The American venture capital model is rooted in this country’s early business climate, and has been exported around the world.
For example, New England whalers came to dominate their 19th-century industry through their innovation of pooling capital and syndicating their risk across many expeditions. This established the concept of long-tail, led to the basic funding model that later developed in modern venture capital and other small innovations.
That’s a central theme of the 2019 book by Tom Nicholas called VC: An American History. The book is a thorough review of the journey that led to the venture capital and private equity of today. I enjoyed it enough to recommend it to anyone interested in business, economics and the history of financial systems.
Below I share my notes from the book for future review.
Continue reading VC: An American History