Entrepreneurship

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March 21, 2015
University of Georgia School of Law, Athens GA

The ninth annual meeting of the Law and Entrepreneurship Association (LEA) will occur on March 21, 2015 in Athens, Georgia.  The LEA is a group of legal scholars interested in the topic of entrepreneurship—broadly construed.  Topics have ranged from crowdfunding to electronic contracting to issues of taxation in startups.

Our annual conference is an intimate gathering where each participant is expected to have read and actively engage with all of the pieces under discussion.  We call for papers and proposals relating to the general topic of entrepreneurship and the law.

Proposals should be comprehensive enough to allow the LEA board to evaluate the aims and likely content of papers they propose. Papers may be accepted for publication but must not be published prior to the meeting. Works in progress, even those at a relatively early stage, are welcome.  Junior scholars and those considering entering the legal academy are especially encouraged to participate. There is no registration fee, but participants must cover their own costs.

To submit a presentation, email Professor Usha Rodrigues at rodrig@uga.edu with a proposal or paper by February 1, 2015. Please title the email “LEA Submission – {Name}.&rdquo…

Effective as of January 1. 2015, Tennessee will allow Tennessee corporations to engage in intrastate offerings of securities to Tennessee residents over the internet without registration.  The new law, adopted earlier this year, is the direct result of a law-student-led movement.  The key student leader was one of my students, and he kept me informed about the effort as it moved along.  (I was called upon for advice and commentary from time to time, but the bill is all their work.)

In my experience, this kind of effort–a student-initiated, non-credit, extracurricular engagement in business law reform–is almost unheard of.  I was intrigued by the enterprise and impressed by its success.  As a result, I asked the student leader, Brandon Whiteley, now an alumnus, to send me some of his perceptions about drafting and proposing the bill and getting it passed.  

This is the first in a series of three posts that feature Brandon’s observations on the legislative process, the key influences on the bill, and the importance of communication.  This post highlights his commentary on the legislative process (which I have edited minimally with his consent).  I think you’ll agree that his wisdom and humor both shine through in this first installment (as well as the others).  His organizational capabilities also are evident throughout.

 . . . here‘s a relatively new Dodge Challenger commercial (part of a series) that you may find amusing.  I saw it during Saturday Night Live the other night and just had to go find it on YouTube.  It, together with the other commercials in the series, commemorate the Dodge brand’s 100-year anniversary.  “They believed in more than the assembly line . . . .”  Indeed!

You also may enjoy (but may already have read) this engaging and useful essay written by Todd Henderson on the case.  The essay provides significant background information about and commentary on the court’s opinion.  It is a great example of how an informed observer can use the facts of and underlying a transactional business case to help others better understand the law of the case and see broader connections to transactional business law generally.  Great stuff.

An early, brief look at some of the social enterprise data I have been collecting with Kate Cooney (Yale School of Management), Justin Koushyar (Emory University, PHD student) and Matthew Lee (INSEAD, Singapore Campus), is up on the Stanford Social Innovation Review (SSIR). 

The charts produced over at SSIR include the number of social enterprise statutes passed per year, total number of L3Cs and benefit corporations formed, and — the most difficult data to track down — the number of social enterprises formed by state.

We are still working to refine the state-by-state data, hope to continue to update it, and may use it for future empirical work. 

I watch a lot of Shark Tank episodes. Like most “reality shows,” Shark Tank is somewhat artificial. The show does not purport to be an accurate portrayal of how entrepreneurs typically raise capital, but I still think the show can be instructive. From time to time, mostly in my undergraduate classes, I show clips from the show that are available online.

Shark Tank
(creative commons image, no attribution requested)

After the break I share some of the lessons I think entrepreneurs (and lawyers advising entrepreneurs) can learn from Shark Tank. After this first list of lessons, I share a second list — things folks should not take from the show. 

CALL FOR PAPERS

Fourth European Research Conference on Microfinance

1-3 June 2015

Geneva School of Economics and Management, University of Geneva

Geneva, Switzerland

Access to suitable and affordable finance is a precondition for meeting basic human needs in incomes and employment, health, education, work, housing, energy, water and transport. Microfinance – and more broadly, financial inclusion – will continue to be on the research and policy agenda. 2015 will be a special occasion to question received notions about the link between access to finance and welfare. In 2015 the Millennium Development Goals will make place for the Sustainable Development Goals. A broad debate and exchange on micro, macro and policy topics in financial inclusion will advance our knowledge and ultimately improve institutional performance and policy. This applies in particular to issues of financial market organization, but also patterns, diversity and trade-offs in institutional performance, scope for fiscal instruments, impact of technology on efficiency and outreach etc.

