Financing Entrepreneurial and Corporate Ventures

Introduction

The ecosystem of startups is changing rapidly, presenting new opportunities and challenges for entrepreneurs and early employees as well as for established corporations seeking fresh entrepreneurial ideas.  Against this dynamic backdrop, financing and growing a new venture—as an entrepreneur launching a startup or as a company cultivating entrepreneurial opportunities—requires distinctive knowledge and a skill set that integrates strategic, operational, and financial tools.  The goal of this course is to apply the analytical skills and functional knowledge developed in the core curriculum to the opportunities and challenges of emerging business opportunities.  This course demands synthesis of strategic and financial analysis in the context of real time applications in a diversity of industry settings, including social media and data analytics, information technology, life sciences, and healthcare and a range of equity and non-equity financing options. One of the biggest hurdles for entrepreneurs is financing their ideas—although securing funding is always difficult, this course helps you appreciate multiple options and implications for each. A special focus will be paid to the investment decision from the perspective of various investors and the entrepreneur, and students will gain insights into factors that influence the viability and financial health of a business as well as the steps that can be taken to increase venture valuation.

Course content

The course content includes:

• Starting Strong and Getting to Launch: Understanding the financing landscape
• Financing the Growth Startup-Early Growth and Risk Capital:  Choice of debt versus equity, angel investment
• Financing the Growth Startup-Early and Later Stages of Equity Investment: Venture capital, term sheets, control rights
• Emerging Models of Entrepreneurial Finance:  Accelerators, crowdfunding
• Corporate Ventures: Corporate venture capital and intrapreneurship
• Milestones, Exit Strategy, and Launch: Evaluating exit options; founder and founding team transitions; growth capital and beyond