VENTURE CAPITALISTS NOW SERVICE PROVIDERS.

Software, as a packaged product, is just about dead. The

Frank Mendicino Ill understands. "Good VC firms are about what they do after the check is written," says Mendicino, a partner in Access Venture Partners, a VC firm with offices in Denver and Austin, Texas. "Companies need capital, and the investment is important. But with the public markets shut down as a way to raise money, the other stuff we do is most important."

Mendicino and three partners closed their first, $34 million fund in February 2000, just in front of last year's massive market correction. The four partners had spent years with Woodside Fund, a successful Silicon Valley-based firm.

From 1996 to the first quarter of 2000, "You had to be pretty stupid not to make money in our business, Mendicino said. "Things were so overheated it was like falling off a log. We had companies in our 1996 fund who never made a dollar, and we sold them for $250 million. That's not going to happen anymore,"

No, it's not.

Companies need to make money or die, and they're likely to take the check-writers down with them. The smart VCs are helping their clients in three key areas:

* Recruiting. Startups need good people, and the right people in the right jobs. A good VC will help find the management team, get its players into the right positions, and keep an eye on the org chart to make sure the people and the jobs stay well-matched as time goes on. A lack of good people, or even having good people in the wrong jobs, can turn a company into the kind of cash-burning machine that is no longer tolerated.

* Value and strategy. Small companies looking to survive in the less-kind, less-gentle world of Bush II need to be, as Mendicino says, either a vitamin that can help customers grow revenues or an aspirin that helps them cut costs. A good VC firm will help a company make its message clear and help its sales team convince potential customers of the company's value.

* Raising more money. From mezzanine investors to investment banks and even the public markets, new companies need more cash than the VC investment. A good VC helps it make new contacts, assists in making presentations, and provides follow up.

Times have changed for venture capitalists. "But this is a good time to be in the business," Mendicino says. "You just have to provide a little more."