Unit 30 Entrepreneurs and Venture Capital listening 1e
Ed Coombes First of all investors are obsessed with two key things: competition and the revenues. With the competition, they want to know who is there at the moment? How are they going to react when this company comes into the market? Or if there is no one there, who is going to come there as well? Now this sends a signal out to the investor about whether the management really understand the market they're in, and how they're going to react in the future and the fact that they are a little bit focused on the future as well. So they can put in barriers to entry or what we call defend themselves. The other thing is, with revenues investors don't mind if a company, if it's a start-up, in the first two or three years is making a loss, because they are using the capital invested in them to achieve as great a market penetration as possible ... So the investor in that business plan when they are reading it is wanting to see when is the first revenue going to come in. How big is it going to be? Apart from those two chapters, there are chap, management are key. You tend to want to find people with past experience of their sector, you want to find out if there's any nonexecutive directors on board. They are very, very critical to young growth companies, but also to mature companies, because the world changes and everybody suffers from myopia, i.e. they can just see their own little spot. They need to be challenged because markets change, customers change, the company needs to change to address its market. Entrepreneurs tend to be very emotional, very focused, a lot of qualities which are paramount for starting a company, drive, etc., but they can get in the way of investors at a later stage in terms of the style of running the company, the attitude, the relationships between the new shareholder or potential investor/shareholder and the existing management.
…………… unable to stop thinking about something; too interested in or worried about something
…………… the main or central point of something, especially of attention or interest
…………… a problem, rule or situation that prevents sb from doing sth, or that makes sth impossible
…………… a movement into or through something or someone
…………… inability to see distant things clearly
……………… a person who makes money by starting or running businesses, especially when this involves taking financial risks
…………… more important than anything else
Sunday, November 25, 2007
Unit 30 Entrepreneurs and Venture Capital listening 1d
market revenue write plan deploy prior overview seize
Ed Coombes Business plans tend to be between 30 and 60 pages long, and so 1_______to any meeting with the company I like to see what they've 2________ down on paper about themselves. You first of all find a two-page, what we call executive summary, and that is basically an 3_______ of the next 50 pages or what this business 4_______ is roughly about and what you are going to expect to read. The next, the first chapter tends to be what the company is going to do. The second chapter tends to be the 5________ opportunity. The third chapter tends to be the strategy of how they're going to 6________ the investment and 7________ this market opportunity. Fourth chap, fourth chapter tends to be the 8________. Fifth chapter is the competition. Sixth chapter is the management. Seventh chapter is marketing, advertising and normally at the, at the end is the finance needed. There you are, there's a quick business plan for you.
market revenue write plan deploy prior overview seize
Ed Coombes Business plans tend to be between 30 and 60 pages long, and so 1_______to any meeting with the company I like to see what they've 2________ down on paper about themselves. You first of all find a two-page, what we call executive summary, and that is basically an 3_______ of the next 50 pages or what this business 4_______ is roughly about and what you are going to expect to read. The next, the first chapter tends to be what the company is going to do. The second chapter tends to be the 5________ opportunity. The third chapter tends to be the strategy of how they're going to 6________ the investment and 7________ this market opportunity. Fourth chap, fourth chapter tends to be the 8________. Fifth chapter is the competition. Sixth chapter is the management. Seventh chapter is marketing, advertising and normally at the, at the end is the finance needed. There you are, there's a quick business plan for you.
Unit 30 Entrepreneurs and Venture Capital listening 1c
Ed Coombes My name is Ed Coombes and I am a corporate finance executive 1________, a small corporate finance team that is regulated by the SFA, and we focus on rais ing funds for private companies. We specialize in the technology, media and telecoms companies. Primarily because ten years ago if you wanted to start one of those companies you needed a lot of money and it took a long time to grow it, then gradually society is demanding products, and so is industry, which are faster to develop and the money necessary to develop them is less, and so, and also the speed to market is less. A market opportunity has opened up in the technology, media and telecom sector, compared to ten, fifteen years ago. It's speed of getting a company up and running, 2________, and pension funds who traditionally in the past were risk averse and also like to just invest in the large companies. They are not getting the return on their investment so they recognize they need to take a higher risk, so a smaller potential high growth company, and they get a higher return. That's effectively the market opportunity that has opened up which wasn't around so much ten years ago and in the financial sector, the banking sector, 3_________they have recognized this, whereas ten years ago they would only service clients that were listed on exchanges, gradually the corporate finance teams have seen, ah, we need to go and find those companies that are going to list and the next stage was, ah, well before they list they're private companies, and we need to go and help them before they even get to that stage for listing, and so bankers like myself have left the City and are now, we're increasing in number and are seeing there is 4_________. Now for us it's cost effective because when we raise some money, if you're a large bank or a small bank you take your fee in cash. What we do is,we, if we raise, if we're dealing with a small company we can't always take it in cash but we'll take it in equity, which is shares in the company, 5_________and if we take the rest of the fee in equity, shares in the company, then we hope that in two or three years' time this will be a high growth company and ideally it lists on the markets and we can sell our shares then.
