups," DRUID Working Papers 11-04, DRUID, Copenhagen Business School, Department of Industrial Economics and Strategy/Aalborg University, Department of Business Studies.
  12. Thomas J. Chemmanur & Karthik Krishnan & Debarshi K. Nandy, 0. "How Does Venture Capital Financing Improve Efficiency in Private Firms? A Look Beneath the Surface," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 24(12), pages 4037-4090.
  13. Thomas Åstebro & Carlos J. Serrano, 2011. "Business Partners, Financing, and the Commercialization of Inventions," NBER Working Papers 17181, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  14. A. Heughebaert & T. Vanacker & S. Manigart, 2012. "Institutional Frameworks, Venture Capital and the Financing of European New Technology-Based Firms," Working Papers of Faculty of Economics and Business Administration, Ghent University, Belgium 12/809, Ghent University, Faculty of Economics and Business Administration.
  15. Ramon P. DeGennaro & Gerald P. Dwyer, 2010. "Expected returns to stock investments by angel investors in groups," Working Paper 2010-14, Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta.
  16. Anna Kovner & Josh Lerner, 2012. "Doing well by doing good? Community development venture capital," Staff Reports 572, Federal Reserve Bank of New York.

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