Healthcare Venture Capital Cheat Sheet 2016

10 key VC resources for life science industry information and competitive intelligence professionals.

Funding is the lifeblood of every industry, and in healthcare venture capital is especially critical. With a rapidly changing landscape, constantly shifting trends and market whims challenging development at every turn, how can life science information, regulatory and competitive intelligence professionals stay up-to-date on key events?

This quick reference offers 10 key resources on the current state of healthcare venture capital, from market trends to major investors and more.

10 Key Healthcare Venture Capital Resources

1. The Wall Street Journal offers an interactive article listing venture capital investments by body part, with the heart and brain currently taking the lead.
2. PricewaterhouseCoopers provides a series of free MoneyTree^TM reports on private equity and venture capital markets. The MoneyTree^TM Life Sciences Report is a quarterly publication that tracks US-based venture capital funding for the life sciences sector. More general Global MoneyTree^TM Reports for China, India, Israel, Russia and the United States are available here.
3. In Private equity investment in healthcare: 15 healthcare investment niches — A review of key sectors for 2015, Becker’s Hospital CFO gives a rundown of important healthcare market insights and trends from the past year.
4. Rock Health reviews digital health funding for 2015, including M&A deals.
5. Modern Healthcare and the Washington Post take a slightly more pessimistic view, providing insight on VC slowdowns in areas such as digital health and medical devices.
6. For a view of the VC market more generally, CB Insights  and Venture Beat review Q4 of 2015, tracking the significant cooldown that closed out an otherwise active year.
7. Silicon Valley Bank’s free, downloadable report, Trends in Healthcare Investments and Exits in 2016, covers healthcare venture fundraising and investment, crossover activity, venture exits, and M&A and IPO activity for the last two quarters of 2015, as well as providing a 2016 outlook for the industry. FierceMedicalDevices breaks down key facts and figures from the report.
8. Forbes noted an important change in its Midas List in 2015, as life science VC investors took the lead over IT investors for the first time: The Top Life Science Investors Of The 2015 Midas List. A recent report on the flow of venture capital money in medicine provides additional insight.
9. Tech Crunch examines the role of big data and “health insurance tech,” which saw an enormous spike in 2014, followed by a sharp decline in 2015.
10. The National Venture Capital Association’s Medical Innovation page details the trade association’s positions on regulatory and reform issues.

Conclusion 

In boom or bust, the healthcare market relies heavily on venture capital for innovation and development. By following key trends and maintaining awareness of market activity, life science information, regulatory and competitive intelligence professionals will be prepared to respond  effectively, no matter what the market may bear.