A a market need for corporate finance at the smaller end of the scale
B and the hope is that we take enough cash to cover our running costs
C and I work for Cambridge Capital Partners
D if we take corporate finance services
E money available for it from high net worth individuals
Ed Coombes My name is Ed Coombes and I am a corporate finance executive 1________, a small corporate finance team that is regulated by the SFA, and we focus on rais ing funds for private companies. We specialize in the technology, media and telecoms companies. Primarily because ten years ago if you wanted to start one of those companies you needed a lot of money and it took a long time to grow it, then gradually society is demanding products, and so is industry, which are faster to develop and the money necessary to develop them is less, and so, and also the speed to market is less. A market opportunity has opened up in the technology, media and telecom sector, compared to ten, fifteen years ago. It's speed of getting a company up and running, 2________, and pension funds who traditionally in the past were risk averse and also like to just invest in the large companies. They are not getting the return on their investment so they recognize they need to take a higher risk, so a smaller potential high growth company, and they get a higher return. That's effectively the market opportunity that has opened up which wasn't around so much ten years ago and in the financial sector, the banking sector, 3_________they have recognized this, whereas ten years ago they would only service clients that were listed on exchanges, gradually the corporate finance teams have seen, ah, we need to go and find those companies that are going to list and the next stage was, ah, well before they list they're private companies, and we need to go and help them before they even get to that stage for listing, and so bankers like myself have left the City and are now, we're increasing in number and are seeing there is 4_________. Now for us it's cost effective because when we raise some money, if you're a large bank or a small bank you take your fee in cash. What we do is,we, if we raise, if we're dealing with a small company we can't always take it in cash but we'll take it in equity, which is shares in the company, 5_________and if we take the rest of the fee in equity, shares in the company, then we hope that in two or three years' time this will be a high growth company and ideally it lists on the markets and we can sell our shares then.
A a market need for corporate finance at the smaller end of the scale
B and the hope is that we take enough cash to cover our running costs
C and I work for Cambridge Capital Partners
D if we take corporate finance services
E money available for it from high net worth individuals
Businesspeople and entrepreneurs
A businessman, businesswoman or businessperson is someone who works in their own business or as a manager in an organization.
Note: The plural of businessperson is businesspeople. Businessperson and businesspeople can also be spelled as two words: business person, business people.
An entrepreneur is someone who starts or founds or establishes their own company. Someone who starts a company is its founder. An entrepreneur may found a serie s of companies or start-ups. Entrepreneurial is used in a positive way to describe the risk-taking people who do this, and their activities. Some entrepreneurs leave the companies they found, perhaps going on to found more companies. Others may stay to develop and grow their businesses.
A large company mainly owned by one person or family is a business empire. Successful businesspeople, especially heads of large organizations, are business leaders or, in journalistic terms, captains of industry.
There is a lot of discussion about whether people like this are born property with leadership skills, or whether such skills can be learned.
Use words from exercise above to complete this text.
The big place at the moment for (1) ________________ is, of course, the Internet. Take
John Pace. 'After an engineering degree at Stanford and an MBA at Harvard, I worked for a
while in a computer games company. But I always felt I was an (2) _____________ _
kind of guy. In 1997, 1 (3) ________ an Internet site for cheap travel: fIights, hotels, renting
cars and so on. I obtained money for investment in the (4) ____ - __ from friends.'
