In the past year, start-ups worldwide have collected as much venture capital as never before, according to a recent study. In Germany, investors rely primarily on artificial intelligence.
With a total of $ 254 billion, start-ups worldwide received a new record sum of investors last year. The venture capital provided increased by almost 50 percent compared to 2017 with 174.6 billion dollars, calculated the accounting firm KPMG in a published evaluation.
Risk capital is now more concentrated around the globe, according to study authors. “Despite the new investment record, the number of deals worldwide has dropped. Investors are now paying more attention to what they are investing in, “says KPMG partner Stefan Kimmel.
Higher amounts in the game
Some exceptionally high levels of funding have a strong impact on statistics, with $ 14 billion spent on China’s Fintech Ant Financial alone in the first half of the year. At the end of the year, US e-cigarette maker Juul slumped 12.8 billion. According to KPMG, the number of so-called unicorns also rose sharply with these mega-deals: 94 of these young companies valued at over one billion dollars were on the move worldwide in 2018, compared with 53 in the previous year.
As noteworthy, the authors of the study point out that start-ups since 2010 increasingly raise financing rounds: on average, they received in 2010 still 5.5 million dollars in the growth phase, 2018 there were already 11.5 million – more than twice as much. This trend can also be seen in early financing rounds.
More deals in Germany
According to KPMG, particularly promising prospects for fresh capital in Germany are above all young companies with business models relating to Artificial Intelligence (AI). “It can be assumed that in Germany, too, this year a lot of money will flow into start-ups that deal with AI applications. Because this technology is still in the early stages of development in this country, “says KPMG partner Tim Dümichen. For the “Venture Pulse” study, auditors regularly analyze worldwide venture capital investments using figures from the Pitch Book database.
In the German start-up world, the consulting firm EY notes both higher investment totals and more deals, as shown by a recent evaluation for the year 2018. At just under 4.6 billion euros EY quantifies the funds that young digital companies have taken from investors, through IPOs or even through crypto currencies.