Jeff Cornwall, director of Belmont’s entrepreneurship program, has been quoted in Card Hub’s recent article, “Ask the Experts: Should Small Business Owners Seek Venture Capital Financing?” The article asks a number of entrepreneurial experts two questions: why an entrepreneur should take venture capitalist money and why an entrepreneur shouldn’t take venture capitalist money. A number of CEOs opinions are also solicited for the article. Cornwall’s answers to the two questions are below.
Why an Entrepreneur Should Take VC Money: “Because the venture has a business model that takes a long time (at least a couple of years) to reach positive cash flow and that requires a large infusion of cash due to high capital and personnel budgets during early growth.”
Why an Entrepreneur Shouldn’t Take VC Money: “Entrepreneurs shouldn’t accept VC money just because they can! I have seen too many business models that are very promising that did not NEED VC money fail when they took the money even though they did not need it. They ended up flaming out while trying to grow too fast too quickly, while trying to satisfy the VC’s expectations.”