Now the site has 300,000 customers, and Pace is very rich, with a big apartment in Manhattan and a house in the Bahamas. 'I don't want to sell the company,' he says. 'I've had offers from
some big companies, but I want to stay independent. I want to (5) _ the business and do
things my way. Unlike many entrepreneurs, I think I have the (6) skills to lead and inspire a
large organization. I can see the day when I'm in charge of a large business (7) __ .'
Magnates, moguls and tycoons
People in charge of big business empires may be referred to, especially by journalists, as magnates, moguls or tycoons. These words often occur in combinations such as these:
Media, press, shipping, oil ………………….
Movie, media, shipping ……………………..
Property, software …………………………..
(Mascull, Bill: Business Vocabulary in Use, CUP 2002)
A businessman, businesswoman or businessperson is someone who works in their own business or as a manager in an organization.
Note: The plural of businessperson is businesspeople. Businessperson and businesspeople can also be spelled as two words: business person, business people.
An entrepreneur is someone who starts or founds or establishes their own company. Someone who starts a company is its founder. An entrepreneur may found a serie s of companies or start-ups. Entrepreneurial is used in a positive way to describe the risk-taking people who do this, and their activities. Some entrepreneurs leave the companies they found, perhaps going on to found more companies. Others may stay to develop and grow their businesses.
A large company mainly owned by one person or family is a business empire. Successful businesspeople, especially heads of large organizations, are business leaders or, in journalistic terms, captains of industry.
There is a lot of discussion about whether people like this are born property with leadership skills, or whether such skills can be learned.
Use words from exercise above to complete this text.
The big place at the moment for (1) ________________ is, of course, the Internet. Take
John Pace. 'After an engineering degree at Stanford and an MBA at Harvard, I worked for a
while in a computer games company. But I always felt I was an (2) _____________ _
kind of guy. In 1997, 1 (3) ________ an Internet site for cheap travel: fIights, hotels, renting
cars and so on. I obtained money for investment in the (4) ____ - __ from friends.'
Now the site has 300,000 customers, and Pace is very rich, with a big apartment in Manhattan and a house in the Bahamas. 'I don't want to sell the company,' he says. 'I've had offers from
some big companies, but I want to stay independent. I want to (5) _ the business and do
things my way. Unlike many entrepreneurs, I think I have the (6) skills to lead and inspire a
large organization. I can see the day when I'm in charge of a large business (7) __ .'
Magnates, moguls and tycoons
People in charge of big business empires may be referred to, especially by journalists, as magnates, moguls or tycoons. These words often occur in combinations such as these:
Media, press, shipping, oil ………………….
Movie, media, shipping ……………………..
Property, software …………………………..
(Mascull, Bill: Business Vocabulary in Use, CUP 2002)
EfBS unit 13 Finance and accounting
bankruptcy; invoice; revenue; ledgers; equities; assets; overheads; debtors; liabilities; budget; investor; returns; balance; fixtures; depreciation; creditor; capital; drawings; goodwill; expenditure; dividend; bankrupt; auditor; discount; security;
Match the words above with the dictionary definitions which follow
1. The spending of money, on advertising for example.
2. Articles such as display cabinets which would be difficult to remove.
3. A payment to shareholders when a company has made a profit.
4. A person whose affairs are in the hands of an Official Receiver.
5. Another name for ordinary shares.
6. The person who takes on the responsibility for checking a company's accounts.
7. Possessions which can be converted into cash.
8. A deduction made from the price of goods when payment is made promptly.
9. Debts which will have to be paid either now or in the future.
10. A list of goods which have been sent to a customer indicating the amount charged to their account.
11. The situation when the two sides of the accounts are equal.
12. The books of account showing how much we owe and are owed.
13. Goods which are not wanted after all, usually because they are faulty.
14. The proprietor's withdrawal of funds from the business.
15. The proprietor's stake in the business.
16.:.. People who owe us money.
17. The fall in the value of an asset as a result of waste or usage.
18. A person to whom we owe money.
19. Something which is valuable yet intangible.
20. The situation facing persons who cannot pay their creditors.
21. Money received from sales.
22. The device which aims to control expenditure.
23. The costs attached to maintaining fixed assets such as plant and machinery.
24. An asset such as a share certificate which can be offered as a safeguard when a loan
is received from a bank.
