James Brocket of Headhunters CallibreOne has been busy compiling a great list of VC investments in tech companies (PDF). Why? Because they do a lot of work for VC backed companies. The number are encouraging – surprising, even, given the doom and gloom in the wider economy.
Nic Brisbourne DFJ Espirit pulled out some good points: More venture capital appeared in Europe in Q1 than ever before – the $1.3bn total was a lot higher than the previous peak in the first quarter of 2007. The UK lead the pack with $592m of deals, more than the previous three quarters combined. The average deal size for Europe broke $10m for the first time, boosted by big deals in the UK including $100m in Spinvox. The average deal size in the UK was $11.9m which is higher than the US figure of $11.6m.
In Ireland the numbers also look encouraging. Total capital invested for the last quarter was $12.6m across two investments which contrasts with $8.4m invested in the first quarter last year across three.
However, the numbers probably mask the seed/early stage market. I counted only four deals in the $1-$2m range, and anything below that was rarely announced or just too small to be picked up by CallibreOne. An anecdotally, we know that investment in early stage startups is probably going down right now.
I have pulled out the relevant parts from the PDF (apologies for the messy list I will tidy it up shortly) and bolded the Web companies relevant to TechCrunch readers.
United Kingdom
Q1 2007
Month – Company – Total – ($US) – Investors
7-Feb Vizimo 1,422,000 Northstar Equity Investors, Private Investors
10-Feb Quick TV 1,738,000 NorthStar Equity Investors
10-Feb Seatwave 25,000,000 Fidelity Ventures, Atlas Venture, Mangrove Capital Partners, Adinvest
11-Feb Axis Network Technology 5,985,300 Bessemer Venture Partners
11-Feb Coull Undisclosed Finance Sout West, Creative Ventures
11-Feb Elonics 4,266,000 Braveheart, Scottish Venture Fund, Tom Farmer, Brian Souter
11-Feb FREEDOM4 Undisclosed Intel Capital, Pipex Communications
12-Feb Quartix 25,438,000 Bank of Scotland Corporate
12-Feb Velocix 27,334,000 Amadeus Capital Partners, 3i Group, Pentech Venutres
13-Feb Bragster 3,500,000 Intel Capital
14-Feb Camrivox 2,394,120 NESTA Investment, Phil O’Donovan, Create Partners, Bank of Scotland Growth Equity, Oxford Investment Opportunity Network
14-Feb Lexara Undisclosed South East Growth Fund
15-Feb Player X Undisclosed Kreos
15-Feb Quantum Filament Technologies Undisclosed Kreos
20-Feb SalesTrak Undisclosed Aspiration Capital
20-Feb Whizz Kid 4,266,000 Ingenious Media Active Capital
21-Feb Opta Sportsdata 1,896,000 Close Ventures
22-Feb Arieso 10,586,000 Oxford Capital Partners, Qualcomm Ventures, Add Partners, Top Technology
25-Feb GroupSpaces Undisclosed Avonmore Developments, Oxford Early Investments
26-Feb Helveta 3,002,000 Close Ventures, Oxford Capital Partners
26-Feb ORECon 24,964,000 Advent Venture Partners, Venrock, Wellington Partners, Northzone Ventures
29-Feb Opscape Undisclosed Mercia Technology Seed Fund
3-Mar Ubiquisys Undisclosed T-Mobile Venture Fund, Google, Accel Partners, Atlas Venture, Advent Venture Partners
3-Mar VoiceSage 4,740,000 Private investors
4-Mar Rapid Mobile Media Ltd 3,990,200 New Enterprise Associates, Alliance Trust Equity Partners, Pen Tech Ventures, Scottish Venture Fund
4-Mar Sayu 498,775 UK Steel Enterprise
5-Mar Livebookings 12,968,150 Balderton Capital
6-Mar Zinwave 10,270,000 SEB Ventures, Scottish Equity Partners, Atlas Ventures
7-Mar Pikum 5,372,000 Virgin USA
11-Mar Playfish 3,000,000 Angel investors
14-Mar isango 8,058,000 SPARK Ventures, Beringea
14-Mar i-Snapshot Undisclosed NorthStar Equity Investors
17-Mar CloudMade 3,792,000 Sunstone Capital
17-Mar Mfuse 5,087,505 Bestport Ventures LLP
18-Mar REM Probe 2,054,000 Partnership Investment Finance, Yorkshire and Humber Equity Fund
19-Mar Reevoo Undisclosed Banexi, Eden Ventures
20-Mar SpinVox 100,000,000 Goldman Sachs, GLG Partners, Blue Mountain Capital Management, Toscafund Asset Management
22-Mar Zemanta 1,496,325 T.A.G., Eden Ventures
23-Mar Moneyexpert 49,877,500 TVC
25-Mar Mobango 5,700,000 Innogest Capital
25-Mar Songkick Undisclosed The Accelerator Group, Softech VC, Betaworks
28-Mar Handy Group Undisclosed Advantage Early Growth Fund
28-Mar Realtime 50,000,000 Maverick Capital, Creative Industries Management, New Enterprise Associates
31-Mar Mantic Point Solutions Undisclosed YFM Group
31-Mar Onzo 3,990,200 Sigma Capital
Total capital invested: 592,383,175
Total number of investments for the quarter: 73
(including undisclosed investments)
Average investment: 11,847,664
Total number of undisclosed investments: 23
Q1 2007:
Total capital invested: 445,528,020
Total number of investments for the quarter: 55
(including undisclosed investments)
Average investment: 9,900,623
Total number of undisclosed investments: 10
IRELAND
Month – Company – Total – ($US) – Investors
Q1 2008
17-Feb Celtrak 2,370,000 Egis, Enterprise Equity, Bank of Scotland
4-Mar NewBay Software 10,270,000 Fidelity Ventures, Balderton Capital
Total capital invested: 12,640,000
Total number of investments for the quarter: 2
(including undisclosed investments)
Average investment: 6,320,000
Total number of undisclosed investments: 0
Q1 2007
Total capital invested: 8,450,000
Total number of investments for the quarter: 3
(including undisclosed investments)
Average investment: 2,816,667
Total number of undisclosed investments: 0