Six Questions To Determine If Your New Idea Is A Real Business

dd

Can You Cover Your (Honest-To-Goodness) Development Costs?
"Most companies that fail do so because they are lacking capital." We didn't say it; venture capital maven John De Puy, chief executive of Oaktree Ventures, did. While investors won't wave blank checks at you, they don't want you to fail either. The key here is honesty: However much you think you need to bring your product to market, tack on a healthy cushion; add more for tech-heavy products that may (read: will) need extra months of tweaking. Can't scare up enough scratch to get out of the garage? The market may be telling you something. "You won't really know whether you have a business opportunity until you try to get funding," says Charles Holloway, director of the Center for Entrepreneurial Studies at the Stanford Graduate School of Business.

Related Links
finance , business