Private Equity & Venture Capital Course

Private Equity & Venture Capital

Program:

First Offered:

Typical Enrollment:

Credits:

Type:

Master of Science (M.Sc.) in Finance

Fall Term 2021

~10-15

Elective

Student Feedback

Sample Lecture

Embedded Research

The course is a deep dive into Private Equity and Venture Capital. In Venture Capital, the course covers the entrepreneur perspective (building, scaling and exiting a startup) as well as the investor perspective (investor types, portfolio considerations, valuations). In Private Equity, the course explores the intricacies of deal structuring and value creation, particularly in Leveraged Buyouts. On fund-level, students are exposed to performance measurement tools as well as the legal and economic dynamic between LPs and GPs. On each level, the course combines theoretic backgrounds with numerical methods, industry 'standards', case studies and the latest in academic research.

Selection of Covered Topics

Startup Scaling Strategies

Financial Forecasting for Startups

Startup Valuation

(Legal) VC Investment Mechanics (CoIs)

Ethical Considerations in PE & VC

LBO Structuring

LBO Valuation

Legal Concepts of PE (LPAs, MSAs)

Fund Valuation (e.g. PMEs, IRRs, NAVs)

GP Compensation Structures

Textbook(s):

'Venture Deals'

By Feld & Mendelson. Wiley.

'Venture Capital'

By Metrick & Yasuda. Wiley.

'Private Equity Laid Bare'

By Phalippou.

Excel

Modeling

Course

Exercises in MS Excel to broaden understanding of industry practice in Private Equity and Venture Capital

Selected Student Feedback

"This has been one of the most intellectually stimulating and rewarding courses for me in the MSF program thus far.
I thank Dr. Chris for his hard work in delivering this course. Tuesday evenings were the highlight of my week! :)"

Average Student Evaluations

1/2

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Description of Sample Slides

Lecture:

Subchapter:

Class 3: Building, Scaling and Exiting a Startup

Subchapter: Scaling

This sample lecture is part of the class on starting, scaling and exiting a startup. It focuses on the scaling part, and discusses the different strategies on how to aggressively grow a startup following its initial stages.

It covers the different funding rounds and what milestones startups typically have to achieve to successfully scale (e.g. 'MVPs' and 'PoC'). It also covers a variety of growth strategies (e.g. 'Blitzscaling' or 'Growth Hacking') and the exit.

See Sample Slides Below

1/23

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This course contains multiple original findings, data sets and support material from my research.

For the Venture Capital part I use:

Original Certificates of Incorporation (CoIs) containing the contractual rules between VC investors and startups
Manually collected valuation- and performance data for 'Unicorn' companies

For the Private Equity part I use:

Original Management Service Agreements (MSAs) which contain all contractual arrangements between PE funds and their portfolio companies
Original Limited Partnership Agreements (LPAs) containing all contractual arrangements between PE funds and their Limited Partners
Manually collected data on portfolio company fees
Manually collected data on buyout companies' leverage, restructuring, performance and valuation
Manually collected data on PE funds' exit strategies following LBOs

The original documents are used to familiarize students with industry standards and practice, while the data points and findings are used to complement textbook knowledge and add (empirical) depth to anecdotal evidence and case studies.

See Sample Slides Below

1/15

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The slides are part of a subchapter of Class 7 (Leveraged Buyouts) and contain the sections on portfolio company fees and dividend recapitalizations in leveraged buyouts, both based on original research.