A pretty good amount of investing, a record year of fundraising and dropping the "growth at all costs" attitude.
That's one way you could sum up 2022 for Nashville-area entrepreneurs and the region's venture capital activity, based on newly issued data from PitchBook and the National Venture Capital Association.
Some highlights:
- Preliminary numbers show that Nashville companies raised more than $708 million of venture capital last year. It's one of the strongest showings in the last decade, capped most recently by this $65 million raise at August Bioservices.
- It turns out that 2021 was a record year for investing in Nashville companies: Updated tallies reveal that $1.16 billion was invested in that year. (A spokesperson at PitchBook explained that data from previous quarters and years is "constantly updated as new deals or information on past deals becomes available as well as the data entry lag.")
- Investment funds based in Nashville boasted a record year, raising $880 million from investors. That figure is about the same as where their haul stood at the end of the third quarter, which tracks with national trends. PitchBook notes that nearly 75% of money committed to investment funds nationwide closed within the first half of 2022.
- The region burst out of the gates to start 2023, as Monogram Health finalized a $375 million raise.
"Although earlier-stage deal activity and fundraising totals show remarkable resiliency in 2022, the overall slowdown in annual [venture capital] activity reflects the sizable headwinds presented by ongoing macroeconomic factors, rising interest rates and frozen avenues for startup liquidity," said John Gabbert, founder and CEO of PitchBook, in a press release.
“Unable to justify the sky-high valuations seen in 2021 and retreating from the ‘growth-at-all-costs’ mindset seen in recent years, many investors are pulling back until the ecosystem returns to a more palatable normal," Gabbert said.
Click here for the full report.
