December 30, 2002 Letters To FORTUNE VCs in the Dark Your depiction of a "world of pain" that is the venture capital business was done in an appropriate chiaroscuro ("Too Much Ventured, Nothing Gained," Nov. 25). The dark? Billions lost to the bubble. The light? The $90 billion currently sitting on the sidelines. The question is, How can we get that money back into play? The answer is that the venture capital industry has to retool and reassert itself as a provider of intellectual capital. Eighty percent of the work of a VC firm should take place after its money is invested. Venture capital firms also have to stop behaving like settlers massing on one piece of overoccupied space — as they did in e-commerce and telecom — and start acting, and working hard, as pioneers. Mark Saul Partner, Foundation Capital Menlo Park, Calif.