TY - JOUR AU - Metrick, Andrew AU - Yasuda, Ayako TI - Venture Capital and Other Private Equity: A Survey JF - National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper Series VL - No. 16652 PY - 2010 Y2 - December 2010 DO - 10.3386/w16652 UR - http://www.nber.org/papers/w16652 L1 - http://www.nber.org/papers/w16652.pdf N1 - Author contact info: Andrew Metrick Yale School of Management 135 Prospect Street P.O. Box 208200 New Haven, CT 06520 Tel: 203/432-3069 E-Mail: metrick@yale.edu Ayako Yasuda Graduate School of Management UC Davis 3206 Gallagher Hall One Shields Ave. Davis, CA 95616-8609 Tel: 530-752-0775 Fax: 530-752-2924 E-Mail: asyasuda@ucdavis.edu AB - We review the theory and evidence on venture capital (VC) and other private equity: why professional private equity exists, what private equity managers do with their portfolio companies, what returns they earn, who earns more and why, what determines the design of contracts signed between (i) private equity managers and their portfolio companies and (ii) private equity managers and their investors (limited partners), and how/whether these contractual designs affect outcomes. Findings highlight the importance of private ownership, and information asymmetry and illiquidity associated with it, as a key explanatory factor of what makes private equity different from other asset classes. ER -