Google Ventures, the corporate venturing arm of internet company Google, has significantly increased investment in health and life sciences in 2014, with 36% of its funding going to the sector.
Bill Maris, managing partner of the unit, told the Wall Street Journal the investment, up from a 9% share of Google Ventures’ spending in both 2012 and 2013, was due to an explosion in technology based around analysing health data.
Google allocated $425m to its venture capital activities in 2014, up from $300m in each of the previous two years, the amount being raised from $300m due to the launch of Google Ventures’ European office, though Maris claimed it can invest more or less than these totals in a given year.
Healthcare companies to secure funding from the unit this year include oncology software Flatiron Health, for which it led a $130m series B round in May, and DNA data platform provider DNAnexus, which raised $15m in January.
Google Ventures plans to carry on pursuing the strategy next year.
“Barring some huge calamity we’ll see more interesting things in life sciences in 2015,” Maris said.
The increased focus on health came at the expense of investment in consumer internet companies, which were responsible for about 66% of Google Ventures’ spending in 2013 but only 8% this year.
Other sectors to benefit from a drop in consumer funding included mobile, which comprised 27% of the total, up from 6% in 2013, and enterprise and data, which secured only 8% of the unit’s funding last year and 24% in 2014.
– This article was originally published on 17th December 2014