With grant deadlines, business plans and (a little bit) of summer vacation, blogging has not been on the priority list. While I haven’t been posting, I have been reading many different blogs.

Over the past few months, I have been working with a few different start-up companies to develop their business plans. Business planning can be a daunting task and one of the greatest challenges is determining what to include and the level of detail required. David Pasieka from MaRS just posted a great list of business plan tips “Tips for bright & not blurry eyed business plans“. His point about following business plan protocol made me laugh – I can’t even count how many times I have read the “[we are] so unique . . . [we have] no competitors” line. When I was working in venture capital, that line often equalled a due diligence fail.

Another element of business planning is translating technical information for the non-technical reader. I usually work with technology companies (in the life science, biotech and ICT sectors) and frequently cut significant amounts of technical detail from business plans. The business plan should be about the business (not about the technology) therefore only necessary details of the technology should be included. For example, it isn’t necessary to explain how antibodies bind to their antigens or include the specific binding sequence – it is more important to explain the (better, faster, cheaper) attributes of the technology and how you plan to get it to market. Business plans are about outlining the path to success for the businesses and engaging the interest of potential financiers and partners. Once you engage their interest, you can break out the enormous technical due diligence packages for them to review to their heart’s content.

Chris Arsenault just posted a refreshingly optimistic post on the Canadian venture capital industry here.

Chris’ blog (and his twitter) are really worth following especially if you are interested in learning about Canadian vc activity and issues of interest to Canadian technology entrepreneurs.

His current post hits a little close to home (in a good way) because he talks about Kirchner & Company as taking a leadership role in the future of Canadian VC. (Kirchner & Co are managing the exit process for the fund that let me skim my toes in the water of early stage venture capital.) There are days when I miss that work – sometimes things are so much simpler when you are on the have side of the money equation!