eBoys

The First Inside Account of Venture Capitalists at Work

By: Randall E. Stross

Narrated by: Eric Conger

Length: 11 hrs and 4 mins

Publisher's summary

The first inside account of life within a Silicon Valley venture capital firm, eBoys is the fascinating true story of the six tall men who backed eBay, Webvan, and other billion-dollar start-ups that are transforming the Internet and setting a new pace for the economy.

Randall Stross, author of acclaimed books on Microsoft and Steve Jobs, blends a business historian's perspective with a journalist's flair for suspenseful storytelling to look at wealth creation up close. For two years, Stross gained unprecedented access to the venture capitalists at Benchmark, an upstart firm founded by thirtysomething renegades whose average height happens to be 6'5. Since Benchmark's founding in 1995, each partner's net worth has increased, on average, $100 million annually.

Stross was present as the Benchmark boys debated which businesses to support, and by recounting their conversations in testosterone-rich detail, he offers listeners the most precise and enlightening account of the ways in which venture capitalists think, evaluate prospects, and wield influence.

The author also gained access to a number of the Benchmark-backed start-ups, including a small, privately held San Jose company called eBay. The value of the company grew from $20 million to more than $21 billion within two years of Benchmark's investment, an increase of 100,000 percent. Business Week called it "probably the best venture capital investment of all time."

©2000 by Randall E. Stross
(P)2000 Random House, Inc.

Critic reviews

"This eye-opening first-hand account of the young, gutsy, and mega-rich entrepreneurs who are financing today's hottest Web-based businesses will leave you gasping." (Glenn Brenner, author of The Emperors of Chocolate)

Good entertaining read

Great entertaining read on the efforts made by several of the popular internet startups to get funding and start in the internet boom years.

Only two quirks, seems to jump around date wise as the different projects (ebay, webvan, art.com, etc) are followed. And the book took place in 2000 so the stories are a bit dated.

Intriguing look into venture capital

Although a bit dated (from the pre-tech crash era), a thoroughly engrossing view of how venture capital works. Lots about the development of EBay.

excellent book

This author actually gets inside the venture shop and tells you what each member of the team is thinking, what motivates them, how they view their entrepreneur investees.

And then the bubble burst

I felt like this whole book was leading up to a climactic moment that never arrived.

The other shoe never dropped. Even though, as we all know, it did.

Strong Language Alert

This is a fascinating book but it contains numerous sections of densely packed profanity. I know there are two schools of thought on this, to include crude profanity or not to. However, I found the straightforward reporting (sans the macho quotes from overamped venture capitalists) to be engrossing. But hearing an F-bomb every few minutes was too jarring and I reluctantly had to abandon ship.

This book is not safe to listen to with kids in the car with you...

Boring

I found this one hard to get through. The writer did a horrible job of keeping focus and the story was all over the place. I would recommend Dot.bomb before this one. The only exciting part of the book was eBay's IPO and "the outage." Other than that, a totally snoozer. I couldn't wait for it to be done and I'm glad it's finally finished.

Excellent

Great content and a great story.

Art of Not Finishing

While I enjoyed many of the historical insights, the exchanges and minute details got in the way and slowed down the story. The opening is colorfully painted with cursing which might turn off some readers. I ultimately decided not to finish it about 1/3 of the way.

Fantastic

Fascinating !