An empirical analysis of the market for formal venture capital: Evidence from the U.S.

The objective of this paper is to conduct an empirical analysis of the risk-return relationships in the formal venture capital market and compare such relationships with the trade-offs available through comparable investment vehicles. Based on ten years of market data, the performance of the venture capital companies (VCCs) is compared with that of the mutual funds as well as the broad market index. Test results from our study show that on average the VCCs well outperformed the comparable mutual funds as well as the market benchmark. The VCCs had the same level of risk as the high-growth mutual funds but yielded 9.5% more return on an annual basis. When ranked according to their performances, the VCCs occupied the top of the list.     

Developing a multivariate approach to monitor fuzzy quality profiles

Referring to several applications in which the response quality characteristic is fuzzy, this paper studies how the profile functional relationship between a fuzzy response variable and a predictor variable can be monitored by using a fuzzy regression model which is referred to as profile. The purpose of this paper is to develop a multivariate approach for monitoring process/product fuzzy quality profiles in phase I for applications where the quality characteristic is linguistic, imprecise, vague or deficient. The multivariate approach includes three fuzzy multivariate control charts which are developed by using fuzzy set theory to monitor fuzzy profiles in order to achieve an in-control process. The performance of developed approach is investigated on the basis of signal probability in various out-of-control scenarios through a simulation study. Compared with univariate approach, the results indicate a good performance of our multivariate approach in detecting all sized shifts in process profiles. A real case in tourism industry is utilized to show the applicability of the proposed approach.