Entrepreneurial Finance

The course provides a theoretical and practical framework useful for addressing typical financial issues of entrepreneurial ventures, and is intended to be hands on.

For many entrepreneurial companies, the assumptions of the standard corporate finance model do not hold, even as approximations. Class participants will study the fundamentals of the Entrepreneurial Finance, the relevance of Entrepreneurship Planning and Strategy, Venture Organisation and Operation.
In the first part of the course, ?Instruments, Players and Prospective?, we will focus on the early stages of company development, identifying key questions which challenge all entrepreneurs: how much money can and should be raised; when should it be raised and from whom; what is a reasonable valuation of the company; how should funding, and exit decisions be structured.

The second part, "Business Finance, key topics", is concerned with the nature of key financial statements such as Income Statements, Balance Sheets and Cash Flow Statements, and their roles as external reporting instruments. It is also concerned with the measurement of performance through the use of financial ratios and non-financial measures. Guest speakers, through their entrepreneurial and consulting experience, will introduce students to the principle of Business Planning and Strategy.