Hartford Business Journal

www.HartfordBusiness.com May 9, 2016 • Hartford Business Journal 5 CT venture activity slows Connecticut venture capital investment came to a screeching halt in the first quarter of 2016 with only six companies raising funds. Venture capitalists injected $9.6 million in Connecticut companies during the first quarter of 2016, down from $57.6 million a year earlier. Overall, six Connecticut companies received funding during the January- March period, compared to 13 a year earlier, according to the latest MoneyTree report, a joint effort of PricewaterhouseCoopers and the National Venture Capital Association (NVCA), using data from Thomson Reuters. Nationally, total venture dollars deployed to startup companies for the quarter remained flat and total deal count was down 5 percent. A total of $12 billion was invested in 1,021 deals. The slow first-quarter deal activity was attributed to nontraditional investors scaling back their investment activity and refocusing on their core businesses, said Bobby Franklin, president and CEO of the NVCA. Meantime, Tom Ciccolella, U.S. venture capital market leader at PwC, said there is a continuing shift among investors to focus on relatively mature startups, mak- ing it harder for early-stage companies to attract investment. Nationally, the top 10 deals accounted for 25 percent of total dol- lars invested in the first quarter, up from 18 percent of total venture capital deployed during the fourth quarter. Danbury specialty pharmaceutical com- pany Perosphere Inc. scored Connecticut's biggest deal raising $4.1 million from an undisclosed firm. Norwalk's Logicsource Inc. had the second biggest deal raising $2 million — also from an undisclosed investor. — Greg Bordonaro CT Venture Deals (Q1 2016) Company City Industry Amount Perosphere Inc. Danbury Biotechnology $4,089,000 Logicsource Inc. Norwalk Software $2,000,000 NXT-ID Inc. Oxford Software $2,000,000 One Medical Passport Inc. Willington Healthcare Services $1,500,000 CircleLink Health Stamford Software $50,000 Game Agency LLC Stamford IT Services NA S O U R C E : P R I C E W A T E R H O U S E C O O P E R S / N A T I O N A L V E N T U R E C A P I T A L A S S O C I A T I O N M O N E Y T R E E R E P O R T, D A T A : T H O M S O N R E U T E R S REPORTER'S NOTEBOOK PDS has been meeting the needs of the construction industry since 1965. Our dedicated team of design and construction professionals welcomes the challenge of serving its past and future customers on their most demanding projects. O'Neill's Chevrolet and Buick, Inc. | Avon, Connecticut This project is a renovated car dealership in Avon, CT which includes a showroom, offices, and a service department for approximately 15 vehicles for repairing. 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At the Connecticut Business & Industry Association's April 29 economic update forum at Southington's Aqua Turf, a trio of economists agreed that if any one indicator was worth track- ing to get a clearer snapshot of the U.S. economy's health it is the weekly new filings for job- less benefits. Filing a claim to collect ben- efits, including jobless pay and job-search counseling, is the first step for laid-off workers or those who lose jobs for reasons other than criminal acts against their employers or who are let go "for cause." JPMorgan Chase Commercial Banking Managing Director and head economist Jim Glassman said so many of the indica- tors that comprise GDP fall short of captur- ing all the necessary measurements of the economy's performance. However, Glassman and fellow panelists Quinnipiac University econo- mist Chris Ball and economist Ryan Sweet, of Moody's Analyt- ics, generally agreed that track- ing the ebb and flow of unem- ployed workers paints a more reliable picture of the economy. They noted that lost among the hand-wringing over national and regional economic viabil- ity, and states' mounting fiscal woes, is that new U.S. jobless- claims filings in mid-April hit a 42-year low (247,000). As for how the U.S. economy is tracking in the sixth year since the official end of the Great Recession, "We're still in the seventh inning of recovery,'' Glassman said, " … and we're looking at extra innings.'' — Gregory Seay Jim Glassman, managing director/head economist, commercial banking, JPMorganChase & Co. 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