25. Someone who buys something in the expectation that it will rise in value.
bankruptcy; invoice; revenue; ledgers; equities; assets; overheads; debtors; liabilities; budget; investor; returns; balance; fixtures; depreciation; creditor; capital; drawings; goodwill; expenditure; dividend; bankrupt; auditor; discount; security;
Match the words above with the dictionary definitions which follow
1. The spending of money, on advertising for example.
2. Articles such as display cabinets which would be difficult to remove.
3. A payment to shareholders when a company has made a profit.
4. A person whose affairs are in the hands of an Official Receiver.
5. Another name for ordinary shares.
6. The person who takes on the responsibility for checking a company's accounts.
7. Possessions which can be converted into cash.
8. A deduction made from the price of goods when payment is made promptly.
9. Debts which will have to be paid either now or in the future.
10. A list of goods which have been sent to a customer indicating the amount charged to their account.
11. The situation when the two sides of the accounts are equal.
12. The books of account showing how much we owe and are owed.
13. Goods which are not wanted after all, usually because they are faulty.
14. The proprietor's withdrawal of funds from the business.
15. The proprietor's stake in the business.
16.:.. People who owe us money.
17. The fall in the value of an asset as a result of waste or usage.
18. A person to whom we owe money.
19. Something which is valuable yet intangible.
20. The situation facing persons who cannot pay their creditors.
21. Money received from sales.
22. The device which aims to control expenditure.
23. The costs attached to maintaining fixed assets such as plant and machinery.
24. An asset such as a share certificate which can be offered as a safeguard when a loan
is received from a bank.
25. Someone who buys something in the expectation that it will rise in value.
Complete the text. Use these words :
record; various; purpose; involve; revenue; generally; file; assume; rule; designer
Sarah Brandston I'm Sarah Brandston. I am an Enrolled Agent, which in America is a person who has been Certified by the IRS as an expert in all areas of taxation. I operate a business that employs two or more people in addition to myself, that concentrates on filing income tax returns and other forms ' required by the federal and local governments related to income taxes and sales taxes, for my clients.
I tell people, on the most basic level, a lot of my clients are young people who are just starting out, and often they have no idea at all what's 1_________, they might be talented in a certain field, they might be a good graphic 2_________, or might be a media person, or a writer, but that doesn't mean they know how to run a business. The first thing I try and do is ease them on and tell them that the basic rule for accounting, in terms of their business, is that they have to keep 3_________ that accurately reflect their financial life, the life, the financial life in the business, and the records have to be accurate enough so that we together can 4_________ a tax return from them. That's the bottom line, that's really all it's about. Then you go and you get into more complex forms of bookkeeping for corporations or partnerships, which have to follow both the generally accepted 5_________ that are put out by the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants, and the rules that change on a daily basis that we get from the IRS.
Bookkeeping is keeping good accounts, period, it's just taking what comes in, it's looking at how much income comes in, and it's looking at what's going out, and then further breaking down what goes out into the 6_________ categories that I’ve told them are important for tax 7_________. So I usually say, in terms of their bookkeeping that they should set up categories that make sense to them in their business. They wouldn’t want entertainment with office supplies, they wouldn't want books and periodicals with car expenses, it's just what I think are those common sense. ..bookkeeping is really a common sense way of keeping track of the income and expenses.
Interviewer The kind of companies you work with. can you just describe the sort of range of companies that you work with. and the kind of input you give them. I 8_________ you see them sort of more than once a year?
Sarah Brandston Right. In terms of the people that I do, my clients who have their own businesses, be they self-proprietorships or small corporations or partnerships, most of the people I deal with are in creative fields. I have several film makers, I have architects and people who consult in the computer field, what I think of as my corporations, and music, those are the kind of people I think of. They're 9_________ people that are
not comfortable with doing bookkeeping. or accounting. nor do they have enough 10_________ in their companies that they want to. or that they're able to pay the type of accountant that needs to see them on a monthly basis, and charge them a minimum of twenty four hundred dollars a year, let's say, to do all the accounting, the bookkeeping, and the tax preparation for them, so I try and keep my costs low so people can function. continue to function as a business...
record; various; purpose; involve; revenue; generally; file; assume; rule; designer
Sarah Brandston I'm Sarah Brandston. I am an Enrolled Agent, which in America is a person who has been Certified by the IRS as an expert in all areas of taxation. I operate a business that employs two or more people in addition to myself, that concentrates on filing income tax returns and other forms ' required by the federal and local governments related to income taxes and sales taxes, for my clients.
