Business a Legal Developmentsin Silicon Valley

Friends,

Happy lunar new year: the year of the Tiger. This month’s newsletter is action packed with business and legal developments across the Global Silicon Valley, deals closed, invitations to digital summits and webinars, and of course a reminder that we are hiring.

2021 In Review
After the most prolific year in venture capital ever recorded, it’s important to take stock of where we are. According to CB Insights “State of Venture 2021,” report, the world saw:

• 959 total unicorns, up 69% y-o-y, with the year seeing a staggering 517 unicorn births and 44 decacorns.
• $621 billion in global financing, more than double the 2020 mark of $249 billion, and six straight quarters of growth across all regions. The US was by far the leading region for total dollars, followed by Asia, Europe and the new upstart: Latin America.
• $311 billion was raised in the US — half the global total, as well as 12,281 deals.
• Early stage deals were a key driver, as high resolution seed financing deals became the norm. We are co-hosting a webinar on high resolution seed financing for startups with Bret Waters (4thly Accelerator), Danielle D’Agostaro (WV Ventures, ex-Alchemist), Christopher Clarke (Locale) and Ben Narasin (founder of Tenacity Venture Capital) on February 2 at 11am PST (register here).
• But who would have guessed that Asia would have had 36% of the deals, and become the number one market by volume of deals at 12,485.
• In M&A, there were 10,792 global M&A exits, representing 58% growth.
• SPACs were a big piece of the story in 2021, with a $1.6 billion median exit valuation, jumping more than 2x from the prior year, and crushing the median IPO valuation of $547 million, and the number of completed SPACs grew 247%. While new regulation expected from the US SEC, the growth has tapered off, but not stopped entirely. More on what’s in store for SPACs here.
• In terms of sectors, 21% of all funding in 2021 went to fintech companies, up 169% from the year. Fintechs also saw the highest proportion of early stage deals of any industry, indicating that the sector will see further growth in 2022.
• And who could miss calling out that Silicon Valley remained the number one global metropolitan area for new funding at $105 billion, making it the tech capital of the United States. These figures were 2x the prior year. New York took the second spot at $55 billion in funding, growing threefold from the prior year. For every two dollars invested in Silicon Valley, one dollar goes to New York.

You can read the complete newsletter here.