In April 2024, global enterprise capital funding reached just over $22 billion – flat month-on-month and up several percentage points year-over-year – Crunch Base data shows.
The slowdown in enterprise funding continues despite the wave of AI technology that has overwhelmed startups over the past few years.
Of the $22 billion invested in startups globally last month, about $2.4 billion, or 11%, went to about 1,000 seed-stage firms. In April, about 500 early-stage firms raised $9 billion globally.
Crunchbase data shows that greater than 150 firms starting with Series C raised $10.7 billion, representing about 49% of last month’s funding. These amounts are consistent with funding for these stages in April 2023.
Great deals
The largest startup funding round in April was a $1 billion deal for a hidden startup Xair therapy for drug development using artificial intelligence. Several deeptech and sustainable energy firms have also raised large funds: electric vehicle developer Hozon; solar energy supplier Pine Gate Renewable Energy; and a quantum computing company PsiQuantum.
Top sectors
Biotechnology and healthcare were the leading sectors in terms of funding amount in April. Companies in this industry have raised $5.7 billion, or about 26% of all funding, in response to Crunchbase.
Last month, AI firms raised $3.9 billion, or about 17% of funding. In addition to Xaira, AI coding assistants have raised significant funds Increase AND Cognitionthe latter of which claims to have created the first member of the AI engineering team named Devin.
Other leading sectors in April included hardware startups, which raised a total of $3.3 billion; manufacturing ($2.9 billion); and financial services firms ($2.9 billion).
Looking at the public markets
The Heading The April IPO was the third venture-backed private company to go public so far this yr with a valuation of greater than $5 billion, compared with two firms in all of 2023. That’s an increase over 2023, but still too much few firms to suggest public markets are really opening up.
Recent public market capitalization gains have largely shifted toward big tech, with many listings from 2021 – the most energetic yr for IPOs on record – failing to achieve their first-day highs.
It doesn’t grow, it doesn’t decelerate
The launch of generative artificial intelligence has led to the creation of recent startups in this cycle. However, larger private software firms are quickly adapting to this recent technology cycle. In many ways, the AI revolution may gain advantage incumbent firms that have raised large amounts of capital in the previous enterprise cycle and are adding AI to existing customers’ products while cutting costs in other areas to shift their efforts to AI.
Big tech has entered the fray and billions are needed to fund the leap, while some generative AI startups struggle to pay these bills.
For now, enterprise is still in the technique of resetting, as valuations are established and recent use cases for AI are explored, while startups increase their spending on cloud and GPUs.
Methodology
The data in this report comes directly from Crunchbase and is based on reported data. The data provided is as of May 6, 2024.
Please note that data transfer delays are most noticeable in the earliest stages of a enterprise, with seed funding amounts increasing significantly after the end of the quarter/yr.
Industries on Crunchbase are not exclusive. An organization may operate in greater than one industry and in greater than one industry group.
Please note that each one financing amounts are in US dollars unless otherwise noted. Crunchbase converts foreign currency to U.S. dollars at the spot rate in effect on the date financing rounds, acquisitions, IPOs and other financial events are reported. Even if these events were added to Crunchbase long after the event was announced, currency transactions are converted at the historical spot price.
Glossary of financing terms
As of January 2023, we have modified the way we include corporate financing rounds in our reports. Corporate rounds are only included when a company has raised seed financing as a part of a series enterprise financing round.
Seeds and Angels consist of seed, pre-seed and angel rounds. Crunchbase also covers enterprise rounds of unknown series, equity crowdfunding, and convertible notes valued at $3 million (USD or converted USD equivalent) or less.
The early stage consists of Series A and Series B rounds, as well as other forms of rounds. Crunchbase includes enterprise rounds of unknown series, corporate ventures and other rounds above $3 million and those valued at lower than or equal to $15 million.
The Late Stage consists of Series C, Series D, Series E, and later lettered expedition rounds following the “Series [Letter]” Naming convention. Also included are enterprise rounds of unknown series, corporate ventures, and other rounds valued over $15 million.
A technology development is a private equity round led by a company that has previously raised a “venture” round. (Basically any round from the pre-defined stages.)