A reopened initial public offering (IPO) market and a bumper round raised by US clean-tech company GreatPoint Energy livened up a February with muted overall investment activity.
The uncertain deal environment in February resulted in a decline in the total number of corporate venturing-backed companies securing investments in February compared with both the previous month and the same time last year.
However, the rebound in public markets resulted in an increase in the number of corporate venturing-backed companies floating and the overall deal value of investments in the period was at similar levels to January and the same time last year.
There were 67 investments worth $1.5bn in February, down from 79 investments worth $1.5bn in the same period last year, and from 90 investments worth $1.6bn in January.
US-based clean-tech company GreatPoint Energy reportedly secured the biggest investment, in a $420m series D round, raised from China Wanxiang Holdings as part of a $1.25bn partnership between the two companies, according to news provider VentureWire.
GreatPoint previously raised $100m in series C financing in 2007 which was co-led by Sustainable Development Investments (SDI), a unit of Citi Alternative Investments, part of the US bank, as well as Dow Chemical Company, and included US-based power company AES Corp and US-based energy company Suncor Energy. Previous backers of GreatPoint were Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Khosla Ventures, Advanced Technology Ventures and Draper Fisher Jurvetson.
China-based women’s clothing company Ochirly landed the second-largest investment, selling a 10% stake for a reported $200m, according to news provider Alt Assets, to L Capital Asia, the corporate venturing unit of consumer company LVMH, and Citic Capital, a private equity arm of China Citic Group.
The stake was acquired from Ochirly’s parent company, Trendy International Group
.A group including UK-based supermarket chain J Sainsbury and the estate of Prince Charles made the third-largest investment, helping Tamar Energy, a producer of energy from organic waste, launch with £65m ($102.1m) funding.
Tamar is led by executive chairman Alan Lovell, previously chief executive of UK-based renewable energy producer Infinis.
There were 11 exits, six of which were IPOs. Of the 12 exits in January, only one was an IPO. The largest disclosed exit was US-based pharmaceutical company Avila Therapeutics’ $350m sale to US-based pharmaceutical group Celgene, which could rise to $925m if Avila hits specific targets.
Backers of Avila included Novartis Option Fund, run by pharmaceutical corporation Novartis, as well as venture capital firms Abingworth, Advent Venture Partners, Atlas Venture and Polaris Venture Partners.
Corporate venturing-backed companies that floated were Netherlands-based security software company AVG Technologies ($128m raised on Nasdaq, Intel Capital-backed), US-based online video platform Brightcove ($55m raised on Nasdaq, backed by New York Times, IAC, Transcosmos, Dentsu, J-Stream, plus corporate venturing units of GE and Hearst Interactive Media), US-based biofuels company Ceres ($65m raised, Monsanto-backed), US-based biopharmaceutical company ChemoCentryx ($45m raised on Nasdaq, Glaxo Group and Techne-backed), US-based supermarket chain Roundy’s ($163m raised on the New York Stock Exchange, Northwestern Mutual Life Insur-ance-backed) and US-based internet services company Synacor ($34m raised on Nasdaq, Intel Capital-backed).
The US accounted for 67% of the investment activity by number. The next most active regions were China and India, accounting for 7% each of dealflo, while the UK had 6%. There were two deals in Brazil. Countries with one investment were Germany, France, Belgium, Israel, Switzerland and Vietnam.
The most active sector was IT, with 18 investments, this was followed by media, with 16, then health and clean-tech, with 10. The next most active sector was consumer with eight deals.
The most common deals were A rounds (25%), followed by B rounds (13%), C rounds (12%), individual stake pur-chases (10%), D rounds were 7% while E and beyond and seed rounds were 5% each, acquisitions were 3%, while 20% were either miscellaneous or undisclosed.