International venture capital plummets 63 percent in Q2
Overseas markets saw a sharp drop in venture capital investing in the second quarter, falling 63 percent since last year to $1.46 billion across 250 deals — the lowest it’s been for six years, according to Dow Jones VentureSource. To put this in context, $5.27 billion was invested in 595 deals in the U.S. during the same time period.
The data VentureSource collected comes from Canada, Israel, China, India and Europe. The second quarter’s investment total… Continue Reading
Q2 venture investing looks like it’s 2005 (and that’s a good thing)
Hey, that wasn’t so bad. Dow Jones VentureSource has released its data on venture capital investments during the second quarter of 2009, and while the numbers might look bleak in most years, given the broader context, they look … okay.
In Q2 (from April to June), venture capitalists invested a total of $5.27 billion in 595 deals. That’s pretty meager compared to the $8.33 billion invested in 726 deals during the same period last year but,… Continue Reading
Recordnet.com tries to save Stockton’s Fourth of July
Who says newspapers aren’t embracing the Internet? Stockton, a city in California’s San Joaquin Valley, had to cancel its July 4 fireworks celebration due to a tight budget. Don’t worry, though — the town’s paper is using the web to bring a a little light to bummed-out patriots.
True, people can always watch a fireworks ceremony on TV, but that just isn’t the same, is it? On a national broadcast, you can’t watch those colorful rockets… Continue Reading
New investments shrink as VCs spend more on insider rounds
Venture capital funding already looked pretty bleak, with VentureSource saying that venture investing dropped 50 percent between the first three months of 2008 and the same period in 2009. But the Wall Street Journal just published new numbers (again from VentureSource) making the picture seem grimmer still for companies hoping to attract new investors — as VCs invest less money overall, they’re spending more of their funds keeping existing portfolio companies going with “insider rounds.”
Here… Continue Reading
VentureSource: Worst venture liquidity in five years
Now that 2008 is over, we can officially declare it the worst year for U.S. venture liquidity since 2003 (when the industry was still feeling the effects of the bursting tech bubble). This year, venture-backed companies generated $24.1 billion through initial public offerings (IPOs) and mergers and acquisitions (M&As), down 58 percent from $57.6 billion in 2007, according to Dow Jones VentureSource.
That drop is particularly worrying when you consider that most of the deals happened… Continue Reading
European venture investments hit new low
European venture investments continued their decline in the second quarter of 2008 — there were only 167 deals completed, the fewest in at least nine years. A total of EUR 858 million was invested in Q2, marking a 35 percent drop from the same period last year, according to Dow Jones VentureSource.
That drop is particularly dismal when you realize that 2007 wasn’t exactly a banner year for venture investment either; in fact, it also represented… Continue Reading
Venture capital: Still white, still male, but getting better (maybe)
Even though well-educated women and minorities have been entering the workforce for years, the venture capital industry is still dominated by white men. But there are a few signs that things are changing.
In a new study from the National Venture Capital Association and Dow Jones VentureWire, men outnumbered women three-to-one among the more than 500 venture capital professionals who responded. The imbalance is even worse among the VCs actually doing the investing — namely, those… Continue Reading
Dow Jones: Web 2.0 investments peaking?
Investment in Web 2.0 start-ups may be peaking, according to new data from Dow Jones VentureSource. Among other warning signs is the fact that Facebook accounted for a whopping 22 percent of the $1.32 billion in Web 2.0 investments made in 2007.
The number of investments in Web 2.0 companies (namely, websites that emphasize social tools like social networks and blogging) increased 25 percent in 2007, from 143 deals to 178, VentureSource says. That seems pretty… Continue Reading
Roundup: Murdoch closer on WSJ, Scoop Bar, Wikia-Grub, Hitachi and more
Here’s the latest action:
Murdoch appears to have enough Bancroft family support for purchase –The jury is still officially out, but the NYT is saying it looks like Dow Jones and its jewel, the Wall Street Journal, will indeed to go to Murdoch’s News Corp.
Hakia’s Scoop Bar — Hakia, one of the new search engines trying to take on Google by using “semantic” technology, has released a so-called Scoop Bar, which takes you more directly to the text… Continue Reading