rethink(ip)

Do you believe the marketing hype? Or do you dig?

Posted by Douglas Sorocco at June 1, 2005 06:19 PM

Interesting quote over at the A VC blog:

I am not joking about this.  A VC investment is not marriage, but it's damn close.  One thing I've noticed over the years is that the VC does a lot of due diligence on the entrepreneur and his company, but entrepreneurs often do not do enough due diligence on the VC and his firm.

What kind of due diligence do you do on the firm you are going to hire to do your intellectual property work? 

I once heard an interesting way one company bought services, when they arrived at the office they would always ask the receptionist, bellman, security guard, coffee barista etc. whether they would hire the prospective firm.  

If they got a negative reply, nine times out of ten they wouldn’t even go on to the meeting.  It isn’t what you do when everyone is watching, you know.

The moral of the story – no place is too crazy to do a little digging.