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Rating: 
Summary: Good Overview of Angel Investing
Review: "Angel Investing" by Mark Van Osnabrugge and Robert J. Robinson gives useful information about angel investors and venture capitalists.Van Osnabrugge and Robinson estimate that angel investors--wealthy individuals who invest their own money into start-up companies--invest three to five times more money than venture capitalists and back thirty to forty times more ventures, making angel investors the primary source of external capital for entrepreneurs. But, how do you meet and present your business idea to an angel investor? What factors do angel investors give the most weight to when debating whether or not to fund a venture? How do angel investors differ from venture capitalists when valuing a start-up company? "Angel Investing" answers these questions and many more. It is stuffed with studies, interviews, and solid advice. "Angel Investing" can be divided into three main categories: * General background about angel investors and venture capitalists and their relationship and importance to business and the economy. * Practical advice for entrepreneurs seeking start-up funds from angel investors or venture capitalists. * Practical advice for individuals considering becoming angel investors and making investments in small companies. Each topic in "Angel Investing" is well documented. It's a rather formal book, actually. Robinson is a professor at the Harvard Business School and Van Osnabrugge is a former fellow of the Harvard Business School. I found the section about successful angel investment deals a bit too rich for my taste. For example, we learn that one angel investor who backed amazon.com got a 260 times return on his initial investment of $100,000 making him $26 million. Another angel who invested in the Body Shop received 10,500 times his initial investment. As a new angel investor, don't get overly excited about the prospects! Remember, many angel investments fail dismally. As the authors point out, you must only invest money you can afford to lose! If you are already a financially successful entrepreneur who considers becoming an angel investor, you might want to read "Angel Investing" to help improve the chances of making successful angel investments. However, the book is not a complete analysis of the due diligence process. And, of course, from an entrepreneur's standpoint, reading a book won't automatically put you in contact with serious angel investors, and much of the real work in financing a new venture involves finding personal contacts to introduce you to appropriate angel investors. Van Osnabrugge and Robinson note that most funded ventures involve personal introductions. Maybe, if you're ready to invest $50,000 per company or more (and ready to lose $50,000 or more per investment!), you're tired of investing in public companies (with mystic accounting and lack of reportability to the investor), and you want to add value to your investment by contributing information and contacts to your investment, this might be a good book to help get you started. On the downside, you'll probably have no diversification and poor liquidity with angel investments. The most important tip from "Angel Investing": Do adequate research before investing in a company. And, it's best if you know the industry and know business. Peter Hupalo, Author of "Thinking Like An Entrepreneur."
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Summary: This book is priceless!
Review: As an entrepreneur searching for funding, I found a lot of gems and solid advice reading this book from cover to cover. The in-depth analysis on everything you need to know on how to get funding is priceless. As far as I'm concerned, the authors have put together the ultimate fundraising handbook. No entrepreneur can afford to bypass this book since this is the best on capturing the essence of raising money the fastest, easiest and cheapest. With a strong dose of common sense and facts, this is an essential guide for start-ups. In fact, maybe the title should be changed to "Raising Money the Easiest, Fastest and Cheapest."
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Summary: more than a Guide
Review: I am the Founder & CEO of a business that within the next 8 to 12 months was seeking to raise between $2M and $5M to fund our expansion. I always thought of going straight to Venture Capital firms or Private Equity divisons of Invmt Banks that I have already been in touch with. This book, Angel Investing, was a truly priceless read to me. The education delivered by authors has helped me re-strategize my approach to inviting external investors and also the amount that I should try to raise and the schedule of funds. What I thought was most helpful was the detailed comparisons between Angel Investors and Venture Capitalist, as well as understanding the psychology behind their thinking and how an entrepreneur seeking outside funds should try to prepare every aspect of their presentation (themselves, their product and overall business plan). The book has given me tools to have most questions covered and more importantly has prepared me to become an angel myself in the years ahead.
