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Press about Basil Peters
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The Globe and Mail, Thane Stenner
August 24, 2009
"‘For most owners, selling the company is the biggest transaction of their lifetimes,’ Dr. Peters says. ‘Unfortunately, most owners get less than they could - often many millions less. The biggest reason is that they didn’t have a good exit strategy. A well-designed and executed exit transaction often adds 50 per cent to the final selling price.’
As he explains, owners are often too busy building their business to think much about leaving it. ‘Exits are the least understood part of being a business owner,’ he notes. ‘Managers will often develop and execute dozens of product strategies, financings or sales plans during their careers. But even veteran managers will only be involved with a few exits.’
The solution is to think of the end right from the beginning. ‘In many cases - possibly the majority - owners wait too long to exit,’ he says. ‘Ideally, companies should have a written exit strategy before the company structure is complete, and certainly before the first financing. A clear exit strategy will literally affect business decisions made almost every day.’" |
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Business in Vancouver, Curt Cherewayko
June 24, 2009
"Analysts and angel investors like Basil Peters frequently cite Club Penguin, which was founded using little capital and sold in a short timeframe, as the exemplary social media company.
‘[These days] you can build a company for almost no capital,’ Vancouver-based Peters said last April." |
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The Okanagan Saturday, Steve MacNaull
June 20, 2009
"Some companies should be started with the ending in mind.
‘Yes, entrepreneurs should definitely think exit as they start a company,’ said Early Exits author Basil Peters during a stop in the Okanagan this week.
‘If an entrepreneur and a company has an exit strategy right from the beginning, then they tend to be more successful and reach their goals sooner.’
The key with exits is to sell when times are good." |
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Angel Capital Education Foundation
"Exit opportunities have changed dramatically over the last few years. Basil Peters, fund manager for Fundamental Technologies II (an angel fund) and member of angel groups in Canada and the US, encourages angel investors to recognize that the opportunity for earlier exits exists and to build strategies to capitalize on it." |
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SFU Research Matters
Volume 6, Number 1, Winter 2009 (page 4)
"SFU faculty, graduate students and staff, keen to set up companies to commercialize their innovations, can turn to SFU Venture Connection’s new Entrepreneur-in-Residence (EIR) program for expert help."
"‘I volunteered as soon as the program was announced,’ says Dr. Basil Peters of Fundamental Technologies II. He's helped start dozens of technology companies, including the Nexus Group". |
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National Post, Paul Brent
January 06, 2009
"It will take a few months to see if the new interest will translate into increased investment, but Peters predicts the angel phenomenon will grow as other sources of capital dry up, and given that more Boomers are hitting their 50s and 60s, the typical age of angels. ‘All the trends are moving towards more,’ he says." |
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Business in Vancouver, Curt Cherewayko
October 21-27, 2008; issue 991
"Peters keeps a list of mergers and acquisitions in the technology sector that occur for less than $30 million.
'You can create a company worth $10 million, $20 million or $30 million in a few years without a lot of capital, and can find lots of people wanting to buy you for cash,' said Peters." |
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Financial Post, Tony Wanless
September 29, 2008
"Built to flip is not a dirty phrase or unnatural act," [Peters] says. "To succeed today, entrepreneurs must not only aspire to early exits, but design that objective into their corporate structures. It’s just not possible any more to take decades to build a company. Entrepreneurs, employees and investors just don't have the patience. Even if they did, their competitors don't." |
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ingenuity - UBC Faculty of Applied Science Engineering News
Spring/Summer 2007 (page 11)
"With the belief that our province's greatest resource is the intelligence of our people, I encourage today's engineering students to consider opportunities to create and build companies from the knowledge and relationships they are building at UBC - it worked for me!" |
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Business Edge, Monte Stewart
November 24, 2005
"[Hellman's] UBC study also points to a ‘funding gap’ or ‘capital gap’ in venture capital markets... U.S. venture capitalists are managing much larger funds than they were a decade ago, but they only invest in firms that require $10 million or more, hampering companies that are too small for a $10-million investment but too big for angels and family and friends. ‘That funding gap should be called a funding opportunity,’ says Peters, adding smaller companies generate bigger returns on investment nine times out of 10." |
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The Now
Saturday, September 6, 2003
"Entrepreneurial innovator and Coquitlam resident Basil Peters will be in the spotlight Sept. 18, [2003] at the BC Institute of Technology's first annual Distinguished Alumni Awards evening." |
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BC Business
May 1991
"Peters and van der Gracht share the belief that entrepreneurship can be taught. After all, they learned a lot of what they know by reading the lessons of other companies and from Tom Holgate and Marc Phillips. 'The knowledge you need to run a business is transferrable. Marc and Tom were our business angels. They didn't just add money. It was more hands-on,' says Peters. 'As Mark and Tom helped us, we're trying to do that with some of the junior companies. We believe you can take all of the new business and management tools and make them work the same way as McDonald's makes a hamburger. Replication is an important part of our philosophy.'" |
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The Vancouver Sun
Saturday, November 8, 1986
"In an interview Friday, Peters said Nexus Engineering will have sales revenues of between $11 million and $12 million this year [1986]. About two-thirds of the sales will be generated in export markets." |
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Canadian Business
August 1986
"...when Peters and van der Gracht were classmates at the University of British Columbia's department of electrical engineering, it was all the two men could do to stop competing for grades and start working together on an electric-vehicle project that was displayed at Vancouver's 1976 UN Conference on Human Settlement. They agree the project taught them a lot. 'It was almost like a minibusiness,' says van der Gracht, 'and it was tough, because a lot of the employees were paid in beer in pizza.' |
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BC Business
July 1986 |
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