Venture Capital Initiative - Courses - Related Courses

Related Courses

ACQUISITION OF CLOSELY HELD ENTERPRISES

Faculty

Hunter Reichert, Adjunct Lecturer

Course Description

This course focuses on the process of acquisition of a business entity. Students will be shown the tools they need and the process to follow to successfully acquire a business of their own. Among the major topics covered will be the search process, assessing and valuing the business, financing consideration, negotiating, and closing the deal. The course may be of interest to MBA students who are interested in leveraged buyouts, investment banking, venture capital and other related careers.

Course Objectives

• Guide students through the process that leads to successful acquisition of a business
• Provide students with the skills and information they need to search, value, and acquire their own business

ENTREPRENEURSHIP THROUGH ACQUISITION

Faculty

Les Alexander, John Glynn Endowed Professor and Professor of Practice in Business Administration

Course Description

Entrepreneurship Through Acquisition (ETA) is a growing career path for EMBA graduates and experienced individuals looking to become CEO of their own company by purchasing an existing business using third-party capital. This course provides students with an introduction to the process of searching for a company, valuing a small business, structuring a deal, negotiating with a seller, completing due diligence, obtaining debt and equity financing, and closing the transaction to become the CEO of their own business. We will review the differences between a funded and a self-funded search, practice how to assess positive characteristics and risks of a company and learn how to utilize various forms of financing to purchase a small business. Through case and other readings, classroom discussions, and conversations with guest speakers who are current or former searchers, or are professionals engaged in the industry, students will explore the many aspects of searching for and acquiring a company. The assigned homework and final project will allow students to experience preparing many of the documents necessary to conduct a search and complete the purchase of a business.

Course Objectives

• Articulate what a search fund is and the entrepreneurship through acquisition model.
• Understand the differences between a funded search and a self-funded search.
• Explain the steps in the process for acquiring a small private business.
• Practice developing an investment thesis and search criteria used to evaluate target opportunities and communicate with investors and brokers.
• Appreciate what makes an attractive acquisition opportunity and what does not.
• Comprehend the importance of conducting due diligence and identifying risk.
• Gain insight into deal structuring including the differences between an asset and a stock purchase.
• Learn about valuing a small private business and how to develop an acquisition model.
• Explore how to structure the purchase of a small business using SBA debt, bank debt, seller debt, preferred equity, common equity, and rollover equity.
• Develop a presentation for potential equity investors to be used to raise capital for an acquisition.

FINTECH

Faculty

Ian Appel, Associate Professor of Business Administration

Course Description

Technology and finance have never been more fused together as they are today. FinTech is now the fastest growing area of VC investment. A plethora of innovations have mushroomed in this space, yet not all of them have achieved lasting success. How to tell truly disruptive innovations from fads? What are the promises and perils of "tech-ing" up finance? How do FinTech startups unbundle and rebundle value chains? What are the implications of financial disintermediation for businesses, consumers, and regulators? This course will catch you up with the latest trends in FinTech. More importantly, it will give you the toolset to cut through the fog and dissect the economics behind various FinTech innovations. The course is particularly valuable for those who are interested in careers in tech, finance, and entrepreneurship.

IMPACT & ESG INVESTING

Faculty

Matthew McBrady, Professor of Practice

Course Description

This course will cover the rapidly-expanding world of impact investing, focusing on the fundamentals underlying investment strategies for funds (and, to a lesser extent, companies) seeking to both create profit and generate social or environmental impact.  Through a combination of in-class and project learning, students will explore what qualifies as an “impact investment,” gain exposure to the fundamentals of the impact investment process, and evaluate various financial structures that unify rather than balance impact and investing.  The class will cover a wide set of investment vehicles: public equity, private debt, and private equity/venture capital, public-private partnerships, microfinance institutions.

Course Objectives: 

• Examine the growing spectrum of impact investing, across every investment and asset class, from venture capital to public equities to fixed income and REITs (below market to alpha generating).
• Examine the changes taking place as the field evolves from niche to mainstream.
• Evaluate if capital markets and investment instruments deliver both impact and generate market returns.
• Understand how institutional investors respond and/or catalyze these strategies.
• Create own impact investing instruments or financial structures in final projects.

