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Why Governments Don’t Get Startups

Steve Blank

On the California coast where I live, we see lifestyle entrepreneurs like surfers and divers who own small surf or dive shop or teach surfing and diving lessons to pay the bills so they can surf and dive some more. Changes in customer tastes, new technologies, legislation, new competitors, etc. lesson of using SBIC funds.),

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The Secret History of Silicon Valley 12: The Rise of “Risk Capital.

Steve Blank

These IPOs meant that technology companies didn’t have to get acquired to raise money or get their founders and investors liquid. The Small Business Investment Company (SBIC) Act in 1958 guaranteed that for every dollar a bank or financial institution invested in a new company, the U.S. government would invest three (up to $300,000.)