The author has written a book for hard-working and imaginative people - entrepreneurs - who have a passion to create valuable technology, products, and companies. Whether you are an inventor with an idea, an aspiring entrepreneur of any age, or a highly experienced senior leader, your goal is to start with an idea and create a successfully-funded start-up company. The ability to navigate the entrepreneurial environment is enhanced by following the guidance provided by the serial entrepreneur and author of the book "The Smart Entrepreneur: The Book Investors Don't Want You to Read." Unlike many business books that only tell the reader what to do in general terms, the focus of this book is on the specific actionable activities and process-oriented details of "how" to execute in a disciplined manner and achieve success. So, why wouldn't an investor want you to read this book? Perhaps they would if they believed you would perfectly execute on the idea and plan you presented. However, nothing ever works perfectly. There are a multitude of reasons why the best expectations for a business are never realized. What happens when things don't go right? In the worst of circumstances investors secure greater control and equity through the funding agreements they originally made with the founders. The ability of investors to secure greater control and ownership lies at the heart of the entrepreneur's relationship with an investor. Avoiding pitfalls and preserving founder equity underpins the author's approach to entrepreneurship. The author has structured the chapters of the book around eleven chronological essential topics: (1) founder vision and invention, (2) due diligence by founders on the founding team, (3) incorporation mechanics, (4) technology and intellectual property development, (5) marketing and sales plan, (6) financial plan, (7) valuation of the opportunity, (8) business plan, (9) preparations for investment and investors, (10) investor network, and (11) leadership and early-stage company operations. The goals of this book are to help an entrepreneur: (1) achieve his/her vision, (2) maximize her/his enterprise's value and return on investment, (3) achieve results efficiently and preserve the equity of founders, (4) avoid catastrophic pitfalls, (5) minimize stress and uncertainty inherent in the processes. The book provides insights and guidance to help an entrepreneur negotiate the difficult issues that often delay or thwart success. The book is intended to help entrepreneurs maximize the starting value of the enterprise, preserve equity along the way, and provide help with early-stage management issues that can cause the entrepreneur to stumble and lose traction. This book also attempts to provide realism to the process of entrepreneurship by outlining what is reasonable and what is not. The author states that "as a founder and leader of your company, how you respond to challenges makes a difference in the success of your endeavor. It is good to be realistic about entrepreneurship. If you are aware of how things might work, and might not work, it will make you more keenly aware of what needs to be done to best assure success. That is why I wrote this book."
About the Author: Rocky Richard Arnold is a hands-on executive with a track record of successful accomplishments in business, technology, and science. He provides strategic corporate and capital acquisition advice to early-stage companies founded by entrepreneurs who wish to successfully commercialize high-value creation opportunities, ideas, and/or technologies. Rocky earned Civil Engineering degrees at Stanford University, a Ph.D. in 1983 and an M.S. 1980. He received an MBA from Notre Dame de Namur University in 1993 specializing in marketing. He secured a B.S.in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Missouri at Rolla in 1970. He learned military leadership principles in the U.S. Army Reserve Officers Training Corps (ROTC) program where he was a distinguished graduate (top 5%). He served in the U.S. Army Reserves for eight years ultimately attaining the grade of Captain. He subsequently went on to MIT where he got an M.S. in Mechanical Engineering in 1972 specializing in acoustics and nonlinear vibration. Rocky worked at the United Technologies Corporation (UTC) as Head of the Motor Case Structural Analysis Group in 1981. His team worked on the Inertial Upper Stage (IUS) program sponsored by NASA and the U.S. Air Force. Working at the Ford Aerospace & Communications Company (FACC), he was the lead structural analysis engineer on the first all-graphite composite supporting structure for a new generation of commercial satellites. Rocky worked at a forensic engineering company as Director of RD&E for 12 years. He was a Principal Investigator on, and proposal writer of, over 20 Phase I/II/III Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) programs. In 1993, Rocky started a business consulting firm. He worked with a myriad of inventors, entrepreneurs, investment bankers, and venture capitalists involved with technology start-ups. He also taught a graduate-level course in entrepreneurship at the graduate school of the Notre Dame de Namur University. Rocky co-founded a technology company in 2000, acquired key patents and a manufacturing facility, and secured funding from his network of friends and angels. He led the company as CEO for over five years and secured funding from U.S. and international private equity sources. He and his investor-supporters accomplished a reverse merger and took the entity public in the UK on AIM in 2004. He served as the CEO of the public entity and later took the role of CTO and Executive VP, as well as continuing as a Board member.