The Golden Age of Data

By Keith Teare • Issue #294 • View online

Crunchbase reported that over 100 2021 unicorns reached the status by the B round. TechCrunch reported that Angel List has a fund that allocates capital using algorithms. Kyle Harrison says Venture Capital is becoming productized. Institutional Investor says that there is plenty of data on private companies. Is this is the golden age of data-driven decisions?

Content

• The Golden Age of Data
• Valuations Crash
• War in the Valley
• Public Markets
• Web3 Focus
• Strong China
• Africa Unleashed
• Startup of the Week
• Tweet of the Week

Editorial

When I read the headline of the press release that heads up this week’s newsletter I had to click. I am a data geek. I love being able to understand an ecosystem through its data. That said, I am not data-led. I start with my experience and intuitions based on it. I form opinions. Then I look to data to support or deny my impression.

“Affinity Finds 20 VC Firms Fund Nearly Half of All Unicorns” was, therefore, a must-click for me. Sadly it was a press release. But it does point to a downloadable report. But that is a marketing document for a CRM offering called Affinity. I kept it in the curated list below as an example of how poor data on venture capital really is, and actionable data is even more sparse. For the record 10 investors are in more than half the unicorns as shown by this query from our friends at Crunchbase.

It reminded me of when Mike Arrington started collecting an Excel spreadsheet about all of the companies he covered on TechCrunch because there was no source of truth about them. Who had invested in them, and so on. Today that spreadsheet is Crunchbase. Along with Pitchbook, CB Insights, and DealRoom, it is one of the few good sources of intelligence about the venture ecosystem. Crunchbase’s Chris Metinko published an article this week showing that unicorns minded prior to the ‘C’round are on the rise.

So data intelligence (not just data) about venture capital is beginning to surface. SignalFire is a data-driven investor in startups and now manages significant funds. Angel List is a source of data about startups too and is using it to help managers make capital allocation decisions.