I tell people, on the most basic level, a lot of my clients are young people who are just starting out, and often they have no idea at all what's 1_________, they might be talented in a certain field, they might be a good graphic 2_________, or might be a media person, or a writer, but that doesn't mean they know how to run a business. The first thing I try and do is ease them on and tell them that the basic rule for accounting, in terms of their business, is that they have to keep 3_________ that accurately reflect their financial life, the life, the financial life in the business, and the records have to be accurate enough so that we together can 4_________ a tax return from them. That's the bottom line, that's really all it's about. Then you go and you get into more complex forms of bookkeeping for corporations or partnerships, which have to follow both the generally accepted 5_________ that are put out by the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants, and the rules that change on a daily basis that we get from the IRS.
Bookkeeping is keeping good accounts, period, it's just taking what comes in, it's looking at how much income comes in, and it's looking at what's going out, and then further breaking down what goes out into the 6_________ categories that I’ve told them are important for tax 7_________. So I usually say, in terms of their bookkeeping that they should set up categories that make sense to them in their business. They wouldn’t want entertainment with office supplies, they wouldn't want books and periodicals with car expenses, it's just what I think are those common sense. ..bookkeeping is really a common sense way of keeping track of the income and expenses.
Interviewer The kind of companies you work with. can you just describe the sort of range of companies that you work with. and the kind of input you give them. I 8_________ you see them sort of more than once a year?
Sarah Brandston Right. In terms of the people that I do, my clients who have their own businesses, be they self-proprietorships or small corporations or partnerships, most of the people I deal with are in creative fields. I have several film makers, I have architects and people who consult in the computer field, what I think of as my corporations, and music, those are the kind of people I think of. They're 9_________ people that are
not comfortable with doing bookkeeping. or accounting. nor do they have enough 10_________ in their companies that they want to. or that they're able to pay the type of accountant that needs to see them on a monthly basis, and charge them a minimum of twenty four hundred dollars a year, let's say, to do all the accounting, the bookkeeping, and the tax preparation for them, so I try and keep my costs low so people can function. continue to function as a business...
Join together words and their definitions
1 Trial
2 Channel
3 maturity
4 publicity
5 assist
6 impact
7 temporary
8 generate
9 counter
10 loss leader
11 sparing
12 complement
13 prospect
14 spread
15 via
A produce or create sth
B lasting or intended to last only for a short time; not permanent
C product or service that is sold at a very low price in order to attract customers, who will then buy goods or services that produce more profit
D reply to sb by trying to prove that what they said is not true
E careful to use or give only a little of sth
F search an area for gold, minerals, oil, etc.
G method or system that people use to get information or to communicate
H thing that adds new qualities to sth in a way that improves it or makes it more attractive
I affect or make sth affect, be known by, or used by more and more people
J business of attracting the attention of the public to sth/sb; the things that are done to attract attention
K help sb to do sth, especially by doing a share of the work
L by means of a particular person, system, etc.
M time when a product has been sold for a long time and is well known, but its sales are not increasing
N powerful effect that sth has on sb/sth; process of testing a product to see whether it is safe, effective etc
1 Trial
2 Channel
3 maturity
4 publicity
5 assist
6 impact
7 temporary
8 generate
9 counter
10 loss leader
11 sparing
12 complement
13 prospect
14 spread
15 via
A produce or create sth
B lasting or intended to last only for a short time; not permanent
C product or service that is sold at a very low price in order to attract customers, who will then buy goods or services that produce more profit
D reply to sb by trying to prove that what they said is not true
E careful to use or give only a little of sth
F search an area for gold, minerals, oil, etc.
G method or system that people use to get information or to communicate
H thing that adds new qualities to sth in a way that improves it or makes it more attractive
I affect or make sth affect, be known by, or used by more and more people
J business of attracting the attention of the public to sth/sb; the things that are done to attract attention
K help sb to do sth, especially by doing a share of the work
L by means of a particular person, system, etc.
M time when a product has been sold for a long time and is well known, but its sales are not increasing
N powerful effect that sth has on sb/sth; process of testing a product to see whether it is safe, effective etc
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