The Internet of things (IoT) continues to be an investment darling for venture funds who keep on dumping record amounts of cash into the industry. In Q1 2016, IoT startups charted their second highest funding quarter in history across all subcategories save one – wearables.
According to analysis by CB Insights, investor interest in IoT continues to burn white hot for startups in Industrial IoT, healthcare IoT and general IoT. Examining data on IoT deal share, most active investors and funding trends, CB Insights saw steady growth in funding across all IoT subsets except for wearables which has cooled recently.
“The first quarter of 2016 is one of the strongest quarters for the IoT yet in funding terms at $846M in financing, second only to Q2 2015,” said Nicholas Pappageorge, Tech Industry Analyst with CB Insights. He noted that this quarter charted 31% growth in dollar value over the previous quarter.
Despite the rising dollar totals invested, CB Insights noted that deal volume continues its fall for the third quarter in a row, dropping to the lowest level since 2014.
“The large dollar tally and low deal volume indicates that deal sizes on average are increasing,” said Pappageorge.
Intel Capital remains investment leader
The most active IoT startup funder remained Intel Capital. Its most recent involvement was partaking in a Series C funding round for Stratoscale, an IoT-focused cloud computing company.
Tied for next active among IoT investors were Qualcomm Ventures and Andreessen Horowitz. Recent investments by Andreessen Horowitz include Halo Neuroscience, Airware and Skydio while Qualcomm Ventures joined in the Stratoscale funding round.
Also notably active in the first quarter investment frenzy was Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, which put money on four IoT startups: Motiv, Airware, Enlighted and Ring.
Some headline-grabbing financing in the quarter included Jawbone’s $165 million Series F round, Razer attracting $75 million in Series C funding and smart doorbell startup Ring generating a $61.2M Series C round.
