Our firm (CB Insights) put out the report that this article references so some additional color on this.
Unfortunately, there is no data to support PG's assertion above (or refute it) about most acquisitions are HR acquisitions so I won't try to address that part of his comment.
The power law is real. Only 0.35% of private tech company acquisitions in 2012 were > $1B (8 of 2277). And more than 50% were less than $50M and more than 80% were less than $200M (of those with disclosed values).
What definition of "institutional funding" did you use in the report? The wording implies that you didn't count angel investments as institutional funding. So how do you treat angel-sized investments by VCs? Does "institutional investment" mean only series A rounds and later, or would that also include a $100k investment by a VC firm in a seed round?
Also, what is your definition of an institutional investor? Do you count super-angels like Jeff Clavier and Aydin Senkut?
There's plenty of data to support PG's assertion. Insofar as Hacker News represents the general startup ecosystem, if you look through the list of acquisitions of companies announced on this site, many of them can be inferred to be HR acquisitions simply by looking at the acquisition price and whether or not the original product is still being developed or whether it is being shut down.
Comments
Our firm (CB Insights) put out the report that this article references so some additional color on this.
Unfortunately, there is no data to support PG's assertion above (or refute it) about most acquisitions are HR acquisitions so I won't try to address that part of his comment.
The power law is real. Only 0.35% of private tech company acquisitions in 2012 were > $1B (8 of 2277). And more than 50% were less than $50M and more than 80% were less than $200M (of those with disclosed values).
If you really like graphs, the full report is here - http://www.cbinsights.com/reports/Private%20Tech%20Company%2...
What definition of "institutional funding" did you use in the report? The wording implies that you didn't count angel investments as institutional funding. So how do you treat angel-sized investments by VCs? Does "institutional investment" mean only series A rounds and later, or would that also include a $100k investment by a VC firm in a seed round?
Also, what is your definition of an institutional investor? Do you count super-angels like Jeff Clavier and Aydin Senkut?
There's plenty of data to support PG's assertion. Insofar as Hacker News represents the general startup ecosystem, if you look through the list of acquisitions of companies announced on this site, many of them can be inferred to be HR acquisitions simply by looking at the acquisition price and whether or not the original product is still being developed or whether it is being shut down.