It is hard being a founder of a startup. Most fail.

See this article in the Wall Street Journal.

In an ironic twist of fate, I believed in Goodmail while I was at AOL and did the partnership deal with them as noted within.

I was saddened to read about their ultimate fate after I left the company. I believed in what they were doing.

I was also surprised to see that only about 11 percent of all startups have an exit (get acquired, conduct an IPO) of some sort. We have been very fortunate with some of our investments as venture capitalists in that we participated in several companies that have had an IPO; or were acquired.

This capital that we invest is true risk capital – and a win, as noted, is rare. This article should be headlined “Venture Capital’s Dirty Little Secret.”