ABSTRACT
This book reports upon an investigation into UK venture capital practice. The distinctive features of this investigation are that it was structured around a single analytical principle, agency analysis, and that it was solidly rooted in evidence. The agency approach, more fully characterized as principal-agent analysis, concentrates on two features of contracting relations between investors and investees, namely, risk and information. The use of evidence focuses on primary source data obtained by direct contact with investors and investees. Thus a single principle, with its two constituent elements of risk and information, is applied to a well-grounded body of evidence on investorinvestee relations.
