The key insight this week
The headlines tell us we are in a venture capital winter. But that chill is varied depending on the county in question. Some places in the US have had a light frost—others are in a deep freeze.
The chart above looks at the change in total invested capital into Carta cap tables split into two 6-month periods. The first (black dot) looks at Apr 1-Sept 30 of last year. The second (blue dot) is Oct 1, 2022-Mar 31, 2023. The bars on the far right show the percent decline from black to blue for each county…*gulp*.
A few highlights:
Congrats to Harris TX, home of Houston, for being the only county to grow VC investment over that timeframe (8% up).
15 counties had over a billion dollars invested in the first 6-month period. Only 7 did so over the most recent 6 months.
Ecosystems like San Francisco and New York fell by more than half. So did less advanced VC spots such as Denver and DC, but this downturn has not spared anyone based on maturity.
The three counties highlighted in green all saw robust investment hold up relatively well (less than 25% decline). Common theme? Biotech was the leading industry in all three and gained share in the latter 6-month period.
So founders across the US struggling to raise capital, fear not - everyone else is in the same boat.
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Peter Walker
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