If you haven’t read or heard, Peter Adriaens and Tim Faley have provided their expertise for several hot topics in recent weeks. Peter Adriaens, a professor of entrepreneurship at the Zell Lurie Institute, offered his expert opinion on internet company valuations as Facebook filed its IPO. Additionally, Tim Faley, managing director of the Zell Lurie Institute, weighed in on his thoughts on entrepreneurial education for the Financial Times.
On Wednesday, February 1, 2012 Facebook filed their prospectus, which was highly anticipated for the startup turned social network giant. On the day the document was filed, Peter was featured on MSNBC as a source for the article, “Facebook offers plenty of reasons not to like its shares.” Peter analyzed the risk factors including the unknown total value of the company, and “restrictions on getting into China, which could hamper its growth.” Peter also compared Facebook to Groupon explaining, “if Facebook can keep costs down that’s good.”
The next day, Peter was featured in Forbes and VentureBeat. In Forbes, “Facebook Valuation: We Don’t Know What We Don’t Know,” Peter brought insight into how the value of Facebook may be affected by information not available in the prospectus such as the challenge to improve the click-through rate as well as the overseas laws which prohibit detailed data about users, which could impact future target-marketing. He concludes, “Careful analysis of the risks associated with its revenue streams almost certainly will mean that the hype and recent growth rates cannot be sustained, and that the initial offering will not be reflective of its valuation going forward.”
Peter was also featured in VentureBeat’s article, “What Facebook isn’t telling you about its risky ad business.” Peter argued, “Facebook, for its part, partially alluded to this potential risk in the S-1, but didn’t do so in a way that provided full transparency to would-be investors.”
VentureBeat had a follow up article, Facebook worth $94B, private market says, about the dollar value of Facebook. Peter pointed out, “the $100 billion number that has been circulated so widely… is all based on 5 percent of the shares being worth potentially $5 billion.”
While Peter provided expert opinion on the Facebook IPO, Tim Faley offered his perspective on entrepreneurial education. “Entrepreneurs are only taught half the lesson” focuses on how entrepreneurial education is incomplete and ends with a hopeful call to action for business schools to offer more well-rounded entrepreneurial curriculums. Tim’s opinion has spurred additional commentary responses such as this reaction in the Financial Times.
Check out the articles in their entirety below:
· MSNBC
· Forbes