Twas The Night Before Funding (alternate title - If Santa Claus was a Venture Capitalist)

Twas the night before funding and all through the suite,

The servers were humming keeping watchful their beat.
The business plans sat neatly stacked on the chair,
In the hopes that some VC with vision would care.

Employees were nestled at home in their beds,
While visions of click-thru-rates danced in their heads.
Engineering was busy still testing the app,
While Biz Dev ran numbers on stealth market cap.

When out on the roof there arose such a clatter,
I sprang from my desk to see what was the matter.
Away to the window I flew like a flash,
Pried with my eco-pass and up came the sash.

The moon on the breast of my laptop’s dull glow,
(showed our UI’s new pages were rendering slow).
When what to my eyes on the roof should appear,
But a Mercedes sleigh pulled by gold-plated deer.

The carriage was parked by valet in the snow,
And I knew in a moment, he was loaded with dough.
More rapid than eagles his money he waved,
And the iPad he’d bought with start-ups he’d saved.

He had a broad face and a well-pampered gut,
And the wrappers from chocolates still stuck to his butt.
He was stately and stern, a nice Cuban he smoked,
And he winked at the team and continued to toke.

Red carpet was laid and trumpets they sounded
The CEO brought out the team that he’d founded,
We’re happy to help you with diligence due
And expect you could raise us a million or two?

He said not a word but went straight to his work,
He snapped for some coffee and turned with a jerk.
I’ll need to see spreadsheets of costs to inspect,
And make sure the backgrounds of VP’s are checked.

He called up our users to ask what they thought,
Of the value they got from the service they bought.
He asked for proposals on market position,
And customer plans for sales acquisition.

He spent hours inspecting each line of source code,
He tested each server’s security mode.
He bought sample product to check feature placement,
And searched partner contracts for legal defacement.

His silence he broke for a moment to stop,
To ask if our web app might work for his shop.
I have thousands of products for good girls and boys,
And I need a good tool to help them choose from my toys.

I can see that your product is just what I need,
To help them decide with precision and speed.
So I’ll give you your millions, with a couple to spare,
Since nothing like you on the markets compare.

And laying a finger aside of his nose,
He nodded his head - up the heat vent he rose!
He sprang to his sleigh, all his investors he dialed,
And said nothing more, just nodded and smiled.

As he flew, he yelled back, with a wise Ho Ho Ho
Why mess with the funding, just go IPO!