Seth Godin has a brilliant post (well, aren’t they all brilliant) about some important pointers for entepreneurs looking to finance their business through venture capital. Venture capital (VCs), for the uninitiated, is the term used for private equity usually administered by financial institutations, used to inject funds into new or growing companies. This sort of investment is usually high-risk, so a corresponding premium on the ROI expected is typical for this source.
Anyway, Seth talks about what sort of criteria VC administrators looks for and supplies a number of gems as to things businesses approaching this sort of funding should be looking out for. I think the most salient point is the last one:
The companies that VCs most want to invest in are the companies that don’t need their investment to survive.