A new book exploring how entrepreneurs, investors and venture capitalists operate is a useful guide to VC and angel investing.

Venture capital is not a major asset class – or at least not yet – for wealth managers and family offices – but it is certainly a notable one and there are signs it is becoming more so. While it can be a risky asset class, the long-term time horizons associated with the business of trying to find the next Skypes, Googles and Facebooks is well-suited to audiences such as wealthy families.

In a recently published book, The Entrepreneurial bible To Venture Capital, (McGraw Hill) by Andrew Romans, some of the challenges are set out that venture capitalists, and the businesses aiming to get VC funding, confront. Romans, who is based in the US, is co-founder and co-chairman of Georgetown Angels, a group of “angels” investing in seed rounds for technology startups. He is also the founder and general partner of the Founders Club, a venture capital equity exchange fund. So he brings plenty of hands-on experience to explaining some of the head-spinning jargon and terminology of what VC is about.

And there are plenty of terms to try and remember: angels, “super-angels”; pledge funds; term sheets; pre-money caps; convertible note financings; IRRs, and venture debt. There is a lot of useful advice on how to deal with lawyers and accountants; how to make a good pitch to a venture capitalist for funds; how to avoid being too greedy and also how to protect your ideas and intellectual property. Much of the book is about the nuts and bolts of either being a venture capitalist or an entrepreneur trying to get VC money. Romans tends to mix up his own observations on the industry with lots of commentaries from professionals in the industry. This brings in lots of colour. The book is snappily written with lots of lists and descriptions that are easy to read; the style is slick and manages to avoid being too breathless in pace. It is 233 pages long, but feels shorter.

For investors such as family offices, there are a few words on how VC ought to be approached: “Historically, family offices have participated as passive investors relying on institutional fund managers to invest their capital. Family office managers are now seeing an increased opportunity to develop their own in-house teams for direct investment or as an active coinvestment partner with institutional funds. These family-sponsored investors deploy funds through majority and minority investment strategies in real estate, buyouts, venture capital, lending and financial instruments.”

“The clear trend is that family offices are growing tired of investing into a blind pool VC or PE fund and want an increased ability to select which they want to fund on a deal-by-deal basis. We are seeing more and more family offices employ fund managers to coinvest with VCs and, in many cases, compete directly with VCs. It is typically easier to access VCs than family offices,” he adds.

Venture capital as an asset class is one that the private banking and family office industry needs to more aware of than perhaps it now is. This is not a book aimed exclusively at the wealth industry, and it is mainly focused, as far as one can tell, at America, with some coverage of Europe. There will, therefore, be plenty of scope, one hopes, for an update. It is certainly a useful guide to the sector.