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Summary: more than a Guide
Review: I am the Founder & CEO of a business that within the next 8 to 12 months was seeking to raise between $2M and $5M to fund our expansion. I always thought of going straight to Venture Capital firms or Private Equity divisons of Invmt Banks that I have already been in touch with. This book, Angel Investing, was a truly priceless read to me. The education delivered by authors has helped me re-strategize my approach to inviting external investors and also the amount that I should try to raise and the schedule of funds. What I thought was most helpful was the detailed comparisons between Angel Investors and Venture Capitalist, as well as understanding the psychology behind their thinking and how an entrepreneur seeking outside funds should try to prepare every aspect of their presentation (themselves, their product and overall business plan). The book has given me tools to have most questions covered and more importantly has prepared me to become an angel myself in the years ahead.
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Summary: Good guide for entrepreneurs who need funding
Review: If you are planning to go after Angel funding, this book is a must-read. The book contains interviews with a broad spectrum of Angels, who discuss their investment experience, the thinking they go through, and key things they look for, when evaluating an opportunity. This book would serve as an excellent reference for anyone preparing to be in front of Angels.
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Summary: Terrific guide for the wary entrepreneur - don't be fleeced
Review: There is a difference between VCs and Angels. And there are several different types of angels with various strengths and challenges. This book helps the reader understand the various types of angel investors and what they expect. It also is very clear about the realities of what happens to your business once the vc or angel investor comes aboard. With the information provided in this valuable resource, the wary entrepreneur can better go after the most approriate resources for the right kind of funding rather than pursuing investors in a random and hapless manner. There is also a section on the flip side - how to BECOME a successful angel investor. This is really good stuff.
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Summary: A Must Have!
Review: This book is absolutely brilliant. I have read it in its entirty once and then skimmed it a second time. The personal annecdotes are very insightful, interesting and helpful while the authors' writing style is smooth and intelligent. This is a great practical guide for anyone who would like to learn about investing in this manner or anyone seeking funding for their own firm. As an experienced entrepreneur and investor, I have highly recommended this indispensible book to my colleagues. I would only expect them to do the same. This is undoubtedly one of the best collections of information on angel investing and venture capitalism that I have ever seen.
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Summary: Place this in your shopping cart now!
Review: This book seems good when you read the 50 first pages but then...the same ideas...again and again. I started to writte on a piece of paper some of the ideas cause I was making a study of the venture capital industry for my MBA. But there were so many repetitions in this book...really annoying sometimes!
In addition, the book is a little bite disorganized sometimes. It starts from A, jumps to J, comes back to D, go to W, .... hard to follow sometimes.
The content is not strong! Contrary to what you could believe about the presentation of this books (the two authors make a lot of references to [previous researchers in that field, which is however useful if you want to go back to their main publications), this book has been made for a large public...a very large one. I believe this book has been made very quickly during the boom of the so-called new economy when business angels and venture caqpital companies were at the apogee. This book is a little far behind the new trend. It even misses some strend that were occuring when this book was written...so, very disappointing. However, the book is still affordable and I think that people who are still impressed by the words Business Angels and that still don't know what it is about should buy this book. It gives a simple but still interesting pictures of the Mysterious investors. If you want a comparison about Business Angeles and Venture Capitalists, that is also a good book. Conclusion: Good for the large public.
Jusr OK for those that have some insight about the VCs and other Business Angels
Avoid it for all the other ones...it's ot worth the price.
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Summary: Great book
Review: This book starts off slowly but when it gets rolling it is very helpful ,giving good infromation where and when you need it.
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Summary: somewhat disappointing
Review: this is a comprehensive but very basic description of start up investing. if you don't know what VC stands for, this is an excellent book. however, if you have some understanding of new ventures and their finance than you won't find much of value. the authors fills 400 hundred pages with such gems as "the tough part about negotiating equity is that at the end of the day, there's only 100%". the prevalence of referenced quotes is also annoying. "whenever possible, try not to back an inflexible, one product firm" is referenced to "Gordon, 1999". is the reference, or even the thought itself, really necessary to include? any angel that needs this sort of advice should just put his money in the stock market. and why bother with the "whenever possible?" last time i chceked investing was at the discretion of the investor. this book is comprehensive, but most sections are overly simple and ignore important subtleties. if you want a much more useful, insightful and informative book, and particularly if the space you're looking at is >$10M, try "high stakes, no prisoners" by charles ferguson
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