You may have heard last week that China-based Internet giant Alibaba Group filed to go public. Analysts believe Japan's SoftBank, which led a $20 million venture-capital investment back in 2000, now controls a stake that could be worth about $30 billion. Astronomical returns like that are out of the reach of most mortals, but the big scores from venture capital don't have to be. That is the thesis propounded by David Rose, a prominent New York VC investor behind such successes as ComiXology, a digital-comics retailer acquired last month by Amazon.com for an undisclosed sum, and Drop.io, which is now owned by Facebook.
