Innovation Casino book summary

In December 2020, I published Innovation Casino, a book about how medium-sized and large enterprises can use corporate venture capital (CVC) to grow their digital ecosystems. Here, you can read a chapter-by-chapter summary.

Innovation Casino, a book about innovation funding

What’s in it for me? Beat the odds with CVC for digital ecosystems.

The book, Innovation Casino, uses its self-titled metaphor to describe the odds of generating financial returns from innovation so you can beat them. For decades, vertically integrated firms have made high-stakes bets on innovation. However, in the innovation casino, it is the players who bet big. Players think they will beat the odds, but few do. By taking a fresh look at your odds, you can retool your approach to win more frequently just as the house does in a casino.

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What is an Ecosystem Innovation Fund (EIF)?

Ecosystem innovation funds replace non-core innovation to help internal teams focus.

An ecosystem innovation fund, or “EIF,” is a seed fund for startups. EIFs are a hybrid of corporate venture capital and the US government’s Small Business Innovation Research grant program, or “SBIR.” EIFs combine the best from both models to create a new vehicle for large companies to invest in innovation in their digital ecosystems.

Ecosystem innovation funds replace non-core innovation to help internal teams focus.
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Grays Sports Almanac for Venture Capital

Grays Sports Almanac for Venture Capital - A new standard for optionality to beat the odds

A new standard for optionality to beat the odds

Grays Sports Almanac for Venture Capital proposes a new risk management strategy for venture capital. In this book, I outline why a venture fund might beat the odds by purchasing 2,208 to 4,416 warrants on startups. Startups would operate under a governance framework called the Founder Friendly Standard, which gives entrepreneurs control of their companies. In exchange, the venture fund would have the option to exercise warrants for 15 years—purchasing discounted equity only in the startups that become successful.

Book cover: Grays Sports Almanac for Venture Capital - A new standard for optionality to beat the odds

Introduction

In 2017, Forbes published an article called, “Group of White Men in Patagonia Vests Confused for VC Fund, Raise $500 Million.” It took a while for me to realize the article was satire. A year later, researchers from Harvard, IESE, and Yale unintentionally corroborated the Forbes story with the finding that luck and past success are the winning factors for startup investors—not skill (Nanda et al., 2018). Luck and past success can cause venture capitalists to become overconfident and tinker with their portfolio companies. This can be a problem for entrepreneurs and for limited partners (often pension funds and family offices) who trust venture capitalists to invest wisely.

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Fishing for “A” Candidates in a Digital Pond

Fishing for “A” Candidates in a Digital Pond was a small publication I wrote in November of 2008. It was supposed to be “a guide to recruiting top talent to your firm by having intriguing conversations over social networks and RSS.”

While some of the ideas are obsolete now, here are some interesting concepts that could tweaked to fit today’s digital landscape. Especially page 12.

Click here to read Fishing for “A” Candidates in a Digital Pond

RSS advertising feeds can be distributed through employees's facebook profiles