Venture capital fundraising for the first three quarters of 2005 is already ahead of total fundraising for all of 2004 according to a new study released by the National Venture Capital Association.
For all of 2004 there was almost $17 billion raised for venture capital and $52 billion for buyout and mezzanine financing.
In just the first three quarters of 2005 there has been well over $17 billion raised for venture capital and $54 billion for buyout and mezzanine financing.
Just to put this in perspective, in 2000 there was over $106 billion raised in venture capital alone, but we all know what happened to most of that money....It vanished when the dot.com bubble burst.
The money flow has slowed down a bit since Sarbanes-Oxley has all but shut down the IPO market for small to mid-sized firms. However, the funds have had an overhang of cash for almost a year, so their coffers are getting really full of cash.
What this means to entrepreneurs looking for funding is that the already cash rich venture capitalists have even more money to invest. That makes money more plentiful and terms a little more favorable for ventures looking for equity financing.
