Volume 2 / Number 1 / Introduction

The Articles in this issue of The Journal of Small and Emerging Business Law were presented at the 1997 Lewis & Clark Law Forum, entitled Financing Innovation: The Future of Capital Formation for Small and Emerging Businesses. The Forum was hosted by the Northwestern School of Law of Lewis & Clark College on September 26, 1997. The mission of the Lewis & Clark Law Forum is to attract leading scholars to the Law School for open intellectual discussions of legal issues of national and international importance.
During the past two decades, unprecedented advances in information technology have generated a voracious demand for capital to finance the development of new products. Today, powerful personal computers, linked by telephone lines and satellites in a World Wide Web, provide nearly instantaneous access to information almost anywhere in the world. These technological advances have not only increased the demand for capital, they have changed the ways in which capital is supplied. From the recent explosion of venture capital to the advent of Internet securities offerings, finance is evolving with technology to meet the needs of businesses. Participants in the 1997 Lewis & Clark Law Forum considered the relationship between technological and financial innovation and suggested ways in which laws relating to venture capital, commercial lending, and public capital markets might evolve to better facilitate the development and growth of small businesses.