In our report in conjunction with BizTech@Wharton entitled the Evolving World of eCommerce, we highlighted a variety of statistics about eCommerce investment and M&A trends since 2008 for those areas of eCommerce being covered as part of the BizTech@Wharton conference.
One statistic we highlighted in the report (instructions on how to get the free report at the end of this brief) was that since 2008, there have been 81 acquisition transactions in the following areas of eCommerce: Flash Sales, Daily Deals, Alternative Currencies, Sharing Economy/Collaborative Commerce, CrowdFunding and Subscription eCommerce. As can be seen, M&A activity in these areas of eCommerce is significantly accelerating as well.
Continue reading “eCommerce M&A Activity – 81 Acquisition Transactions Since 2008” »
In our report in conjunction with BizTech@Wharton entitled the Evolving World of eCommerce, we highlighted a variety of statistics about eCommerce investment and M&A trends since 2008 for those areas of eCommerce being covered as part of the BizTech@Wharton conference.
One statistic we highlighted in the report (instructions on how to access the free report at the bottom of this research brief) was that since 2008, there has been $4.1 billion invested in 203 financing transactions in the following areas of eCommerce: Flash Sales, Daily Deals, Alternative Currencies, Sharing Economy/Collaborative Commerce, CrowdFunding and Subscription eCommerce .
Continue reading “Venture Capital Investment in eCommerce – Since 2008, $4.1 Billion Invested in 203 Deals” »
With our quarterly venture capital report for Q4 2011 having just come out, we inevitably will get questions when the Dow Jones VentureSource report eventually comes out a couple weeks later about why the data is different. We did a comparison some time ago of venture capital databases, but since we get the question pretty regularly, we figured we’d document our answer publicly.
Dow Jones VentureSource is just not that good.
That was simple. By not that good, we mean Dow Jones VentureSource data is not that accurate, complete or timely.
Let us explain why.
It comes down to Dow Jones VentureSource having an outdated data aggregation model. It wasn’t always outdated. In fact, it was the right model in 1992…
Continue reading “Dow Jones VentureSource Data – It’s Not That Good” »
Venture capitalists weren’t bashful in Q4 2011 showering 755 companies with $7.6 billion in venture funding. Q4’s performance brought 2011’s total to $30.6B invested in 3051 deals which marked a 10-year high for the VC asset class on both deals and dollars.
Let the talk of a bubble begin in 3, 2, 1…
Here are some of 2011′s highlights.
The Fat Venture Capital Funnel
With 2011’s results, the bubble talk will shift into overdrive. The reality is that VC funding is a funnel. More companies get Series A than B than C – etc, etc. Within tech, our data shows the VC funnel has gotten fat at the top (a lot of Series A and Seed deals). And VC Darwinism means that not all of these companies can or should receive Series B, C, etc. While some would rightfully say this is the way markets work, for a company raising money, this dynamic will represent a “chokepoint”. Some will receive funding, some will die quickly, some will get acq-hired or be asset sales get dressed up as acquisitions, some will be orphaned and figure out a way to make money and become steady real businesses and some will die a slower, more tortured death.
Continue reading “2011 Venture Capital Report – A Record Year with $30.6 Billion Invested in 3051 Deals” »
Earlier today, Forbes released its annual list of America’s top 100 private companies aka Forbes’ America’s Most Promising Companies. This was the largest list of private companies ever done by Forbes due largely in part to their use of CB Insights’ Mosaic software (learn more about Mosaic here). Mosaic’s software mines the web for digital information left behind by companies and these “digital footprints” are used to assess the strength or weakness of companies.
While we have plenty of exciting product and other updates coming out about Mosaic in the near future, we wanted to use this post to congratulate the 100 amazing companies who were honored by Forbes. These are companies who are leading in some giant markets and which are poised for big things for many years to come.
You can learn more about these impressive companies and their growth by visiting Forbes America’s Most Promising Companies section here. An article about the top 20 in particular is here which is def worth a read as well. Congratulations again to all of the deserving top private companies who made the list.
For our subscribers, all the company profiles are on CB Insights, and you can just click here for a complete list (hit the link after you login). This will not just give you the list but their profiles will include their prior investment history, if any. This, of course, is very handy for VCs and PE investors.
Below is the list of Forbes top 100 private companies.
Continue reading “Forbes Announces America’s Top Private Companies of 2011 with Help of CB Insights Mosaic” »
As part of the BizTech@Wharton conference this Friday, we’ve put together a free report (see below) which details investment funding and M&A trends to some of the fast growing segments of eCommerce including:
- Flash sales (Gilt Groupe, One Kings Lane, etc)
- Daily deals (LivingSocial, Peixe Urbano, etc
- Subscription eCommerce (H. Bloom, ShoeDazzle, etc)
- Alternative currencies (TrialPay, BOKU, etc)
- CrowdFunding (Kickstarter, IDEAME, etc)
- Sharing Economy / Collaborative Commerce (Airbnb, RelayRides, etc)
Continue reading “BizTech@Wharton and CB Insights Partner on the Evolving World of eCommerce” »
We commented on a post on Hacker News which linked to a TechCrunch post that suggested that to close this week’s venture capital neurosis, aka the Series A crunch, we need to start more VC funds. We have copied our comment from the HN post below for your viewing pleasure with some edits for clarity.
Continue reading “Impractical Solutions to Non-Existent Problems – Start More Venture Capital Funds to Close the Series A Gap” »
This past week’s venture capital drama centered on race & gender in Silicon Valley (last week’s drama was about a fictitious startup cash crunch in case you missed it). As as is customary with the topic of race and gender, there were some reasoned arguments and some name calling. And as is even more often the case with race & gender, there was very little to no data beyond a couple of anecdotes and the gut feelings of a couple of individuals.
Data — that’s what we bring to the conversation.
So attached below is the Human Capital Venture Capital report which is the only real study of VC-backed founders and their race, gender, education, age and founding team composition ever done. There are some interesting insights that can be gathered from it, and the best part is that it’s data-based and not based on a couple of folks anecdotal viewpoints.
Continue reading “Some Data on Race, Gender, Silicon Valley, Venture Capital – Since This is a Hot Topic Again and Nobody Except Us Has Data” »
New York’s venture capital scene, compared to California or Massachusetts, is tremendously lopsided in favor of tech, and this trend continued in Q3 2011′s venture capital numbers. In fact, Q3 2011 saw 78% of financing dollars and 85% of deals in NY go to tech-focused industries. To see how different NY’s orientation towards tech is, you need to just compare it to to Massachusetts where 21% of financing dollars and 47% of deals went to tech in Q3 2011. As will be obvious from the numbers, Massachusetts venture capital scene has greater exposure to other areas like energy and healthcare.
The data comparing Massachusetts to New York on its venture capital totals in Q3 2011 is provided below.
Continue reading “New York Venture Capital – Is the Lack of Industry Diversity a Positive or Its Achilles Heal?” »
Dow Jones VentureSource revealed its Q3 2011 venture capital report this morning, and we wanted to congratulate them on confirming what CB Insights had revealed in our Q3 Venture Capital Activity Report issued more than a week ago.
Specifically, they did do a nice job restating our earlier findings including:
- Early stage activity is up (more details on that here)
- NY overtook Massachusetts on both VC deals & dollars
- VC levels are back to pre-recession levels
- Medical device companies were a hot area in healthcare
Below is a side-by-side comparison of our 2011 year-to-date data vs. Dow Jones VentureSource.
