Choosing co-investors;Friends without benefits

　　選擇投資伙伴;不帶來好處的友誼;

　　Venture capitalists need to be ruthless about theirrelationships;

　　風險投資家們在他們的關系里需要更加無情;

　　Even in a world of algorithmic trading andautomated credit scoring, good financial decisionsstill depend on judgment. Choosing whom toinvest alongside is particularly important in theuncertain world of venture capital, where manydeals are syndicated, in order to share risk and information. Paul Gompers and Yuhai Xuan ofHarvard Business School and Vladimir Mukharlyamov of Harvard University have put togethera dataset of 3,500 early-stage investors in almost 12,000 deals to examine why specificpairs of investors are drawn to each other, and how that affects their financial performance.

　　就算在一個充斥著算法式交易和自動信譽評級的世界里，好的投資決策依然依靠判斷力。選擇與誰并肩作戰，在一個充滿著未知數的風投世界里顯得尤其重要。許多風投項目都是聯合投資以分散風險與共享信息。哈佛商學院Paul Gompers和Yuhai Xuan跟哈佛大學Vladimir Mukharlyamov整合了一個擁有3500名早期投資者，將近12,000個案例的資料庫。該數據庫式用以檢驗為什么特定組合的投資者能互相吸引，而這種關系如何影響他們的投資表現。

　　Investors clearly prefer partners with whom they have something in common. People whohave worked at the same company are over 60% more likely to co-invest than those whohave not. Investors who belong to the same ethnic minority, or studied at the sameuniversity, are around 20% more likely to pair up. The bias towards co-investors onmeasures of ability is weaker: investors with degrees from the best universities are just 9%more likely to get together.

　　投資者明顯更喜歡擁有共同點的伙伴。曾在同一家公司上班的比那些沒有這種經歷的伙伴共同投資的幾率要高60%。同一種族，或同一大學畢業的投資者共同投資的幾率也要高出20%。根據個人能力來搭伙的傾向并不明顯，具有最優秀大學學位的投資者共同投資的幾率僅高出9%。

　　Rapport is a poor basis for selecting partners. The authors examine investors record atexiting investments through an initial public offering . An IPO is the holy grail for manystart-ups, but the odds of success are 22% lower if a co-investing pair are alumni of the sameuniversity, and 18% lower if they share a past employer. By itself, ethnicity has no effect oninvestment success. In a pair, it is a different story. Co-investors from the same ethnicminority are 25% less likely to bring a portfolio company to an IPO . The data suggest that the poorer results of similarinvestors stem less from selecting bad companies, more from bad decisions taken togetherafter the initial investment. It may be that a diversity of views helps investors to makebetter calls.

　　基于友善來選擇伙伴是一個失敗的根據。作者從現有上市的表現來檢驗了投資者的投資記錄。上市是許多創業公司的終極目標，但校友伙伴搭配投資的成功率比非校友的要低22%，同時曾同事過的伙伴成功率則低18%。如果僅考慮種族問題，這對最終投資成功率沒有影響。但一旦涉及搭配，這就完全不一樣。由同一種族組成的共同投資搭配，旗下企業上市的幾率要低25%。這些數據表明具有共同點投資伙伴所產生的疲弱投資結果，受選錯公司的影響其實較小，而更多的是由初步投資后的錯誤決策而導致。這可能是因為多樣化視角有利于投資者作出更好的判斷。

　　Partnerships based on ability, not similarity, tend to do better. If one investor of a pair hasa degree from a leading university, this adds 9% to the possibility of their selected firmsreaching an IPO; if the second does too, that adds a further 11%. Of course, such investorsstill have to find each other. Research led by Alexander Ljungqvist of New York University sStern School of Business has shown that VC firms in influential network positions performbetter, as they have more opportunity to take part in syndications. The moral seems to bethat investors should make friends easily, but not invest for friendship s sake alone.

