Venture capital investors are pushing
younger startups out of the nest these days. Driven by pent-up buyers
and sellers on both sides of transactions, time to liquidity is
shortening in the venture industry, according to analyst reports.
The market for acquisitions of U.S. companies will have been worth about $212.6 billion in the first quarter, according to a preliminary report by Dealogic. That’s a lower number than Q1 2009—likely because of two mammoth pharma deals that closed during the year-ago period: Pfizer Inc.’s $68 billion merger with Wyeth, and Merck & Co. Inc.’s $41.1 billion deal for Schering-Plough.
This quarter’s deal announcements included two large Massachusetts deals, both take-privates—Millipore’s $7.2 billion acquisition by Merck, and Bain Capital’s $1.1 billion grab of Skillsoft. Deals of that magnitude indicate the market is recovering overall, but other factors are at play in the market for small startups with a technological edge, said Peter Falvey, managing director at Revolution Partners, a Boston, Massachusetts, investment bank that focuses on tech M&As.
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