Two New Reports, Angel and VC Activity, Released this Week; Mobile is Where the Action Is

 The  2013 Venture Capital Annual Report, covering  VC financing and exit trends, is released today by CB Insights, a respected venture capital database. Please note that this report does not include Angel Investing.   The most recent report on Angel Group investing, the Q3 2013 Halo Report, was also released this week.

Both studies report that Mobile is where the action is. For Angels, Mobile grabs a greater share of deals and dollars. For VCs, Q3 2013 was the first quarter of mobile funding greater than $1 billion; Q4 2013 saw an encore performance hitting $1.09B.

Healthcare round size jumps year over year for Angels. VCs had a big year for IPOs. While the tally for 2013 was up 55% vs 2012, the growth was driven exclusively by healthcare IPOs. VC backed M&A fared worse and actually fell 5% from 2012.

From the VC report:

·         Seed VC financing hits highest level in 5 years: 2013 saw $893 million invested across 843 seed VC deals. Seed VC deal sizes hit a four-year high in Q4  with the average hitting $1.5M and the median at $1.3M.

·         Most active investors: Andreessen Horowitz led the pack followed by 500 Startups, Google Ventures, New Enterprise Associates and Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers.

·         New York is here to stay: NY saw $2.94B in venture capital funding across 396 deals in 2013 - a five year high. Behind several large deals to Fab, MongoDB and Quirky, NY VC funding jumped 49% while deal levels jumped 12% on a year to year basis.

·         Massachusetts weakens: VCs deployed $3.04B across 318 deals to Massachusetts' companies in 2013. But whereas rival NY saw both funding and deals accelerate significantly in 2013, Mass. saw year over year funding and deals drop 1% and 5%, respectively. 

·         After huge exits, Washington state sees VC funding high in Q4 2013: WA had two of the biggest venture-backed exits in 2013 with Tableau and Zulily. The state also saw VCs pour more VC dollars in during Q4 than Q1 - Q3 2013 combined.

From the HALO Report:

• Angel round size is still down from peak in early 2013
• Median round size trending up to $2 million when angels co-invest
• New England retains share of dollars; New York bounces back
• Great Lakes shows biggest gains in share of deals, biggest drop in share of dollars
• Based on total deals, the 10 most active angel groups in Q3 were (alphabetic order) Alliance of Angels, Golden Seeds, Houston Angel Network, Hyde Park Angels, Investors’ Circle, Launchpad, Life Science Angels, Sand Hill Angels, Tech Coast Angels and Wisconsin Investment Partners. - See more at: http://www.angelresource.org/research/halo-report.aspx#sthash.e7iLAKTS.dpuf
   Based on total deals, the 10 most active angel groups in Q3 were (alphabetic order) Alliance of Angels, Golden Seeds, Houston Angel Network, Hyde Park Angels, Investors’ Circle, Launchpad, Life Science Angels, Sand Hill Angels, Tech Coast Angels and Wisconsin Investment Partners.

One clear difference between the two groups is geographic.  VC activity is heavily concentrated on the two coasts, while seventy-three percent of angel group deals are now done outside California and New England.  A list of VC investments by state is included below. Should you be unable to view this table, the original can be found on Page 11 of the CB Insights Report.

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