Includes bibliographical references (pages 321-356) and index.

Introduction: The significance of history -- Whaling ventures -- The early development of risk capital -- The rise of private capital entities -- The market versus the government -- The limited partnership structure -- Silicon Valley and the emergence of investment styles -- High-tech, an evolving ecosystems and during the 1980s -- The big bubble -- Epilogue: From the past to the present and the future.

VC tells the riveting story of how the venture capital industry arose from the United States' long-running orientation toward entrepreneurship. From nineteenth-century whaling to the multitude of firms pursuing entrepreneurial finance today, venture capital has been driven by the pull of low-probability but substantial financial rewards. Appreciating the history of venture capital, Tom Nicholas shows, is essential to understanding the industry's future directions and possibilities, its challenges and prospects for surmounting them, and its place in America's exceptional style of capitalism.-- Provided by publisher