Venture Capital Jobs

Earlier this week, members of the Venture Capital Lunch Club met for their annual luncheon at a law firm in downtown New York City to make their predictions for what could be the hot areas for venture capital jobs and investment this year.

Number one on the list is “Big Data”, which involves ramping up the processing power of sorting through mountains of consumer data. Previously, it had been too expensive or had taken too long to sort through all this. But today’s new hardware, cloud architecture and open source software make it much more affordable. Companies like Walmart or Google and even smaller firms can now analyze the data to discover shopping patterns or create new products. And since they are working with actual customer data, it is presumably more accurate than using surveys.

Venture capital firms will be focusing on startups that are working with the predictive nature of Big Data, says Peg Jackson of Gridley & Co., a technology investment bank, according to an article in Entrepreneur.com

Target area number two is “Machine-to-Machine” communications. These new technologies include sensors on home fuel tanks that can signal to oil-delivery companies when they need refilling.

Target area number three is the “Internet of Things”, in other words, Internet-connected devices that collect data and communicate with other physical devices. One example are objects equipped with radio-frequency identification (RFID) chips that can be identified and inventoried by computers. Barcoding is another example. If more objects are equipped with these miniscule tracking devices, it can help with “just-in-time” manufacturing, recovering stolen goods and customer re-ordering of frequently-used items.

Attendees at the luncheon listed target area number four as Software as a Service, hardly a new development, but one that will continue to be a fertile area for venture capital investment.

Are there any key areas of venture capital jobs and investment for 2012 that you think didn’t make the list? Add your comments below.

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What were the big stories for venture capital jobs in 2011? For some, 2011 was a year of recovery, with returns picking up as a result of a few successful IPOs. Some notable tech IPOs included LinkedIn, Groupon, Zynga, ZipCar, RenRen (China’s Facebook), Yandex (Russian search engine), to name a few.

The activity boosted the National Venture Capital Association (NVCA) US VC Index to one-year returns of 26.3% as of Q2 2011. However, even as venture capital recovered as an asset class, investors were not exactly flocking back to venture capital, according to the Huffington Post.

Early in the year, VentureBeat reported how the time is ripe for Russia to emerge as a center for innovation and entrepreneurship. And how venture capital firms are taking notice. A number of VC firms have done deals in Russia, including global firms such as Accel Partners, Bessemer Ventures, and Index Ventures. Venture capitalists have been “cloning” successful start-ups from the West.

We learned that Vietnam is emerging as a venture capital hotspot, even though China and India often grab the bulk of the headlines. Boston’s IDG Ventures and other firms are pouring hundreds of millions of dollars into tech startups in these three countries.

We saw how Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz launched their career as venture capitalists, raising nearly a billion dollars in starting Andreessen Horowitz. And how these newly-minted venture capitalists chose an unusual model to guide their firm, that of the Hollywood talent agency. They focus on guiding entrepreneurs much the way talent agents serve their clients, working to find engineers, designers, product managers, and the best marketing talent available for their portfolio companies.

But we also learned that the entire VC industry is nevertheless shrinking. In 2011, 147 venture funds raised $12.2 billion in the first 3 quarters. Ten years ago, at the height of the bubble, over 1100 firms raised $100 billion. And those raising funds had to spend at least 16 months, if not longer, raising those funds, according to Huffington Post.

What do you think where the big venture capital job stories of 2011? Add your comments below.

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