MERGERS & ACQUISITIONS

Faculty

Michael Ho, Professor of Practice

Course Description

This course is designed to provide students with a practical understanding of the merger and acquisition marketplace, addressing such topics as why companies grow through acquisitions, how acquisition or merger candidates are analyzed strategically and valued financially, and ultimately, whether and how mergers and acquisitions create value for stakeholders. Takeovers and mergers are a daily fact of life, have evolved into a critical part of every CEO’s strategic toolbox, and will most likely affect every person who enters the corporate world at some point in their career. Whether a student chooses to be a senior corporate manager, an M&A practitioner, or merely an informed armchair observer, the course is intended to provide the analytical framework to evaluate an acquisition from a strategic, financial, structural, tactical, legal and ethical perspective. Students will apply learned content to real business situations, including the opportunity to develop, create and present an acquisition proposal to an actual corporate client during the class.

Course Objectives

• Examine the role that M&A plays in the contemporary corporate world, and its use as a strategic tool to provide revenue growth, enhance competitive position, transform a company or industry, and create economic value
• Use the language and processes of M&A to develop a framework for analyzing transactions including understanding strategic rationale, valuation methodologies, deal structures, bidding strategies, and the need for a value proposition
• Develop a concept, structure a deal, and present an actionable proposal for an M&A transaction to an actual corporation as part of a group project
• Show how M&A can be used successfully as well as its pitfalls, dangers, and risks

STARTING NEW VENTURES

Faculty

Saras Sarasvathy, Paul M. Hammaker Professor in Business Administration, Academic Director of the Batten Institute, and Jamuna Raghavan Chair Professor in Entrepreneurship at the Indian Institute of Management in Bangalore

Course Description

The primary objective of the course is to allow students to walk a few steps in the shoes of an entrepreneur while learning how expert entrepreneurs build new ventures that endure. Cases, guest lecturers, and students’ project work will allow them to explore financial, legal, interpersonal, and personal challenges likely to be encountered by the independent entrepreneur. This course draws from cognitive science-based research on how expert entrepreneurs think, decide, and act while starting new ventures. Key issues addressed will include risk perception and management, formulation of innovative stakeholder relationships, and the creation of new markets through new ventures. As part of the course, students will be required to come up with a venture idea and take the initial steps in actually starting it. The course is recommended for those interested in initiating a personal venture at some point in their lives working with or consulting for an early stage entrepreneurial team or seeking entry into Darden’s Progressive Incubator.

Course Objectives

• Contrast conventional wisdom with how expert entrepreneurs actually do it 
• Show how to build innovative and effective partnerships 
• Help students grasp the subtleties of ownership and control
• Increase the probability of success and reduce the costs of failure
• Comprehend the personal realities of becoming and being an entrepreneur
• Acquire basic tools for successful entrepreneurship that include incorporation, putting together a board, creating a new brand, and elements of business plans

TACTICAL TOPICS FOR ENTREPRENEURSHIP THROUGH ACQUISITION

Faculty

Randolph (Randy) Seibert, Adjunct Lecturer

Course Description

This course provides students with exposure to practical matters faced by operators of smaller enterprises. Whether starting or acquiring a small enterprise, entrepreneurs will be better prepared having been introduced to real-world topics such as relationships with key service vendors (banking, legal, accounting), commercial leasing terms, employee benefit programs, state and local public policy, government procurement, commercial insurance, commercial security interests, credit policies, and financial and operational control systems– from the vantage of the smaller enterprise where choices are often limited as compared to the options available to larger enterprises.

ENTREPRENEURIAL THINKING

Faculty

Sankaran Venkataraman, MasterCard Professor of Business Administration and Senior Associate Dean for Faculty and Research

Course Description

In this course, we will discuss and learn about the art and science of “creating something new from little.” The course’s orientation will challenge you to think about creating, financing, and building a productive business organization with commonly available resources (e.g., intelligence, insight, energy, initiative, and personal relationships). This orientation is useful wherever new business creation may occur, namely through the actions of an independent entrepreneur or in a large, established firm. Entrepreneurship is not about “small business” or starting a new business. Instead, it addresses the process of new value creation by exercising imagination, creativity, action, trial and error, learning, and execution.

Entrepreneurial thinking is also about developing a particular attitude and state of mind, an artful, insightful, and innovative mentality rather than just “business administration.” It is a way of perceiving and creating opportunity wherever it may be needed. In a world undergoing continuous change, the ability to think “like an entrepreneur” has become a core skill of the “managerial mind,” and entrepreneurial management is the quintessence of “good management practice.”