Problems of Data Collection, Processing and Use of Informal Venture Capital

During the exploration of informal venture capital the authors of the work frequently came across with various definitions of such terms as informal investors and business angels. This research showed that various investigators, organizations and associations have different interpretation of the above-mentioned terms and, accordingly, use them differently. The analysis carried out during this work allows one to confirm that, in process of data collection on the number of informal investors and business angels and its processing, a distortion of data describing the number of business angels takes place in some cases. The problem is that, even if the procedure is correct but the inquiry-making quality is poor, a significant distortion of data is possible. In the authors’ opinion, some mistakes in detection of the number of business angels can occur due to different understanding and usage of definition of business angels, and incorrect methods and organization of numeric data collection.