A premise of the capabilities perspective in strategy is that firm-specific capabilities allow some firms to be unusually adept at exploiting growth opportunities. Since few firms have the capacity to internally generate the quantity or variety of strategic resources needed to exploit growth...

This paper analyzes a comprehensive data set of 160 non venture-backed, 79 venture-backed and 61 bridge financed companies going public at Germany´s Neuer Markt between March 1997 and March 2002. I examine whether these three types of issues differ with regard to issuer characteristics, balance...