Roughly nine out of ten early-stage bets fail to return their investors' money. Across a typical portfolio, something like one in ten produces the outsized winner that makes the whole portfolio work. And more than half of the positions you hold will likely hand back less than you put in. That is the ordinary, expected math of investing in early-stage companies, even for professionals who do this for a living.

Roughly nine out of ten early-stage bets fail to return their investors' money. Across a typical portfolio, something like one in ten produces the outsized winner that makes the…

Over years of studying some of history's greatest venture capital successes, Luke Lango has developed a straightforward framework for evaluating young companies before they ever…