Corey Leibow eased the car back on the road Sand Hill in Palo Alto, California. As president and chief executive officer of Mercado, a company that provided search and merchandising technology to power retail websites, he just met with other venture capital (VC) firms in an effort to raise $ 26 million Series E round of financing. It was in June 2008 and is now offered as Mercado on premise and on-demand or "software as a service (SaaS)" versions of their applications. Despite the fact that the income from both solutions were expected to grow over 80 percent this year , Leibow found that investors generally pushed for a hybrid approach to the distribution company. Some VCs are Mercado wanted to focus solely on its traditional business enterprise, based on the eternal, on-premise licensing model. Other investors preferred to see Mercado turned into pure play SaaS company . Leibow knew he had to make a decision quickly to raise the capital needed, but he also wondered if it was possible to continue pursuing both angles. choice he would have made a significant impact Mercado sales and R & D team as well as which the company's customers targeted and how it will be to attract and retain them. "Hide
by Bethany Coates, Mark Leslie, James Lattin Source: Stanford Graduate School of Business 21 pages. Publication Date: July 10, 2008. Prod. #: E296 -PDF-ENG
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