Presentation on success factors for technology based startups given by a doctoral student at MIT Sloan for graduate students in departments touching on nanotech.

1. Chuck Eesley [email_address] http://www.mit.edu/~eesley Success Factors for Technology-Based Entrepreneurs Entrepreneurship Club July 17 th , 2007 Small Talks July 18 th , 2007

5. Bigger Founding Teams Cox (1972) Hazard Rate Regression Dependent Variable = IPO (subjects start being at risk at year of firm founding) Note: coefficients are hazard ratios – numbers >1 represent higher likelihood of IPO Idea from graduate thesis 1.15 (0.66) Idea from MIT class 5.42 (4.50)* Idea from MIT UROP 3.77 (2.45)* Prior IPO 1.68 (0.39)* Venture Capital 1.69 (0.43)* Angel Investors 1.52 (0.51) Patent 1.73 (0.32)** # Cofounders 1.27 (0.09)*** Number of observations 1509

6. Founding teams can be a lot of fun! Chuck Eesley First Place in Duke Startup Challenge, May 2002

7. Early Hiring and Co-founder Mistakes Can Be Deadly!

8. Prior Founding Experience Panel A –Revenues (in constant 2001 dollars) Firm Rank 1 st firms (N=556) 2 nd firms (N=182) 3 rd firms (N=84) 4 th firms (N=21) 5 th firms and higher (N=36) Median Revenues (‘000’s) 836 1,784 924 1,181 7,274 Standard Dev. (‘000’s) 153,000 117,000 130,000 10,800 21,200 Panel B – Lag (from graduation and from the prior firm founding) Firm Rank 1 st firms (N=761) 2 nd firms (N=241) 3 rd firms (N=150) 4 th firms (N=71) 5 th firms and higher (N=31) Lag Between Subsequent Firms (years) 14.02 7.95 7.38 6.99 6.71 Lag St. Dev. 9.78 6.90 6.73 5.42 6.37

9. Prior Founding Experience Revenues are in dollars and divide by the age of the firm and then take the natural log to adjust for skew.

10. Work Experience

11. Sources of Product/Service Ideas # Responses % of Founders MIT-Doing outside-funded research 33 2.1 MIT-Graduate thesis 45 2.87 MIT-In class 10 0.64 MIT-Informal discussion with students 27 1.72 MIT-Other 32 2.04 MIT-Other research 16 1.02 MIT-Professional literature 6 0.38 MIT-Undergraduate Research Opportunity 8 0.51 MIT-Visiting scientists, engineers, or entrepreneurs 6 0.38 MIT-Working with an outside company 30 1.91 Other Sources-Discussions with social or professional acquaintances 193 12.3 Other Sources-Other 102 6.5 Other Sources-Research conference 10 0.64 Other Sources-Working in the industry 915 58.32 Other Sources-Working in the military 46 2.93

12. Work Experience and Teams

13. Work Experience and Teams

14. Work Experience and Ideas

15. Work Experience and Ideas

16. Initial Funding – Savings and VC

17. Persistence! (in ‘000’s of $)

18. Famous MIT Entrepreneurs Mr. d'Arbeloff co-founded Teradyne, now the world's largest producer of automatic test equipment with MIT classmate Nicholas DeWolf in 1960. In 1965, Ray Stata founded Analog Devices, Inc. with his former MIT roommate, Matthew Lorber '56 EE and Richard Burwen (a Harvard alumnus). Edward Roberts co-founded Pugh-Roberts Associates, Medical Information Technology, Inc., Sohu.com, Inc., Advanced Magnetics, Pegasystems, PR Restaurants, Interactive Super Computers, and Visible Measures. Patrick McGovern Phil Sharp Noubar Afeyan Bob Langer

20. MIT Factors in Venture Founding Panel A – Proportion of Founders Choosing MIT for the Entrepreneurial Environment Graduation Decade 1960s (N=313) 1970s (N=373) 1980s (N=315) 1990s (N=214) 12% 19% 26% 42% Panel B – Factors as Important in Venture Founding* Graduation Decade 1960s (N=111) 1970s (N=147) 1980s (N=144) 1990s (N=145) Students 24% 38% 50% 66% Faculty 42% 37% 28% 37% Research 32% 30% 26% 33% Entrepreneurial network 25% 32% 40% 50% MIT Entrepreneurship Center 1% 2% 1% 12% MIT Business Plan Competition 1% 0% 3% 30%

21. Why Are So Many Entrepreneurs Drawn to MIT?

24. Chuck Eesley [email_address] Thank you! As one survey respondent stated: “I look at the MIT experience as training in problem solving. Business is a series of ‘problem sets’ that must be solved, so MIT is a key training ground.” * Thanks to Adam Kalish (Lux Capital) who provided extensive comments/edits/encouragement for this presentation.

25. Extra slides

28. Proportion of Entrepreneurs by School