This course will teach you how to manage a startup’s financing strategy, where you will learn how to build capitalization tables (or “cap tables”) in Excel. Cap tables will help you explore different financing strategies for your startup company and determine which financing decisions are best for your entrepreneurial venture. You will also learn about innovations in the digital space that allow new ways to finance entrepreneurial ventures. These include different forms of crowdfunding, and alternative credit scoring mechanisms based on web-based data. This course concludes with a module featuring cutting edge research from Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business on the financial technology industry. In this module, you will learn how financial technology companies are disrupting the credit scoring industry by developing new methods for credit scoring using consumers’ digital footprints. In addition, you will explore how financial technology platforms have introduced new, experimental forms of financing, such as crowdfunding.
What you'll learn
Build capitalization tables in Excel to model startup financing scenarios
Evaluate different financing strategies and their impact on a startup's ownership structure
Understand crowdfunding as a financing mechanism for entrepreneurial ventures
Recognize how fintech companies use digital footprints for alternative credit scoring
Assess emerging experimental financing forms introduced by financial technology platforms
Course objectives
Manage a startup's financing strategy using quantitative tools
Determine optimal financing decisions for entrepreneurial ventures
Understand innovations in digital financing for startups