In news that’s not exactly unexpected, a mid-year survey shows that fundraising among U.S. venture capital firms is near low ebb, with the total raised so far at the lowest point since 2003, when 34 VC funds raised $2.2 billion in the first half of the year.
The survey released today by Dow Jones Private Equity Analyst shows shows 51 venture firms raised $5.1 billion nationwide during the first six months of 2009—down almost two thirds from last year, when 115 VC firms raised $13.6 billion.
The survey found similar results for fundraising by all types of private equity funds, not just venture capital, with 173 PE funds raising $54.9 billion during the first six months of 2009. That was 64 percent less than the $152.7 billion raised by 261 funds during the first half of 2008.
In a statement, Jennifer Rossa, the managing editor of Dow Jones Private Equity Analyst, said, “Right now, most venture firms are more concerned about conserving cash and helping portfolio companies survive than raising a new fund.”
The largest venture capital fund raised so far belongs to New Enterprise Associates of Baltimore, MD, which got $907 million for its eighth venture fund. The firm has said it intends to raise $2.5 billion for the fund, known as New Enterprise Associates XIII.
Author: Bruce V. Bigelow
In Memoriam: Our dear friend Bruce V. Bigelow passed away on June 29, 2018. He was the editor of Xconomy San Diego from 2008 to 2018. Read more about his life and work here.
Bruce Bigelow joined Xconomy from the business desk of the San Diego Union-Tribune. He was a member of the team of reporters who were awarded the 2006 Pulitzer Prize in National Reporting for uncovering bribes paid to San Diego Republican Rep. Randy “Duke” Cunningham in exchange for special legislation earmarks. He also shared a 2006 award for enterprise reporting from the Society of Business Editors and Writers for “In Harm’s Way,” an article about the extraordinary casualty rate among employees working in Iraq for San Diego’s Titan Corp. He has written extensively about the 2002 corporate accounting scandal at software goliath Peregrine Systems. He also was a Gerald Loeb Award finalist and National Headline Award winner for “The Toymaker,” a 14-part chronicle of a San Diego start-up company. He takes special satisfaction, though, that the series was included in the library for nonfiction narrative journalism at the Nieman Foundation for Journalism at Harvard University.
Bigelow graduated from U.C. Berkeley in 1977 with a degree in English Literature and from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism in 1979. Before joining the Union-Tribune in 1990, he worked for the Associated Press in Los Angeles and The Kansas City Times.
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