In contrast to the big drops in Xconomy’s sister regions of the Pacific Northwest and Southern California, venture deals in New England seemed to hold up pretty well in the third quarter. All told, as Greg reported Saturday, the region’s venture capitalists ponied up some $834 million for 117 deals during the period. That was second only to Silicon Valley ($2.78 billion and 292 deals), and down barely 2 percent from the second quarter, versus a 7 percent drop nationwide.
I say they seemed to hold up because the figures above came from the quarterly MoneyTree report from PricewaterhouseCoopers and the National Venture Capital Association. But Dow Jones VentureSource data released simultaneously showed a much bigger falloff in New England: investment tumbled 23 percent to $769 million in 78 deals, according to their numbers. The two groups usually report the same general trends—both saw a 7 percent national decline in venture investments in Q3, for instance—but because of different reporting standards, they often differ on particulars, although not usually by this much. (I did notice that the Dow Jones numbers above are about $8 million lower than its state-by-state breakouts for New England show—it looks like they forgot Rhode Island, Vermont, and Maine in the big tally—but that still doesn’t explain the difference.)
Both groups, however, agreed that third-quarter investments were actually up over the first quarter.
In any case, below is a list of the New England top 10 venture deals for the quarter—topped by two Massachusetts biotech firms, which each raised $40 million—and the venture firms behind them.
— Link Medicine, Cambridge, MA — $40 million
Investors: Clarus Ventures, SV Life Sciences
— BG Medicine, Waltham, MA — $40 million
Investors: Flagship Ventures, GE Asset Management, Gilde, Humana Ventures, Individual Investors, Legg Mason
— Vanu, Cambridge, MA — $32 million
Investors: Charles River Ventures, Norwest Venture Partners*
— JumpTap, Cambridge, MA — $26 million
Investors: AllianceBernstein*, General Catalyst Partners, Redpoint Ventures, Summerhill Venture Partners, Valhalla Partners, WPP Group
— CambridgeSoft, Cambridge, MA — $21 million
Investors: Goldman Sachs Group
— Carbonite, Boston, MA — $20 million
Investors: 3i Group, CommonAngels, Menlo Ventures
— Eleme Medical, Merrimack, NH — $18 million
Investors: EDF Ventures, Hambrecht & Quist Capital Management, L Capital Partners*, Three Arch Partners
— Cara Therapeutics, Shelton, CT — $12.3 million
Investors: Ascent Biomedical Ventures, Connecticut Innovations, Devon Park Bioventures*, Mitsubishi
— Quanterix, Cambridge, MA — $10.86 million
Investors: Arch Venture Partners*, Bain Capital*, Flagship Ventures*
— NEXX Systems, Billerica, MA — $10.7 million
Investors: Enterprise Partners Venture Capital, Genevest Consulting Group, Individual Investors, Sigma Partners
* lead investor
Source: Dow Jones VentureSource
