In VC market, life sciences dominate

In the first quarter of this year, venture capital investment dipped 5 percent to $7.1B, signaling that the current economic slump could have an impact on venture financing. However, there was still a dose of good news for biotech, as the industry outpaced the software sector, raising $1.27 billion with 126 deals (software, with 234 deal, had more transactions overall). The Life Sciences sector (both biotech and medical devices together) took the lead in VC investing, raising with $2.3 billion in Q1--that's roughly a third of all VC dollars and a quarter of all deals.

"The continued interest in the life sciences and clean technology industries, as well as the traditional IT sectors, reflects the long-term investment horizon..." said Mark Heesen, president of the NVCA. "We do not expect to see significant declines in investment levels in the coming year. However, the dollars going to later stage investments could increase if the IPO window remains closed for an extended period of time and venture capitalists have to sustain companies longer than expected."

- see the release [1]
- read this AP report [2]

Related Articles:
Top 20 VC deals of 2007 [3]
Do VC groups love the Web more than biotech? [4]
Rocky market puts freeze on biotech deal-making [5]
Billion-dollar baby: Biotech still on a roll with VC funds [6]