The European Research Conference on Microfinance is a unique platform of exchange for academics involved in microfinance research. The three former conferences organized by the Centre for European Research in Microfinance (CERMI) at the Université Libre de Bruxelles in 2009, by the University of…

Received Saturday (edited slightly for publication here):

Dear Colleague,

Please consider submitting your work to the Track “Crowdfunding: a democratic way for financing innovative projects” @ the RnD Management Conference 2015.

The RnD Management Conference 2015 will be held in June 23-26 at Sant’Anna School of Advanced Studies in Pisa.

You can find more information on the Conference Track and on the submission process at the following link: http://www.rnd2015.sssup.it/.

I warmly apologize for cross-posting.

Best regards,

Cristina Rossi Lamastra, PhD

Associate Professor at Politecnico di Milano School of Management

Phone: 0039 0223993972

Fax: 0039 0323992710

Skype: crossi73

Web page: http://www.dig.polimi.it/index.php?id=308&tx_wfqbe_pi1[id]=52

Call for Papers

ITEM 6 – Lyon

Microfinance: Coaching, Counting, and Crowding

The Banque Populaire Chair in Microfinance of the Burgundy School of Business (France) organizes the 6th edition of the annual conference “Institutional and Technological Environments of Microfinance” (ITEM) in March 2015 (17, 18, 19) in Lyon, France. This conference was initially programmed in Tunis, Tunisia within the campus of l’École supérieure du commerce de Tunis.

The 6th edition brings together–but is not limited to–three major issues that are shaping the sector of microfinance:  Coaching, Counting, and Crowding.

Coaching in microfinance provides training in business and soft skills (attributes enhancing an individual’s interactions and self-performance) that the poor micro-entrepreneurs rarely have. Increasingly, microfinance academics and practitioners consider building the human capital of micro-entrepreneurs as a critical ingredient of moving out of poverty.

Counting and tracking the microfinance clients and prospects with information technologies not only lessen information asymmetry, but also lower the transaction cost of financial intermediation. Corollary: information technologies can open ways for offering financial services to the poor as a normal way of doing and extending normal business and accelerate their social integration. 

Crowding, based on Web 2.0 technologies, enables direct interactions between millions…

The below is from an e-mail I received earlier this week about an impact investment legal symposium on October 2, 2014 from 8:30 a.m. to noon (eastern):

Bingham, in conjunction with the International Transactions Clinic of the University of Michigan Law School, Aspen Network of Development Entrepreneurs (ANDE) Legal Working Group and Impact Investing Legal Working Group, is proud to present a legal symposium on Building a Legal Community of Practice to Add Still More Value to Impact Investments.

The symposium will be held at Bingham McCutchen LLP’s New York offices at 339 Park Avenue or you can attend virtually by registering here.

The panelists include Deborah Burand (Michigan), Jonathan Ng (Ashoka), Keren Raz (Paul Weiss), and many others.   

Call for Papers

ITEM 6 – Tunis, Tunisia

Microfinance: Coaching, Counting, and Crowding

The Banque Populaire Chair in Microfinance of the Burgundy School of Business (France) and l’École supérieure du commerce de Tunis jointly organize the 6th edition of the annual conference “Institutional and Technological Environment of Microfinance” (ITEM) in March 2015 (17, 18, 19) in Tunis, Tunisia.

The 6th edition brings together–but not limited to-three major issues, which are shaping the sector of microfinance: Coaching, Counting, and Crowding.

Coaching in microfinance provides training in business and soft skills (attributes enhancing an individual’s interactions and self-performance) that the poor micro-entrepreneurs rarely have. Increasingly, microfinance academics and practitioners consider building the human capital of micro-entrepreneurs a critical ingredient of moving out of poverty.

Counting and tracking the microfinance clients and prospects with the information technologies not only lessen information asymmetry, but also lower the transaction cost of financial intermediation. Corollary: information technologies can open ways for offering financial services to the poor as a normal way of doing and extending normal business, and accelerate their social integration. 

Crowding, based on the Web 2.0 technologies, enables direct interactions between millions of lending and borrowing people. Through crowdfunding, micro and…