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Articles 1 - 8 of 8
Full-Text Articles in Law
Independent Directors And Shared Board Control In Venture Finance, Brian J. Broughman
Independent Directors And Shared Board Control In Venture Finance, Brian J. Broughman
Articles by Maurer Faculty
In most VC-backed firms neither the entrepreneurs nor the VC investors control the board. Instead control is typically shared with a mutually appointed independent director holding the tie-breaking seat. Contract theory, which treats control as an indivisible right held by one party, does not have a good explanation for this practice. Using a bargaining game similar to final offer arbitration, I show that an independent director as tie-breaker can reduce holdup by moderating each party’s ex post threat position, potentially expanding the range of firms which receive external financing. This project contributes to the literature on incomplete contracting and ...
Regional Integration And The Evolution Of The European Polity: On The Fiftieth Anniversary Of The Journal Of Common Market Studies, Alec Stone Sweet
Regional Integration And The Evolution Of The European Polity: On The Fiftieth Anniversary Of The Journal Of Common Market Studies, Alec Stone Sweet
Alec Stone Sweet
No abstract provided.
Regional Integration And The Evolution Of The European Polity: On The Fiftieth Anniversary Of The Journal Of Common Market Studies, Alec Stone Sweet
Regional Integration And The Evolution Of The European Polity: On The Fiftieth Anniversary Of The Journal Of Common Market Studies, Alec Stone Sweet
Alec Stone Sweet
No abstract provided.
Renegotiation Of Cash Flow Rights In The Sale Of Vc-Backed Firms, Brian Broughman, Jesse Fried
Renegotiation Of Cash Flow Rights In The Sale Of Vc-Backed Firms, Brian Broughman, Jesse Fried
Articles by Maurer Faculty
Incomplete contracting theory suggests that VC cash flow rights - including liquidation preferences - may be subject to renegotiation. Using a hand-collected dataset of sales of Silicon Valley firms, we find common shareholders do sometimes receive payment before VCs' liquidation preferences are satisfied. However, such deviations tend to be small. We also find that renegotiation is more likely when governance arrangements, including the firm's choice of corporate law, give common shareholders power to impede the sale. Our study provides support for incomplete contracting theory, improves understanding of VC exits, and suggests that choice of corporate law matters in private firms.
The Role Of Independent Directors In Startup Firms, Brian Broughman
The Role Of Independent Directors In Startup Firms, Brian Broughman
Articles by Maurer Faculty
This Article develops a new theory to explain the widespread use of independent directors in the governance of startup firms. Privately held startups often assign a tie-breaking board seat to a third-party independent director. This practice cannot be explained by the existing corporate governance literature, which relies on diffuse ownership and passive investment-features unique to the publicly traded firm. To develop an alternative theory, I model a financing contract between an entrepreneur and a venture capital investor. I show that allocating a tie- breaking vote to an unbiased thirdparty can prevent opportunistic behavior that would occur ifthe firm were controlled ...
Renegotiation Of Cash Flow Rights In The Sale Of Vc-Backed Firms, Brian Broughman, Jesse Fried
Renegotiation Of Cash Flow Rights In The Sale Of Vc-Backed Firms, Brian Broughman, Jesse Fried
Brian Broughman
Incomplete contracting theory suggests that VC cash flow rights – including liquidation preferences – may be subject to renegotiation. Using a hand-collected dataset of sales of Silicon Valley firms, we find common shareholders do sometimes receive payment before VCs’ liquidation preferences are satisfied. However, such deviations tend to be small. We also find that renegotiation is more likely when governance arrangements, including the firm’s choice of corporate law, give common shareholders power to impede the sale. Our study provides support for incomplete contracting theory, improves understanding of VC exits, and suggests that choice of corporate law matters in private firms.
Engineering A Venture Capital Market: Lessons From The American Experience, Ronald J. Gilson
Engineering A Venture Capital Market: Lessons From The American Experience, Ronald J. Gilson
Faculty Scholarship
The venture capital market and firms whose creation and early stages were financed by venture capital are among the crown jewels of the American economy. Beyond representing an important engine of macroeconomic growth and job creation, these firms have been a major force in commercializing cutting-edge science, whether through their impact on existing industries as with the radical changes in pharmaceuticals catalyzed by venture-backed firms' commercialization of biotechnology, or by their role in developing entirely new industries as with the emergence of the Internet and World Wide Web. The venture capital market thus provides a unique link between finance and ...
Engineering A Venture Capital Market: Lessons From The American Experience, Ronald J. Gilson
Engineering A Venture Capital Market: Lessons From The American Experience, Ronald J. Gilson
Faculty Scholarship
This paper seeks to identify the core of the U.S. venture capital contracting model, and then assess the extent to which the model provides guidance in engineering venture capital markets in other countries and, in particular, in identifying a viable role for government in assisting that project. All financial contracts respond to three central contracting problems: uncertainty, information asymmetry and opportunism in the form of agency costs. The special character of venture capital contracting is shaped by the fact that investing in early stage, high technology companies presents these problems in extreme form. The genius of U.S. venture ...