Week 11/07/2005 through 11/13/2005

Prepared by Capital Hunter analysts.

Weekly venture funding was over $300 million for the seventh straight week, the first time that has happened since before 2004. Over $408 million was raised by 32 companies this week, with an average deal size of $12.75 million per deal. Later round funding dominated this week (which can be gleaned from the larger average deal size just mentioned) as opposed to last week where the funding was more evenly spread out between early and late stage financing.

There were six initial public offerings this week, up from three last week. (Activant Solutions Holdings, as reported last week, did not go public with a $200 million offering. Capital Hunter regrets the error). The six companies that listed are as follows:

iRobot Corporation priced at $103.2 million on the NASDAQ Stock Exchange and is a provider of robots that are used to assists people in various tasks.

CombinatoRx priced at $42 million on the NASDAQ Stock Exchange and is a developer of medicines built from synergistic combinations of existing drugs.

Boardwalk Pipeline Partners LP priced at $292.5 million on the New York Stock Exchange and is a limited partnership engaged in the interstate transportation, gathering and storage of natural gas.

Saifun Semiconductors priced at $117.5 million on the NASDAQ Stock Exchange and is an Israeli developer of nitride-read-only-memory (NROM) chips for the semiconductor memory market.

IHS priced at $232.24 million on the New York Stock Exchange and is a provider of technical information, decision-support tools, and other services to the energy, electronics, automotive and government sectors.

Clear Channel Outdoor Holdings priced at $630 million on the New York Stock Exchange and is a provider of outdoor advertising solutions.

CapitalHunter.com was able to verify that $408 million of venture capital was invested in 32 U.S.-based companies during this week’s reporting period. The average deal size was approximately 12.75 million. The amount of venture capital invested this period decreased by 1% compared to last periods $414 million.

Once again, California was the most popular destination for venture capital. Twenty California companies raised $255.83 million in new equity financing which was 63% of the total venture capital invested this reporting period. The largest private venture financing in California this period was invested into Portola Pharmaceuticals. Portola Pharmaceuticals raised $46 million in Series B funding and is a South San Francisco biotechnology company currently developing next-generation cardiovascular therapies.

The biotechnology sector raised 24% of the venture capital this period. Five biotechnology companies raised $99.1 million in venture financing. The largest private venture financing in the biotechnology sector this period went into the aforementioned Portola Pharmaceuticals.

Companies raising their Series B financing round led this week’s venture capital activity. These financings represented 35% of the total venture capital deployed this period. The largest Series B financing was placed into Portola Pharmaceuticals.

The three largest venture deals this period are as follows:

The following twenty-six companies and other unnamed investors funded the above mentioned top three venture capital investments for $116 million:

A total of 63 equity financings of private and public companies occurred during this reporting period. Each of the 63 equity financings are profiled in a weekly report which include venture financings, private placements, secondary offerings, PIPE’s, and IPO’s.

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