　　基于能力而非共同點組成的搭配往往更成功。如果其中一名投資者擁有頂尖大學學位，這將使被投資公司的上市幾率上升9%;如果另一名也有同樣等級的學位，這將額外增加11%的上市幾率。紐約大學斯特恩商學院Alexander Ljungqvist帶頭的研究顯示，擁有具影響力關系網的風投企業表現更好，因為他們更有機會參與到聯合投資里。這個寓言似乎告訴投資者應廣泛交友，而不要僅因友誼就參與投資。

　　Choosing co-investors;Friends without benefits

　　選擇投資伙伴;不帶來好處的友誼;

　　Venture capitalists need to be ruthless about theirrelationships;

　　風險投資家們在他們的關系里需要更加無情;

　　Even in a world of algorithmic trading andautomated credit scoring, good financial decisionsstill depend on judgment. Choosing whom toinvest alongside is particularly important in theuncertain world of venture capital, where manydeals are syndicated, in order to share risk and information. Paul Gompers and Yuhai Xuan ofHarvard Business School and Vladimir Mukharlyamov of Harvard University have put togethera dataset of 3,500 early-stage investors in almost 12,000 deals to examine why specificpairs of investors are drawn to each other, and how that affects their financial performance.

　　就算在一個充斥著算法式交易和自動信譽評級的世界里，好的投資決策依然依靠判斷力。選擇與誰并肩作戰，在一個充滿著未知數的風投世界里顯得尤其重要。許多風投項目都是聯合投資以分散風險與共享信息。哈佛商學院Paul Gompers和Yuhai Xuan跟哈佛大學Vladimir Mukharlyamov整合了一個擁有3500名早期投資者，將近12,000個案例的資料庫。該數據庫式用以檢驗為什么特定組合的投資者能互相吸引，而這種關系如何影響他們的投資表現。

　　Investors clearly prefer partners with whom they have something in common. People whohave worked at the same company are over 60% more likely to co-invest than those whohave not. Investors who belong to the same ethnic minority, or studied at the sameuniversity, are around 20% more likely to pair up. The bias towards co-investors onmeasures of ability is weaker: investors with degrees from the best universities are just 9%more likely to get together.

　　投資者明顯更喜歡擁有共同點的伙伴。曾在同一家公司上班的比那些沒有這種經歷的伙伴共同投資的幾率要高60%。同一種族，或同一大學畢業的投資者共同投資的幾率也要高出20%。根據個人能力來搭伙的傾向并不明顯，具有最優秀大學學位的投資者共同投資的幾率僅高出9%。

　　Rapport is a poor basis for selecting partners. The authors examine investors record atexiting investments through an initial public offering . An IPO is the holy grail for manystart-ups, but the odds of success are 22% lower if a co-investing pair are alumni of the sameuniversity, and 18% lower if they share a past employer. By itself, ethnicity has no effect oninvestment success. In a pair, it is a different story. Co-investors from the same ethnicminority are 25% less likely to bring a portfolio company to an IPO . The data suggest that the poorer results of similarinvestors stem less from selecting bad companies, more from bad decisions taken togetherafter the initial investment. It may be that a diversity of views helps investors to makebetter calls.

　　基于友善來選擇伙伴是一個失敗的根據。作者從現有上市的表現來檢驗了投資者的投資記錄。上市是許多創業公司的終極目標，但校友伙伴搭配投資的成功率比非校友的要低22%，同時曾同事過的伙伴成功率則低18%。如果僅考慮種族問題，這對最終投資成功率沒有影響。但一旦涉及搭配，這就完全不一樣。由同一種族組成的共同投資搭配，旗下企業上市的幾率要低25%。這些數據表明具有共同點投資伙伴所產生的疲弱投資結果，受選錯公司的影響其實較小，而更多的是由初步投資后的錯誤決策而導致。這可能是因為多樣化視角有利于投資者作出更好的判斷。

　　Partnerships based on ability, not similarity, tend to do better. If one investor of a pair hasa degree from a leading university, this adds 9% to the possibility of their selected firmsreaching an IPO; if the second does too, that adds a further 11%. Of course, such investorsstill have to find each other. Research led by Alexander Ljungqvist of New York University sStern School of Business has shown that VC firms in influential network positions performbetter, as they have more opportunity to take part in syndications. The moral seems to bethat investors should make friends easily, but not invest for friendship s sake alone.

　　基于能力而非共同點組成的搭配往往更成功。如果其中一名投資者擁有頂尖大學學位，這將使被投資公司的上市幾率上升9%;如果另一名也有同樣等級的學位，這將額外增加11%的上市幾率。紐約大學斯特恩商學院Alexander Ljungqvist帶頭的研究顯示，擁有具影響力關系網的風投企業表現更好，因為他們更有機會參與到聯合投資里。這個寓言似乎告訴投資者應廣泛交友，而不要僅因友誼就參與投資。