????“創業101” 在線課程指出，聰明的創業者會儲備現金，特別是當他們正打算開辟一個全新市場時。明智的投資者將獎勵堅持這一原則的創業者，那些上市公司的投資者就更是會關注資金去向。那么，為什么會有這么多錢涌向所謂的“獨角獸公司”呢？這樣的企業有90多家，其價值均在10億美元以上，有的超過100億美元，甚至500億美元。

????以從事辦公室共享業務的初創公司WeWork為例，它剛剛宣布了新一輪融資計劃，完成后其估值將超過100億美元。和同樣從事辦公室租賃的波士頓地產公司相比，WeWork的市值已超過后者一半以上。波士頓地產擁有的房產面積超過4500萬平方英尺（418.5萬平方米），而且以高端寫字樓為主。WeWork則正好相反，它出租的辦公室面積為350萬平方英尺（32.55萬平方米），散布于美國各地，還有幾處在國外。顯然，投資者的預期是WeWork將改變人們的工作方式，進而可能讓他們的生活方式發生變化，甚至還有可能改變公司的組織形式。

????這樣的預期也許不會成真。

????預示市場泡沫可能萎縮（甚至直接破裂）的早期危險信號有很多。“創業101”法則普遍遭到無視就是其中之一。一些獲得風險投資的公司燒錢速度非常快。目前情況還好，前提是投資者繼續撒錢。但這種情況可能給WeWork這樣的公司留下軟肋，原因是它放棄了成本固定的長期租賃業務，只把辦公場地短期租給小公司。如果此類需求枯竭，WeWork就會陷入困境。而“創業101”的黃金法則就是盡量降低固定成本，以便應對這種局面。

????那么問題來了，如果那些基本上不會成為客戶的投資者停止“輸血”，這些公司就得開始從真正的用戶那里獲取相當大的一部分資金。按照以往的經驗，此時它們就會“原形畢露”，而且這也將成為一個轉折點，此后這些公司可能會相當快地陷入現金斷流的境地。這就說明，它們的經營模式依賴于大量資金的持續投入，就像許多所謂的獨角獸公司一樣。在投資者變得小心謹慎后，這些公司要么“忽悠”前者繼續投資，要么就會遇上大麻煩。

????另一個早期警示是一些投資者開始質疑初創公司的會計方法。就像對新業務模式的直觀印象和宣傳推廣支撐起了上一次科技泡沫，最終，這些公司也得使用人們信得過的衡量標準。投資者已將某些行業整個列為禁區，比如約會網站。

????觀察人士已經注意到，股市無法一下子消化所有的“獨角獸公司”。此外，硅谷風險資本家馬克?安德森發現，如今的初創公司創始人從未在資金緊張的情況下進行過決策。他形象地說，這些創始人有可能“蒸發”。

????那么，了解上述情況有什么用呢？預測贏家和輸家的難度非常大，但推斷其后果就容易得多。

????對準備充分的老牌企業來說，初創公司崩盤帶來的機會可能令人咋舌。大批非常出色的人才將會失業，或者他們所在的公司可能出現虧損并陷入停滯。這些人對于到大型傳統企業工作的興趣將陡然上升。此前處于瘋狂水平的薪資和股權報酬要求將更貼近歷史正常水平。辦公場地租金將下跌（嗯哼，WeWork會怎樣可想而知）。尚未大量應用的優良技術將變得唾手可得，獲取成本也會大幅下降。

????在這些初步影響的基礎上再略微延伸一下大家就會發現，向科技公司提供服務的行業將出現連鎖反應，這種情況將再次創造以可接受成本進行收購或實施行業整合的機會。不過，只要有精明的頭腦和充分的準備，從中獲得好處的就不僅僅是大公司。確實用心學習過“創業101”的創業者也可能成為受益者。（財富中文網）

????譯者：Charlie

????校對：詹妮

????In entrepreneurship 101, the golden rule is to keep your fixed costs as low as possible to ride out the lean times.

????Entrepreneurship 101 suggests that smart startups conserve their cash, particularly if they are the kinds of startups that are trying to create entirely new markets. Savvy investors are supposed to reward the founders who adhere to this principle, and investors in public companies are even more likely to ask questions about where their money is going. Why then, is so much money sloshing around the so-called unicorns, the 90-plus firms worth more than a billion … more than 10 billion … more than 50 billion …?

????For perspective, consider that office-sharing startup WeWork just announced a financing round that would put the company’s market capitalization atover $10 billion, more than half the market capitalization of Boston Properties, Inc., an office leasing competitor. Boston Properties owns more than 45 million square feet of real estate, with a focus on high-priced areas for offices. WeWork, in contrast, leases 3.5 million square feet scattered around the U.S. and in a few global locations. Clearly, investors’ expectations are that the small firm is going to revolutionize the way people work, then later maybe the way they live, and then perhaps even the form corporations will take.

????Or maybe not.

????The early warning signs of a bubble potentially deflating (if not popping outright) are many. One is the widespread disregard of Entrepreneurship 101—burn rates at some of these venture-backed companies are very high. So far, so good, if investors keep pouring in cash. But it can leave a company like WeWork vulnerable, because it takes out long leases at fixed cost and rents out spaces to small players in the short term. If demand dries up for those spaces, WeWork is still stuck with the leases. The golden rule in entrepreneurship 101 is to keep your fixed costs as low as possible to ride through any such scenario.

????Here’s the problem: Once the cash stops coming in from people who are basically not customers, money has to start coming in at a pretty good clip from people the companies actually sell things to. If history repeats itself, the arrival of an “emperor has no clothes” moment is a tipping point which can shut off the fund flows pretty quickly. That in turn means that companies whose business models depend on continued, significant investment—like many of the so-called unicorns—will either be able to sweet talk now-wary investors into continuing the party, or they are going to run into serious trouble.

????A few other early warnings—some investors are starting to question startups’ accounting practices. Like the eyeball-counting and talk of new business models that fueled the last tech bubble, eventually these companies have to agree on numbers people can trust. Some entire sectors are being declared off-limits by investors, such as dating websites.

????Observers are already noting that the public markets can’t absorb all those unicorns at once. Moreover, as Marc Andreessen has observed, today’s startup founders have never made decisions in a tight-money environment. They are likely, as he picturesquely observed, to be “vaporized.”

????All right, knowing all this, what does it mean? What is very hard to predict is who the winners and losers will be. What is much less hard to predict is the aftermath.

????For the established organization that is well prepared, the opportunity presented by a crash is potentially staggering. An awful lot of very talented people, facing an actual loss of their jobs or the prospects of working for a money-losing venture that isn’t getting traction, are going to suddenly get a lot more interested in talking to the recruiters from Big Old Company X. Crazy salary levels and demands for equity will come back to more historical norms. Office space prices will drop (ahem, WeWork?). Good technologies that have not yet been scaled will be far more readily available, and at far better prices.

????Moving a little further away from the immediate impacts, you’ll see the ripple effects in the services provided to the tech companies, which can again create affordable opportunities to make acquisitions or consolidate a sector. But not only big companies can benefit if they are smart and well-prepared. The entrepreneur who did heed the lessons of Entrepreneurship 101 is also likely to be among the beneficiaries.