Venture Deals: Be Smarter Than Your Lawyer and Venture Capitalist

by Brad Feld and Jason Mendelson

star4.7

Feld and Mendelson demystify the VC fundraising process by walking founders clause-by-clause through term sheets, covering economics (valuation, option pools, liquidation preferences) and control (board seats, protective provisions, drag-along rights). The fourth edition adds chapters on bank debt, crowdfunding, ICOs, and hiring investment bankers, arguing that informed founders negotiate better deals and build healthier investor relationships.

Published:: 2019
Pages:: 304

Buy on Amazon

In the Conversation

In this collection, Venture Deals: Be Smarter Than Your Lawyer and Venture Capitalist references 4 other books.

It draws on The Lean Startup, The Hard Thing About Hard Things and Zero to One.

Scroll down to read the exact passages where other authors reference this book and what they say about it.

What This Book Draws On

The books Mendelson references and why each one mattered to the argument.

Recommends Ries's The Lean Startup as the companion methodology for de-risking the business before seeking venture capital, since term-sheet leverage depends on traction built via validated learning

References

The Lean Startup

by Eric Ries

Buy

Points founders to Horowitz's The Hard Thing About Hard Things for the operating-CEO perspective on living with the governance structures that Venture Deals teaches you to negotiate

References

The Hard Thing About Hard Things

by Ben Horowitz

Buy

Engages Thiel's Zero to One on why VCs chase power-law outliers, using that framing to explain why liquidation preferences and anti-dilution clauses are structured the way they are

References

Zero to One

by Peter Thiel

Buy

Parallels Wickman's Traction on operating cadence, arguing that the governance rhythms VCs impose (board meetings, reporting) are compatible with EOS-style execution frameworks

References

Traction

by Gino Wickman

Buy

What Other Authors Say About It

No books citing this title yet.

Intellectual Lineage

How ideas flow through the citation network. Ancestors are books this title builds on; descendants are books that build on it.

Builds on (2 layers deep)

Directly cites

The Lean Startup

The Hard Thing About Hard Th...

Zero to One

Traction

2 steps back

The Innovator's Dilemma

The Innovator's Solution

The Four Steps to the Epiphany

Crossing the Chasm

High Output Management

Good to Great

Unexpected Connections

Books from completely different categories that share citation overlap with this one. These are the reads you would not find by browsing a single shelf.