Venture Funding Dries Up in Q1

The venture capital industry took another big hit in the first quarter of the year, according to new data from Dow Jones VentureSource. VCs pumped 50% less money into startups than they did one year ago. At $3.9 billion, it was the lowest total the industry has seen since 1998. That means it was worse than anything seen in the years after the seminal dot-com bust. Information technology fell to its lowest levels since 1997, with just $1.68 billion in deals, and clean tech fell by 73% to just $117 million.