Thanks to Crunchbase’s downloadable database, we can report that in 2013 investors poured more than $2 billion into Analytic startups, up 38% from 2012. Crunchbase reports 2013 funding for Analytics ventures more than five times greater than in 2009.
Palantir led the pack in new funding, going to the well twice, in October and December, to raise a total of $304m based on a valuation of $9b. As a point of reference, at 4X revenue, industry leader SAS is worth about $12b.
Funding flowed to companies that build advanced analytics into focused vertical or horizontal solutions. Examples include:
- Ooyala (analytics-driven solutions for video and digital TV): $43m
- WorldOne (global health care data): $35m
- Drillinginfo (oil and gas exploration analytics): $25.1m
- DemandBase (B2B targeted marketing): $15m
- RetailNext (retail in-store analytics): $15m
- Tidemark (performance management): $13m
Investors paid special attention to vendors who specialize in social media analytic platforms:
- DataSift (social media analytics): $42m
- Dataminr (social media analytics): $30m
- Networked Insights:() $9.4m
Capital also flowed to companies offering general-purpose software, platforms and services for analytics, including:
- Arria (natural language generation): $40.3m
- Ayasdi (advanced analytics platform): $30.6m
- Opera Solutions (specialized techniques for analysis of Big Data): $30m
- Fractal Analytics (analytic services provider): $25m
- Skytree (machine learning software): $18m
- Databricks (Apache Spark-based analytics): $14m
- Guavus (streaming analytics): $9m
- Revolution Analytics (analytics based on open source R): $7.8m
Investors continue to fund startups offering easy-to-use interfaces for the business user, including:
Top investors in Analytics for 2013 include:
- Founders Fund (Palantir)
- Lightspeed Venture Partners (Evolv, EdgeSpring, MapR, DataStax, Numerify, Jut)
- Redpoint Ventures (Moogsoft, MapR, Tidemark, Looker, Heap, Datameer)
- Scale Venture Partners (Demandbase, DataStax, DataSift)
- Khosla Ventures (Ayasdi, Evolv, Bidgely, Kyron, ParStream)
Clearly, investors are placing bets on a robust future for analytics.
Thomas Dinsmore's Blog 