I've always wondered if a tweaked version of the DARPA model might work for VC's. The gist is that DARPA hires a bunch of PhD's (to limited terms) to serve as program managers. The PhD's have an area of expertise and a research agenda, but not specific ideas. During their tenure, they think of specific projects and get a few tens of millions to fund them. Obviously for a VC you'd want to pin down ideas into more concrete, less blue-sky sorts of things with correspondingly smaller budgets.<p>I think the real benefit to the model is that you decouple idea generation from execution. The guy who is an expert in a particular field and can analyze the literature to see what can be done isn't necessarily the right guy to bring a product to market. Indeed, that expert doesn't necessarily want to take all the risk entailed in bringing a product to market, but may be the person best positioned to determine what can and can't be done.
So here is the fundamental flaw in this model. Conflict of interest.<p>If I, as an entrepreneur, walk into the VCs doors to pitch them on something I have done and research I am doing - presumably without knowing that they have invested (or are investing in similar research with a view to taking that research into a commercial business) why should I feel comfortable knowing that they won't take my research and use it without me.<p>I know that a successful business is more than just 1 idea, but if two sets of eyes are looking at the same problem, both trying to build a business around it and 1 has some insight that the other doesn't....that's a competitive advantage. That could be used against the entrepreneur - given that VCs tend to not want to sign NDAs & non-competes before hearing pitches (understandably so).<p>So this whole VC investing in their own ideas, while also hearing pitches from founders....I am not too bullish on.<p>The potential for conflicts are just too great.<p>This is like having an EIR but worse....from the pitching entrepreneur's perspective anyway.