Can a medtech start-up raise too much money? Most device CEOs today would see that as a nice problem to have. The corollary question long debated in management circles is whether a company should raise money when funding is available or only when necessary? During frothy or even ordinary times, you could find device CEOs coming down on both sides of that question. Now, however, with companies scrambling to survive the global economic collapse and the concomitant demise of much of medtech venture capital, there aren’t too many start-up CEOs who would criticize a colleague for going to the financing well for as much cash as possible.
That is the choice that Nadim Yared, CEO of Minneapolis-based CVRx Inc. faced in 2007. Of course, Yared did not know then of the impending economic collapse, nor did...