Venture capitalists are entrepreneurship’s avant-garde. Their commercial antennas¹ are developed through their access to companies very early in their evolution. They make multiple bets and hope enough succeed in order to deliver market-beating returns to their investors³. Their skill often lies in judging the founders⁵ of the businesses they assess.

风险投资家是创业先锋。他们在企业发展的初期就与企业接触，由此磨练出商业悟性。他们多重押注，期待有足够多的企业获得成功，为投资者带来高于市场的回报。他们的技巧往往来自对企业创始人的判断。

They are busy at the moment, having completed more than 4,000 deals in the US alone last year, according to the National Venture Capital Association, and attracting the highest level of investment in more than a decade. As they undertake more deals, and more investment, they also attract criticism — notably⁶ for being disproportionately male.

从美国国家风险投资协会(National Venture Capital Association)的数据看，如今风投家们忙得很，去年仅在美国就完成了超过4000笔交易，并吸引了10多年来最高水平的投资。随着他们接手的交易越来越多，筹集到的投资也越来越多，他们也招致一些批评——特别是男性比例过高。

We should listen, therefore, when Silicon⁷ Valley technology investors tell us what a decade’s experience reveals. Early-stage investor² First Round Capital has published the findings of a review of its first 10 years. It looked at the 300 companies and 600 founders it has invested in, removed one huge outlier (Uber) from the data, and assessed how much their value had changed between its initial investment and at exit, or now.

因此，当硅谷的科技行业投资者讲述他们10年来的心得体会时，我们应该好好听一听。早期投资机构First Round Capital近来发表了回首创立头10年的种种发现。它回顾了投资过的300家公司和600名创始人，从数据中剔除一个巨大的异常值——优步(Uber)，然后评估各企业的价值从初始投资到退出投资时（或当前）的变化。

There were some deeply unsurprising findings (going to a great university helps; technology matters more in business-to-business than to consumer companies; a founder⁴ who has worked at Twitter, Facebook, Microsoft, Apple or Google is a plus). But it also came up with some data that upset a number of early-stage investing precepts⁸.

他们总结出的发现有一些在深层次上不足为奇——进一所顶级大学会有帮助；比起消费者企业，技术对B2B企业更重要；在推特(Twitter)、Facebook、微软(Microsoft)、苹果(Apple)或谷歌(Google)的工作经验对创始人是个有利条件。不过他们拿出的数据也推翻了好几条早期投资成见。

It found that the portfolio⁹ teams with at least one female founder outperformed all-male founding teams by more than 60 per cent, and that younger teams outperformed older groups. The wisdom that comes from experience did not pay from an investor point of view because the data showed repeat founders performed no better than first-time founders (mostly because initial valuations were higher). Gratifyingly for believers in collective wisdom, however, teams outperformed solo founders by a massive margin¹⁰.

按照数据，至少有一名女性创始人的投资团队的绩效高于创始人全是男性的团队60%以上，且年轻团队表现优于年长团队。在投资者看来，从经验汲取的智慧并不能带来回报，因为数据显示连环创业者的表现并未优于初次创业者（主要原因在于连环创业者的初始估值更高）。然而，令集体智慧的信奉者欣慰的是，团队创业者的绩效大大超过单人创业者。

Moreover, companies started outside the main technology hubs of the San Francisco Bay Area and New York performed just as well (or slightly better) from an investor point of view than those within. This is almost certainly because initial valuations in regional businesses were up to 50 per cent lower.

此外，从投资者的视角看，创建于旧金山湾区和纽约以外的公司表现与在这两个主要技术中心创立的公司相仿（甚至还稍好一点）。这几乎肯定是因为其它地方的初创企业初始估值低了50%。

One message from the First Round data appears to be that if you are a founder seeking a high valuation you should be in a known hub and a repeat founder. If you are an investor you should seek out companies with first-time founders and in regions not yet dubbed¹¹ “silicon” this or that.

从First Round的数据似乎可以得出这样的见解：如果你是个寻求高估值的创业者，那你需要在著名的创业中心创建企业，而且最好是个连环创业者。如果你是投资者，你应该寻觅初次创业者，而且是在尚未被冠以“某某硅谷”美名的地方。

Another shibboleth¹² put in question by the First Round data, which should cheer those seeking seed investment, relates to how deals were sourced. It has long been assumed that investors are best approached through an introduction by trusted connections. However, in First Round’s portfolio the companies discovered through other channels, such as Twitter or a demo day, outperformed referred companies by just under 60 per cent. Founders making cold approaches did about 23 per cent better. It seems that it really isn’t who you know.

First Round的数据还令人质疑关于如何物色交易的老观念，这应当使那些寻求种子投资的人感到振奋。人们长期认为，接洽投资者的最好方法是由可信赖的人脉引荐。然而，在First Round的投资组合中，通过其他渠道（比如Twitter或者演示日）发现的公司的表现要高出受引荐而来的公司近60%。自己找上门的创业者的表现要比受引荐而来的创业者高23%。似乎重要的并不是你认识谁。

Does this mean that if you are a 25-year-old female entrepreneur outside Silicon Valley, with an Ivy¹³ League engineering degree, who knows hardly anyone except your co-founder — who by the way worked at Twitter — all will be well in winning early-stage backers?

这是否意味着，如果你是一名年方25，在硅谷以外创业，拥有常青藤盟校的工程学学位的女性，并且除了你的联合创始人（在Twitter工作过）以外谁也不认识，就会毫无疑问地赢得早期投资者的青睐？

Almost certainly not. As Megan Smith has been pointing out since joining the White House as President Barack Obama’s chief technology officer, only 3 per cent of US venture capital is allocated¹⁴ to start-ups led by women. Of those companies to have achieved coveted¹⁵ unicorn¹⁶ status (private companies with a minimum $1bn valuation) most have all-male boards; women hold only about 6 per cent of unicorn board seats in total in the US.

答案几乎肯定是“不”。就像梅甘史密斯(Megan Smith)加入白宫担任奥巴马的首席技术官后一直指出的那样，美国只有3%的风投资本投给了由女性领导的初创企业。大多数取得令人羡慕的“独角兽”地位的企业（估值至少10亿美元的私有企业）的董事会为全男性阵容；女性仅占全美国独角兽企业董事会席位的6%。

It is highly likely, therefore, that venture capitalists may not be making optimum investment decisions.

因此，风险投资家极有可能没有做出最优的投资决策。

But using data to inform venture decisions would help both investors and founders. A famously opaque¹⁷ industry should routinely publish more information about a founder’s gender¹⁸, origin, education and background. To be serious about seed funding those who can, rather than those who usually do, investors should seek out any data that helps make better decisions.

不过，运用数据来启迪风投决策对投资者和创业者来说均有帮助。一个以不透明出名的产业应定期发布更多关于创始人性别、出身、教育程度和其他背景的信息。要认真地对那些有能力（而不是通常能够争取到投资的人）进行种子投资，投资者应该尽其所能地搜集有助于更好决策的数据。