[FoRK] Private equity, venture capital, entrepreneurs, and tax policy

[Jeff Bone]

On May 6, 2008, at 1:26 PM, Daniel Grisinger wrote:
> Jeff Bone wrote:
>>
> <snip>
>
> +1 overall.  But,
>
>> This has all sorts of bad consequences.  Such a venture capital  
>> concentration has occurred in Texas through various non-tax means,  
>> and the net result is that the VC / startup picture in this state  
>> is quite grim relative to what it was a decade ago.
>
> though I'm not qualified to comment on the state of Texas' VC  
> community, it seems clear that no reasonable comparison can be drawn  
> between the VC/startup experience circa 1998 and the VC/startup  
> experience in 2008.  I seem to recall the role of the startup in our  
> society may have grown somewhat exaggerated at around that time, or  
> that a lot of deals that transparently should not have been done,  
> were, or something along those lines.  :-)

I'm assuming that the 2000-2005 period is a reasonable facsimile of  
the present, moreso by far than e.g. 1998.  My startup experience from  
1992-1999 had very little to do w/ VCs per se, we had a flock-of- 
angels sort of investor base;  Deepfile (2001-2004) pursued and  
received VC backing in that timeframe, spanning the worst temporary  
dry-up of real VC in Texas' history (15 months w/ no early-stage  
enterprise software deals done.)  Got to see (and feel) first-hand the  
blow-up of the tier-3 and tier-2 VCs due to AV's concentration of  
wealth;  that played out through 2002 an 2003.

$0.02,

jb