中文摘要
风险投资专门从事客户资本密集型企业的融资——这类企业的销售与营销费用对收入之比更高、销售与营销员工的工资支出更高,且更倾向于申请商标——而且风险投资在此方面的专业化程度高于其他金融中介。风险投资家瞄准客户资本高而知识资本低的行业,但回避知识资本高而缺乏客户资本的行业。在首轮风险投资之前,企业会将投资向客户资本倾斜;此后,其规模便加速扩张。风险投资家专注于客户资本融资,是因为这类投资要求容忍巨大的失败风险,以追求极端的上行潜力,其特征体现为幂律回报。这种回报特征更契合客户资本投资,而非知识资本投资。将小额投资撒向大量企业的风险投资家——俗称"广撒网"(spray and pray)策略——瞄准客户资本行业进行投资;而将较大金额投向少数企业的风险投资家则瞄准知识资本行业。风险投资对客户资本的关注,反映出在过去30年间,其重心已从传统上关注的知识资本密集型企业发生转移。
Abstract
Venture capital specializes in the financing of customer capital intensive firms—firms with higher sales and marketing expense to revenue ratios, a higher wage bill for sales and marketing employees, and a higher tendency to apply for trademarks—and they do so more than other financial intermediaries. Venture capitalists target high customer capital industries with low knowledge capital but avoid high knowledge capital industries that lack customer capital. Firms tilt investment toward customer capital leading up to the initial venture capital investment, after which their scale accelerates rapidly. Venture capitalists focus on financing customer capital because such investments require tolerance for substantial risks of failure in pursuit of extreme upside potential, as characterized by power law returns. This return profile fits customer capital investments more closely than investments in knowledge capital. Venture capitalists that sprinkle small investments across a large number of firms, colloquially referred to as the “spray and pray” strategy, target customer capital industries for investment, whereas venture capitalists that commit larger amounts to a small number of firms target knowledge capital industries. The venture capital focus on customer capital reflects a shift away from its traditional focus on knowledge capital intensive firms over the past 30 years.