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This paper aims to explore the challenges the Venture Capital (VC) funds industry in New Zealand (NZ) faces when sourcing new capital. In NZ, there is a significant gap currently for companies seeking VC funding of between $2 and $10 million to commercialise new products and ideas. Also, the estimated financing needs of the next generation of early stage NZ enterprises are around $2 billion of investment over the next 10 years (NZVIF, 2011).

A qualitative research design is applied, given the exploratory nature of this research. In this study, 15 face-to-face semi-structured interviews with VC fund managers, investors and intermediaries were undertaken.

The findings suggest that the lack of observable proven historical returns from NZ domiciled VC funds is a significant impediment to raising new equity capital. Fund managers and intermediaries also note that there is a lack of domestic entities in NZ that have the capacity and current appetite to invest in VC. In part, this may indicate that VC investors are unwilling to invest further capital in NZ VC funds until the current funds realise their existing investments.

Overall our findings support recent initiatives by the NZ VC funds industry to track and monitor the performance of NZ VC funds.

This case describes how eight entrepreneurs discover different opportunities for new businesses to exploit a single technological invention. The case focuses on the process of entrepreneurial discovery and its implications for the creation of new firms. Many of the teaching materials on entrepreneurship assume that entrepreneurs have already discovered an opportunity. While these materials provide useful information about the process of creating new enterprises, they miss the crucial first step in the entrepreneurial process: identifying an opportunity. The case illustrates the theoretical concept of the role of information in the discovery of entrepreneurial opportunities. It can be used in a class on entrepreneurship or management of technology.