If somebody says that the contents of this course mirror the things taught in MBA, I would heartily disagree. It would be preposterous and erroneous. Some may turn a few somersaults in their grave.
This course does not teach or preach but ambles effortlessly in a humorous, effective way full of real-life example., visuals and delightful videos to reinforce the points. Along with adequate examples, practical advice is aplenty because the lecturer is very much part of the startup and venture capital ecosystem.
This course is literally is from the horse's mouth. The author behind this tutorial from Udemy has himself worked at famous Goldman Sachs and in different VC firms. He has aided many start-ups and sits on many of their boards. This course is created and designed by Chris Haraun, who with his years of practical expertise, is the perfect guide to hold your hands in nurturing your start-up.
The free E-book version (downloadable for the whole course) is a unique bonus along with this online tutorial and lets you study the points even when you are offline or do not want to tug your bigger laptops.
The lecture starts with the concept of creating a small capital, privately owned startup. Obviously, to grow, you will need a capital infusion. The pitch of the lecture gets stronger at this point. It discusses in detail how to obtain the capital. It discusses the different rounds of capital infusion. These rounds are called Round a, Round b etc.
It tells us how the venture capitalists fund one venture and keep the rest money for future need by that entity or how it distributes its allocation between different start-ups.
It's fascinating to view/read the contents as the lecture proceeds .A world of seed investor, then angel investors and ultimately the venture capitalists open up. View the course to get answers to your queries as to and why and when does the VCs fund your dream.
When you know the reasons of a venture capitalist to fund a start-up, you are better prepared with the figures and statements for presentation before the firm. Imagine your advantage when you are prepared with slides, figures, illustrations because this tutorial has already prepared you about what the VCs expect from you. There is a section on why the VCs would put money in your venture and what they expect in return. Compare it with a geek who also needs funding but hasn’t gone through this tutorial. He will come with only his ideas, while you will be prepared for all the queries that the investors may have.
Accompanying are countless videos. One video that I have particularly appreciated is on what not to do when asking for fresh funds from an investor.
The tutorial covers practically everything in the field of start-up capital infusion.
It advises you on the tax matters and how not to put your personal assets on the block. The lecturer is an experienced hand in funding and he knows that in case of the firm going belly up, mortgaged personal assets will be auctioned. Therefore, this gem of a guy guides you on how to raise capital without putting your personal assets on the block.
Once your company grows big and A, B, C i.e. all rounds of funding have exhausted, you will go public. Then you will have to deal with the world of NCDs, CDs etc. A chapter has been thoughtfully, thoroughly dedicated to Convertible Debt, Warrants and Options for this purpose.
You will need debt, actually, a lot of it to run your increasingly big venture. For this, a section of lecture deals with Interest rates and Yield curves.This section will also help you to add debt when the interest rates are low.
Next comes the financial analysis part. You may tend to ask that why should a startup founder need to know financial analysis? Well, as the founder of the start-up, its for your own good. Performance of your company will vary over time. Financial analysis will help you to understand and pinpoint the cash burning black holes in your operation. This course will tutor you on some basic ratios and terms like DCF, valuation of a company, SWOT analysis. It,s not that you are mired in these ratios. Rather the lecturer touches these ratios so that you get the idea and can calculate it on your own, but does not go so deep enough to drown you in theories.
In case you want to tap the IPO market, you need to know the basics of IPO . Along with the merchant bankers who would run your IPO show, you have to know the calculation behind the issue and the public issue price. If you do not have a clear idea on IPO, the merchant banker may fleece you. The IPO section is hence immensely important, should you want to publicly issue the shares.
Many times you read about the BS, IS and CF on a standalone basis on tutorials on financial accounting. While going through the material here, I was pleasantly surprised the way these guy has interlinked the three entities of annual reports. You will get beautiful illustrations making it clear how the different entities of cash flow, balance sheet and income statement relate internally to each other.
As you go to the chapter where the build-up of financial reports of a company is described stepwise, you will emerge much stronger and knowledgeable in the field of investing and certainly fitter than ever before to jump into the world of Venture Capital.
Even if you are a regular MBA student, take this course, this will clear your niggling doubts that a regular course may not answer to, and make your MBA knowledge base stronger than before. To find more information about this course see here An entire MBA in 1 course award winning author From Udemy.
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