That's a question that was researched by Xconomy's Luke Timmerman. He provides his analysis and results in today's post. As usual, Luke did a good job with research and presentation of facts on VC activity (at least as it can be seen publicly) in the start up sector. He has determined that there are only 8 "super active" firms in the sector -- those handling 10 or more deals per year. But he seems to conclude from this that there is a shortage of cash out there to fund new ideas and companies? I'm not in agreement with the premise.
I would cite his last paragraph, "...we could end up having a generation of biomedical scientists who won't ever have the opportunity to turn one of their ideas into a growing biotech enterprise. And that would be a shame for science, for the economy and for patients."
I don't get it. Using the math above, there are at least 80 deals per year, and other statements in the article lead you to believe that is substantially understated as this info is not easy to come by. I don't understand the position that it used be to "easier to get funding" so that it should continue to be that way. I think that you can show in the past that a lot of ventures got funded that had no business being so blessed. Why should you get funded for a poor concept? I think if you got the property, the market will have the funds. If you can't find funding, maybe you don't deserve funding.
Posted by Bruce Lehr Jul 2nd 2012.
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