Sebastian Mallaby

eBook, ePUB

The Power Law (eBook, ePUB)

Venture Capital and the Art of Disruption

Beschreibung

From an award-winning financial historian comes the gripping, character-driven story of venture capital and the world it made

Innovations rarely come from "experts." Jeff Bezos was not a bookseller; Elon Musk was not in the auto industry. When it comes to innovation, a legendary venture capitalist told Sebastian Mallaby, the future cannot be predicted, it can only be discovered. Most attempts at discovery fail, but a few succeed at such a scale that they more than make up for everything else. That extreme ratio of success and failure is the power law that drives venture capital, Silicon Valley, the tech sector, and, by extension, the world.

Drawing on unprecedented access to the most celebrated venture capitalists of all time, award-winning financial historian Sebastian Mallaby tells the story of this strange tribe of financiers who have funded the world's most successful companies, from Google to SpaceX to Alibaba. With a riveting blend of storytelling and analysis, The Power Law makes sense of the seeming randomness of success in venture capital, an industry that relies, for good and ill, on gut instinct and personality rather than spreadsheets and data. We learn the unvarnished truth about some of the most iconic triumphs and infamous disasters in the history of tech, from the comedy of errors that was the birth of Apple to the venture funding that fostered hubris at WeWork and Uber to the industry's notorious lack of women and ethnic minorities.

Now the power law echoes around the world: it has transformed China's digital economy beyond recognition, and London is one of the top cities for venture capital investment. By taking us so deeply into the VCs' game, The Power Law helps us think about our own future through their eyes.

Technische Details

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Autor

Sebastian Mallaby is the author of several books, including the bestselling More Money Than God and The Man Who Knew: The Life and Times of Alan Greenspan, the winner of the 2016 Financial Times/McKinsey Business Book of the Year Award. A former Financial Times contributing editor and two-time Pulitzer Prize finalist, Mallaby is the Paul A. Volcker Senior Fellow for International Economics at the Council on Foreign Relations. He lives with his family in London.

Produktdetails

• Verlag: Penguin Books Ltd
• Seitenzahl: 496
• Erscheinungstermin: 25. Januar 2022
• Englisch
• ISBN-13: 9780241356531
• Artikelnr.: 61648184

Rezensionen

Thoroughly magnificent. . . . Seriously great, and wildly important. Forbes

Sebastian Mallaby is the master of unspooling human drama from financial systems. Here, the venture capitalists are the protagonists. Whether it s financiers scrambling to court a pajama-wearing young Mark Zuckerberg or venture capitalist Bill Gurley s efforts to oust Uber founder Travis Kalanick from the company, the stories are almost Shakespearean in their depictions of ambition, jealousy and ego. NPR, Books We Love 2022

A must-read for anyone seeking to understand modern-day Silicon Valley and even our economy writ large . . . Most people who write about Silicon Valley do so from the viewpoint of entrepreneurs who built

companies with the backing of venture capitalists. Mallaby writes from the perspective of the venture capitalists themselves. He tells his story through an accumulation of smaller stories, each one phenomenally detailed and engaging. Bethany McLean, The Washington Post

"A gripping fly-on-the-wall story of the rise of this unique and important industry based on extensive interviews with some of the most successful venture capitalists . . . Mr. Mallaby writes a fast-paced narrative. He also has a journalist s eye for revealing details Daniel Rasmussen, Wall Street Journal

Sweeping and authoritative . . . tells an undercovered tale. . . . A worthy successor to More Money Than God. Financial Times

Well-researched book, leavened by lively portraits of leading figures. The Economist

Sebastian Mallaby's The Power Law: Venture Capital and the Making of the New Future is a rip-roaring read full of eccentric geniuses . . . A smart and consequential public intellectual, Mallaby has formulated a smart recipe to restore America (and the world) to vibrant equitable prosperity. He makes the case vividly in a new book which should be on every congressional desk . . . It may be the most informative and engaging economic narrative history since Liaquat Ahamed's Lords of Finance: The Bankers Who Broke the World which won the 2010 Pulitzer Prize in history. NewsMax

How does the venture capital industry work its wonders? Is there a replicable formula for successful VC investing, or is it just a matter of being in the right place at the right time? And how secure is Silicon Valley s dominance of the industry? Sebastian Mallaby s absorbing new book, The Power Law: Venture Capital and the Art of Disruption seeks to answer these questions. . . . He brings his trademark mixture of exhaustive research and clear analysis to his most interesting subject so far. Adrian Wooldridge, Bloomberg

