US venture capital investments in cleantech rose 12% in 2011 despite strong headwinds from slow global economic growth, political deadlock in Congress and Europe’s debt crisis, according to the MoneyTree report released today by PwC and the National Venture Capital Association.
Both dollars and deal volume increased in 2011, bringing the year’s total to the highest level ever recorded at $4.3 billion across 323 deals, compared with $3.8 billion going into 289 deals in 2010. Keep reading →
Clean energy remains the new kid on the block for an energy sector dominated by fossil fuels for electricity generation both currently and for years to come. As the sector develops along with newly emerging technologies and falling costs, venture capitalists and other early-stage investors have seen enormous potential.
That potential has been regularly stymied to date by a number of factors, ranging from the specific like the financial crisis to the heavily regulated nature of an industry with reliability as its primary goal. Keep reading →
The first in a two-part series in which Breaking Energy asks a leading venture capital specialist about the intersection of two of the hottest parts of the economy today. Both are also are major contributors to hopes for increased hiring and accelerated tecnology innovation.
Q: What is the state of the venture capital industry, particularly in the energy sector, at the start of 2012? Keep reading →
Though power companies have traditionally owned entire supply chains from generation to transmission and distribution, recent decades have brought about increased fragmentation and specialization.
But as talk of smart grid and electric vehicles increases, power companies and utilities are recombining along the supply, delivery and service chains, trying to improve efficiency and remove unnecessary kinks from operations. Keep reading →
Deal activity in the US power and utilities sector nearly doubled in the first six months of 2011 over the preceding year as companies spent $52 billion to acquire new capacity rather than build their own.
Companies are “buying growth versus building new capabilities from within,” US power and utilities transaction services leader John McConomy for accounting firm PwC said in announcing the latest figures from the North American Power Deals report for the second quarter of 2011. Keep reading →
