Last year was a milestone in the U.S. for venture capital (VC) funds, which topped $100 billion for the first time ever. That’s according to the National Venture Capital Association’s latest report on VC activity across the country in 2021. On the heels of several years of strong VC fundraising, assets under management (AUM) for
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Tom Still[/caption]
Still said there were a few big deals in Wisconsin during 2021 that led the way to the $852.4 million grand total for the state, which is a good thing because that means companies are maturing. There were still several deals within the $1 million and below range as well.
“Some of these companies are maturing and attracting the big dollars, like Shine (Medical) and Fetch (Rewards), but we’re still getting a pipeline of emerging deals. We certainly feel good about that,” Still said.
While this data does reveal some positive news for Wisconsin, the state is still quite a way behind other Midwest states of similar size and population. Still pointed to Minnesota, a state he said has been hovering around $1.3 billion worth of VC investments the last three years. Minnesota also saw two times the number of deals Wisconsin did in 2021.
One other key stat from the WTC shows at least 90 out-of-state investors put some amount of money into Wisconsin in 2021, an increase from 55 out-of-state investors in 2020.
“The word is slowly but surely getting out that Wisconsin has the kind of early-stage deals that can be attractive to money from anywhere,” Still said.
National Venture Capital Association’s 2021 report also shows there were 25 companies in Wisconsin that received VC funding and 29 Wisconsin venture firms were actively raising money.
This shows Wisconsin is slowly catching up with other states in garnering funding for startups, an ongoing issue highlighted in 
Matt Cordio[/caption]
“Is the eco-system here in Wisconsin growing? Yes, and that’s positive. Are we at parity with other states in the Great Lakes region? No, we still lag,” Cordio said. “If we go out west to Utah, which is a smaller state with 2 million fewer residents, they saw five times the amount of capital in their state’s startups.”
He added that seeing an AUM increase in Wisconsin is good to a certain point.
“Just because we’re growing assets under management by VC funds here in Wisconsin, doesn’t necessarily mean we’re going to see a rapid increase in funding events. It’s really based off if there are entrepreneurs in Wisconsin building scalable ideas,” Cordio said.