As we face urgent man-made existential challenges from climate change to economic inequality, Sebastian Mallaby shows that the capitalists of Silicon Valley are shaping the future in ways few understand. In The Power Law he takes us inside their rarified world, showing the possibilities and shortcomings of their big egos and big bets. Mallaby's deep access enables us to get a rare and unsettling look inside a subculture of unparalleled influence. Jane Mayer, Chief Washington Correspondent, The New Yorker

Absorbing. Reuters

The Power Law should be on every tech founder s and self-reflective VC s reading list . . . Go and buy The Power Law. It is a fantastic account of how American venture capital has developed and some of the most important rules that govern it. Let s use Mallaby s brilliantly executed observations of VC as an opening for a long-overdue, ongoing debate and continue our scrutiny of the kingmakers world. Sifted

Mallaby writes with humor and historical sweep . . . His account is immensely enriched by interviews with most if not all of the rainmakers in venture capital. Prospect Magazine

Venture capital has influenced the American economy for over half-a-century now, and finally we have a book of exceptional reporting, analysis and storytelling to bring that history to life. What makes Sebastian Mallaby s The Power Law a classic is how deeply it takes us into VC's defining successes and failures which are much harder to get anyone to talk frankly about. I m not sure this is the book of VCs' dreams, but it s what the rest of us have been waiting for. Charles Duhigg

Returning to the rough and tumble of business, January also brings The Power Law (Allen Lane), in which author Sebastian Mallaby sets off into the world of venture capital and the strange bunch of financiers behind some of the most successful companies. It s a tale of triumphs but also major failures, hubris and jaw-dropping eccentricity. Financial Times, Spring Preview

Heavyweight and richly detailed, [The Power Law] is both a careening ride through the chaos of startup culture and a sober assessment of how the relationship between founders and their financiers has evolved. Strategy and Business

A lucid, thoughtful, and entertaining account of high-wire capitalism at work. Publishers Weekly

Indispensable. Kirkus

In this fascinating study of venture capitalists, Sebastian Mallaby explains why they invest with the sole purpose of winning the jackpot while the rest of us are advised to invest cautiously. A compelling story of flesh-and-blood financiers, sprinkled with insights from which all economists could learn. Mervyn King, former Governor of the Bank of England

If you can read only one book on venture capital, this is the one. The Power Law narrates the evolution of venture capital from its origins in Silicon Valley to its emergence in China by following the ambitious and often idiosyncratic investors who finance risky new ventures while recognizing that success is rare, but transformative. The book is a fascinating read, and illustrates well one of its core themes, that venture capital is a network that straddles and offers the virtues of both markets and corporations. AnnaLee Saxenian, dean of the School of Information at University of California, Berkeley

A fascinating journey through the tightly networked world of the venture capitalists who make Silicon Valley tick, from the scrappy dealmakers of the 1960s to the high-flying global investors of today. Filled with eye-opening case studies and vivid personalities, frank in its analysis of the industry s greatest strengths and most dangerous blind spots, The Power Law is essential reading for understanding our tech-driven economy and where it might go next. Margaret O Mara, author of The Code

The Power Law is a remarkable book. It takes us inside venture capital from its origins with a handful of restless risk-takers to today s powerhouses that reshape our world. Both a formidable researcher he has gotten key players to talk with amazing candor and a gifted storyteller, Mallaby captures the drama and clashes of an extraordinary gallery of people who with insight and instincts, appetite for risk and tolerance for failure, unforgiving ego and relentless ambition make big bets in the face of huge uncertainty. Yet all of them must ultimately answer to the power law the reach for outsized returns. Mallaby does not shy away from detailing what has gone wrong, but he sees the triumph of the network of Silicon Valley as also a triumph for the United States though one now challenged by the mirror image that is rising up in China. The Power Law is an important book, for sure. It is destined to be of wide impact and lasting influence. Daniel Yergin, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Prize and The New Map

Everyone talks about venture capital. We glorify it, we vilify it, and everywhere outside Silicon Valley envies it. At last we have a storyteller with the intelligence to understand venture capital, the diligence to dig out some astonishing tales, and the eloquence to make the journey of discovery such a pleasure. This is a superb book. Tim Harford, author of The Data Detective