In just several years, Israel developed a strong venture capital industry that places it among the top countries in terms of capital-GDP ratio. The strategy of the Israeli government was twofold. First, the government strongly stimulated the demand for venture capital, using R&D grants,...

Several governments have designed tax incentive programs to promote small business finance, yet evidence of their efficiency is very scarce. This article analyzes the QBIC program, introduced in Quebec to help capitalize SME. Individual investors in holding companies that finance one or more...

Canadian listed firms issue private offerings more often than public offerings. Yet the issuing cost of private investments in public equity (PIPEs) has neither been analyzed nor compared with the cost of conventional seasoned equity offerings (SEOs). We examine a sample of 2,108 PIPEs and 1,990...

We describe and analyze how a stock exchange can be used to finance emerging companies and to assume the role usually played by private VCs. We find that the Canadian public VC market has a success rate which is approximately four times the corresponding rate for private VC. The public VC market...

In Canada, most of the private placements are offered by small and unprofitable entrepreneurial ventures -- for which the asymmetry of information and adverse selection problems are particularly acute. Private placements are a very important source of equity for these emerging businesses. In...

Most countries have set up structures and programs for new business creation and financing. We analyze strategies implemented in France, Germany and United Kingdom, where the proportion of government funds in venture capital financing is significantly smaller than in the Quebec, yet the rate of...